Nov. 11, 2006

PRINCETON, NJ - Junior Sean McCreery (Pleasant Hill, CA/ De La Salle) and sophomore Peter Davis (Greenwich, CT/Greenwich) combined for seven goals as Johns Hopkins defeated Harvard University 11-7 to advance to the fifth place game at the 2006 Collegiate Water Polo Association Eastern Championship hosted by Princeton University. Hopkins will play the winner of the MIT-Brown game on Sunday at 10:30.

Trailing 1-0 after a goal by the Crimson's Spencer Livingston with 5:31 left in the first period, the Jays turned up the pressure and tallied five straight goals over the next nine minutes to take a 5-1 lead into halftime.

Hopkins started the run with 3:24 left in the first period as McCreery collected a rebound off a missed shot and deposited over the shoulder of Harvard goalie Jay Connolly to knot the game at 1-1. Freshman Peter Sauerhoff (St. Louis, MO/John Burroughs) put the Blue Jays in front to stay with 17 ticks left on the period clock as his blast from outside sliced an inch inside the near post.

The run continued in the second period as McCreery scored off a double ejection for a 3-1 lead at 5:27. Forty-four seconds later, Davis placed a shot over the left shoulder of Connolly which sailed into the upper right 90 of the cage for a 4-1 lead before finishing a penalty shot at 3:11 for a 5-1 lead at intermission.

Harvard pulled back to within a pair of goals in the opening minutes of the third period as Michael Garcia and John Voith found the back of the cage at 7:42 and 4:58, respectively. However, Hopkins countered with a 4-0 run to build the lead out to 9-3 with 7:13 left in the fourth period.

Leading 10-4 after the teams traded goals, JHU saw its lead trimmed back to four goals at 10-6 as Garcia scored at 6:23 and buried a penalty shot at 2:45. Needing a stop to squelch the Harvard comeback attempt, the Blue Jays sealed the win by scoring off a fast break opportunity with 1:16 to play as junior Joey Jankiewicz (Coronado, CA/ Coronado) steered a shot into the goal for an 11-6 lead. Egen Atkinson finished off the scoring for the Crimson finishing a feed with a minute to play for the 11-7 final.

In goal, Connolly made nine saves for Harvard in the loss, while junior Mitch Williams (San Diego, CA/Patrick Henry) stopped five shots to take the win.

Johns Hopkins Goals: Sean McCreery (4); Peter Davis (3); Peter Sauerhof (2); Chris Hemmerle; Joey Jankiewicz
Harvard Goals: Michael Garcia (3); Spencer Livingston; John Voith; Alessandro Lazzarini; Egen Atkinson

Johns Hopkins Goalie Saves: Mitch Williams (5)
Harvard Goalie Saves: Jay Connolly (9)