USU hammered by NMU
It was six flags over the Stan Laub Center Saturday afternoon when Utah State’s Kent “Doughnut” Arnold was ejected to cap a six-goal run in the second period by the Montana State Bobcats as the men’s lacrosse club lost 13-7.
“I thought I hit him on good timing and I guess the ref saw differently,” Arnold said of the play immediately preceding himself getting ejected, when he was flagged for a late hit on a Bobcat immediately after another Bobcat scored. Arnold then had two seperate altercations with Bobcat players as he circled around and headed for the sideline. Arnold said it was hard not to react when, “one of their guys gets up in my face and starts talking trash.”
Coach Matt Polytyka said, “That was a top player going down. Getting kicked out of the game will change the game every time.”
The Aggies got out to a 3-0 lead on the Bobcats early, but then a crack opened in their defense. Even as Polytyka bellowed at his troops to close the gap from the sideline, a yellow jersey flashed into the opening and fired a goal that looked like no keeper could have stopped.
“Turnovers killed us and we never got set in our offense,” Polytyka said of the second period. “We were playing their game the whole time.”
After the Bobcats poured in the sixth unanswered goal of the second period, the frustration boiled over for Arnold.
“I guess the ref saw that I punched him when I really just kind of pushed his face away, so that’s pretty much all I have to say about that,” he said. Arnold also said he regretted the incident.
“It was stupid; I was way too fired up. I let my teammates down.”
USU didn’t just roll over and die after that, Polytyka said. “We had plenty of opportunites in the fourth quarter down three, but our legs ran out.”
MSU went on another scoring spree to make the score 13-7.
-graham@cc.usu.edu