ITHACA, N.Y. – With time winding down in a 16-16 contest, Cornell junior midfielder Connor Fletcher took the ball near midfield, faked his defender by cutting from his right to his left and then ripped shot that went through the legs of UAlbany's goalie Nate Siekierski to give the Big Red a 17-16 lead with 14 seconds to play. The Great Danes, as they had done for the majority of the game, won the ensuing face off, but Brandon Salvatore forced the visitor's 20th turnover of the game, and Kason Tarbell picked up the ground ball to secure the victory for the No. 3 Cornell men's lacrosse team.
 
Fletcher's late heroics capped a wild fourth quarter that saw UAlbany score five unanswered goals over the final 9:38 of the contest to erase the Big Red's 16-11 lead. The late run by the Great Danes had been preceded by one from the home team, as Cornell scored four unanswered in a span of 1:58 to close the third and open the fourth quarter to seemingly take control of the game.
 
Prior to the team's respective runs, the game had been closely contested with the squads staying within two goals of each other through the first half. Cornell pushed its advantage to three goals (10-7) early in the third quarter but led by just one, 12-11, before Jonathan Donville scored off a pass from Fletcher to open the Big Red rally at the 1:25 mark of the third quarter. Freshman Tim Graham won the ensuing face off, streaked to the cage and scored his first career goal just eight seconds later to make it a 14-11 game. John Piatelli then closed the third quarter with his fourth and final goal of the game, off a pass from Jeff Teat, and Donville and Fletcher teamed up again in the opening moments of the fourth to put Cornell up, 16-11 with 14:27 to play.
 
Donville finished with a career-high seven points on four goals and three assists, while Teat finished with four assists and one goal to move into fourth place all-time in Cornell history for career points (190). Fletcher scored two goals and had two assists, while Clarke Petterson tallied one goal and two assist. Jake McCulloch also had his best game of the season with two goals and one helper.
 
Defensively, Cornell caused six of UAlbany's 20 turnovers, with Salvatore finishing with three and Dom Doria causing two. Salvatore also picked up a team-high five ground balls, once again playing an instrumental role on the Big Red's face-off unit.
 
UAlbany (1-2) was kept in the game thanks to face-off man Austin Jones, who won 25-of-37 and picked up 14 ground balls, to give the Great Danes ample offensive opportunities. Cornell utilized Graham (8-25), Luca Tria (3-10) and Salvatore (1-2), with its most successful stretch coming when it won the battle in the third quarter (7-of-12), allowing Cornell to go on the game-changing run.
 
Both goalies struggled on the blustery, snow-blown day with Siekierski stopping 10 and Cornell's Caelahn Bullen making seven saves to improve to 8-0 in his career.
 
The Great Danes held the edge in shots (44-37) and ground balls (42-29) and were 3-of-6 on man-up chances.  
 
The Big Red has its biggest challenge of the season on tap next weekend as it heads to North Carolina to participate in the Crown Lacrosse Classic at the Sportsplex at Matthews. Cornell will play No. 5 Penn State at 8 p.m. on Friday, March 8, before closing the tournament vs. No. 7 Towson at 1 p.m. on Sunday, March 10.