COSTA MESA, Calif. – The [8/8] University of Denver men's lacrosse team used a 3-0 third quarter to pull within two goals after digging itself a first half hole, but [10/10] Notre Dame held the Pioneers to one goal in the fourth to defeat Denver 10-7 on Saturday night in the Pacific Coast Shootout at Orange Coast College.
 
Senior Colton Jackson (Highlands Ranch, Colo.), junior Ethan Walker (Peterborough, Ontario) and freshman Ellis Geis (Tustin, Calif.) co-led the Pioneers with three points apiece. Jackson and Walker found the back of the net twice, while providing a helper. Geis finished with two assists and a tally late in the second quarter.
 
Freshman Brett Boos (Parker, Colo.) won all five faceoffs in the second half to finish 9-of-17 on the night, picking up five ground balls off of his nine wins.
 
Redshirt-senior LSM Matt Neufeldt (Naperville, Ill.) led the Denver defensive statistics, causing three turnovers and picking up a team-high six ground balls. Senior Dylan Gaines (Baltimore, Md.) added three caused turnovers and junior Colin Squires (West Linn, Ore.) forced two.
 
The two teams combined for 17 penalties and 13:30 of penalty time in the contest. Denver finished 3-of-6 on the man-up, a season-high in man-up goals, while the Pioneers defense held Notre Dame to just 2-of-9 in their man-up opportunites.
 
Notre Dame was called for a push with possession on the opening faceoff of the contest, and Jackson buried a man-up strike off a feed from Walker to give Denver the lead 40 seconds in. The Irish answered with four-straight over the next 7+ minutes to take a 4-1 lead before Jackson answered with an unassisted goal to make it 4-2 at the end of the first quarter.
 
The Irish carried an 8-2 lead into the final two minutes of the half before Geis cashed in on the Pioneers second man-up goal of the night to make it 8-3 at the intermission.
 
Denver scored the only three goals of the third quarter to cut the Irish lead to two at 8-6 with 15 minutes to go. Walker buried goals with 7:02 and 45 seconds to go in the third to make it 8-5, and then freshman Alex Simmons (Smithville, Ontario) netted his seventh of the season off a feed from Geis in a last-second scramble to end the quarter.
 
Notre Dame pushed the lead back to three with 12:20 to go on the man-up, before senior Austin French's (Danville, Calif.) second goal in two games made it 9-7 with 9:18 to play. The Irish closed out the scoring with 4:58 to go.
 
Senior close D Dylan Johnson (Englewood, Colo.) missed the game due to an injury suffered in practice this week.
 
UP NEXT: The Denver men's lacrosse team, Presented by Your Hometown Toyota Stores, will play the middle game in this all-nationally ranked five-game road swing next Saturday when the Pioneers travel to Columbus to take on Ohio State at 1 p.m. ET/11 a.m. MT on BTN Plus and ESPN Denver 1600.   
 
TICKET INFORMATION: Single game tickets for the remaining home games are on sale, and can be purchased here.

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