Piedmont Men’s Lacrosse Falls Short to Berry College

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Brittany Gowen, Contributing Writer

The Jenks brothers were back in action for the first time in 350 days Wednesday afternoon. The men’s lacrosse had their season opener at home against Berry College at 4 PM on February 24th, 2021. The team was off to a strong start in the first half with freshman Brady McGuire scoring a total of three points for the Lions.

 

McGuire had two goals and one assist to Avery Jenks. Avery Jenks came out of the game with his first hat trick of the season and also assisted his older brother for his first goal of the season. Brady Jenks decided to come back and play one last year with his brother to get redemption after his senior season was taken from him due to the pandemic. With the last full season being played in 2019, Brady Jenks ranked first in Piedmont record books for having 46 goals and 11 assists.

 

The season is looking to be in the Lions favor with Brady being back on the field one last time. On the defensive side of things, Zach Czualda also came back for redemption since his senior season was also cut short. Czaulda is the goalkeeper for the Lions and he is highly ranked in team statistics and also through the USA South conference. Czaulda ranked first in 2019 for goalies in the USA South conference. He also ranks first in the Piedmont mens lacrosse record books with 357 saves before their game against Berry.

 

Against Berry College, Czualda had thirteen saves and allowed twelve goals in. In the last minute of the game, while the lions were man up, Czualda fouled out and freshman goalie Johnny Matrona got his home opener debut. Matrona played for the last fifty seconds of the game with no saves and no goals allowed in. The men’s lacrosse teams hits the road this weekend to Danville, Kentucky to play Centre College on Saturday, February 27th at 1 PM. The last time these two teams played each other was March 20th, 2019.

 

The lions fell short to Centre with a 4-11 loss. The past five matchups against Centre, the lions have lost. Therefore, they are eager to hit the road and challenge Centre for their first win of the season with a brand-new team.