UNIVERSITY PARK, PA – The Johns Hopkins men's lacrosse team used an 8-1 run to turn a 4-4 tie into a 12-5 lead and the Blue Jays never looked back in knocking off host Penn State, 15-7, in the Big Ten Quarterfinals Saturday evening at Panzer Stadium.  The win moves the Blue Jays into the semifinals, where they will take on second-seeded Rutgers on Thursday, May 6 (7:30 pm).
 
Johns Hopkins improves to 6-3 all-time in the Big Ten Tournament and 4-0 against the number three seed.  JHU's six all-time wins in the tournament are the most by any team in the league.
 
The Blue Jays (3-8) had trailed 3-1 early and found themselves tied 4-4 after Jack Kelly's extra-man goal for the Nittany Lions knotted things up with 10:43 to play in the second quarter.  By the time Penn State scored again it was 9-4 Blue Jays and the Johns Hopkins lead never dipped below four in the final 30 minutes of the game.
 
The 4-4 tie held for more than three minutes before a Connor DeSimone goal in transition ignited a four-goal half-ending spree that gave the Blue Jays an 8-4 lead at halftime.  The first career goal from freshman Casey McDermott, the second of Garrett Degnon's three goals in the game and a Joey Esptein goal just six seconds before the break closed out the four-goal spree.
 
Jacob Angelus and Penn State's Grant Haus traded goals in the first 6:15 of the third quarter before the Blue Jays got three goals in a span of less than three minutes to grab the 12-5 lead and put the game away.
 
DeSimone dodged from behind the goal at the 6:48 mark, Degnon blew one home off a feed from Angelus and freshman Brendan Grimes added his seventh of the year to make it a seven-goal game with just over two minutes remaining in the third quarter.
 
Mac O'Keefe and TJ Malone sliced the deficit to 12-7 with back-to-back goals that bridged the third and fourth quarters, but DeSimone scored his third of the game 69 seconds after Malone's tally and Cole Williams added the final two of the night for the Blue Jays to secure the spot in the semifinals.  The first of those two goals for Williams was the 100^th of his career.
 
Penn State (4-7) had scored three times in the first eight minutes of the game to grab the early 3-1 lead, only to see the Blue Jays grab a 4-3 lead at the end of the first period as freshman Johnathan Peshko ignited a three-goal run that took just 2:04 late in the period.  After Peshko made it 3-2, Degnon and Williams scored back-to-back goals just 38 seconds apart to quickly turn the 3-2 deficit into the 4-3 lead.
 
The one-goal lead held for just over four minutes in the second quarter before Kelly scored Penn State's third extra-man goal of the game, but DeSimone answered 3:30 later to ignite what eventually became the deciding 8-1 run.
 
DeSimone (3g, 3a), Williams (4g) and Degnon (3g) led a Blue Jay scoring attack that saw eight different players score at least one goal and 10 different players register a point.
 
Sophomore Tim Marcille made his second straight start in goal for Johns Hopkins and picked up his first career victory as he played all but seven seconds and registered 12 saves while allowing just six goals.   He led a defensive effort that saw the Blue Jays cause 10 or Penn State's 17 turnovers; the Nittany Lions scored just one goal in a span of 29:51 midway through the game.
 
O'Keefe (2g, 1a), Malone (1g, 2a) and Kelly (2g) led the way for Penn State, which also got a 16-of-23 performance at the X from Gerard Arceri.
                                                                                                                                                                                                            
The Johns Hopkins-Rutgers game will be the second semifinal as top-seeded Maryland will play fifth-seeded Michigan at 5 pm on May 6 with the Hopkins-Rutgers game to follow.  Both games will air live on BTN.
 
Notes:  Williams set a school record by playing in his 65^th career game today … he had shared the record with Paul Rabil (2005-08), Michael Kimmel (2007-10), John Crawley (20014-17), Joe Carlini (2014-17), Pat Fraser (2015-18) and Shack Stanwick (2015-18).  Williams also started his 50^th career game today, while DeSimone and Jared Reinson played in their 50^th.  Williams is the 20^th player in school history to score 100 goals and he is also now the just the 15^th player in school history with more than 100 goals and 50 assists.