No. 9 UVA Visits Manhattan in Tuesday for a Non-Conference Tilt

March 5, 2018

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. – The Virginia men’s lacrosse team returns to action on Tuesday night as the Cavaliers (4-1) travel to Riverdale, N.Y., to play the Manhattan Jaspers (3-2). This is a change from the regular schedule because of impending weather coming to the New York area. Faceoff is at Gaelic Park is set for 8 p.m. UVA is ranked No. 9 this week in the USILA coaches poll and No. 8 in the Inside Lacrosse/Maverick media poll.

Live stats will be available at VirginiaSports.com. There will be a web video stream of the game courtesy of the Jaspers Sports Network, which can also be accessed at VirginiaSports.com.

Virginia and Manhattan are meeting for the second time in men’s lacrosse and for the first time in Riverdale, N.Y. UVA leads the all-time series with the Jaspers after an 18-2 win against Manhattan at the University Hall Turf Field in 2005. All-time against MAAC teams Virginia is 16-0. The Cavaliers went 7-0 against Mount St. Mary’s when the Mountaineers were members of the MAAC. UVA also was 7-0 against in-state foe VMI when the Keydets (2006-12) were associate members in the MAAC for lacrosse. UVA is 2-0 against current members of the MAAC, which also includes a win over Siena last season.

Virginia is led by Michael Kraus‘ 21 points. Kraus and Mikey Herring share the team lead with nine assists. Ian Laviano has a team-high 16 goals and is second on the team with 19 points. Dox Aitken with 11 goals (17 points) and Mike D’Amario with 10 goals (12 points) round out the top Cavalier scorers. Justin Schwenk is winning 62 percent of his faceoffs and has a team-best 33 ground balls. Alex Rode started the last two games in the cage and is saving 52.2 percent of shots, while posting an 11.82 goals against average.

Manhattan head coach Drew Kelleher is in his third season in charge of the Jaspers, and returns 31 letterwinners and 10 starters off last year’s 3-11 team. Parker Giarratana leads the Jaspers with 10 goals and eight assists. Sean MacKinney has nine goals, while Luke Hanson rounds out the top scorers with 11 points on five goals and six assists. Michael Zingaro is saving 56.8 percent of shots between the pipes, while posting a 9.85 goals against average. After opening the season with back-to-back losses at Bryant and at Wagner, the Jaspers have won three in a row. During the spurt the Jaspers have beat VMI, Lafayette and Bellarmine.

UVA returns to action on Saturday at Stony Brook. Faceoff on Long Island is set for 1 p.m.