Flames senior faceoff specialist Shane Supek was successful on 18 of his 22 draws against UConn. (Photo by Grace Greer)
Men’s lacrosse runs with Huskies, improves to 3-0 with 15-8 home win
2/21/2026 11:43:00 PM | Men's Lacrosse
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The Flames executed their 10-man ride and fast-break attack efficiently and leaned on Ian Carvajal’s nine-save performance in net to stop UConn.
Senior attack Luke Branham netted five goals to eclipse the 200-point mark for his career and boost Liberty University's men's lacrosse team to a 15-8 triumph over the University of Connecticut, Saturday afternoon at the Liberty Lacrosse Fields.
"Losing (graduate attackmen) Keaton (Mohs) and (Braden) Landry, he had some pretty big shoes to fill," Liberty Head Coach Kyle McQuillan said of Branham. "He's the lead dog on that attack group line, and he's really stepped up and shown that. … He's not a secondary player, but can lead this team and lead our attack, and he's done a really good job of that so far this season. He's been super consistent."
Junior goalie Ian Carvajal made nine saves in three quarters of action in net.
Junior goalie Ian Carvajal made nine saves through three quarters to help the Flames (3-0) extend their winning streak to 22 games since last year's season-opening loss to Virginia Tech. UConn, which opened its season with a 13-7 loss to the Hokies on Friday in Blacksburg, Va., ended Liberty's program-record 26-game home winning streak in 2017, but was not up to the task of upsetting the reigning MCLA Division I national champion.
"Today was really a good result," McQuillan said. "Ian had a great game. From a statistical standpoint, he made nine saves and allowed six goals. He played really well."
Senior faceoff specialist Shane Supek won 18 of 22 faceoffs, giving Liberty an advantage in time of possession. However, offensively and defensively, the Flames still have a long way to go before they are firing on all cylinders.
"Our 10-man (ride) was very effective, and we took a lot of steps in a positive direction in terms of being able to score on transition and gaining some confidence there," McQuillan said. "Unfortunately, offensively, it was a really unsettled, kind of jumbled performance, and lacked some consistency. We just really couldn't find much rhythm, didn't run our offensive sets very well. … And a lot of our goals in the settled six-on-six came from unassisted individual performance, so we've got to really improve on that moving forward."
Branham said the Huskies gave the Flames a much better test than they received in their first two games against North Carolina State and the University of North Carolina.
"UConn was definitely the best team we've played so far," Branham said. "Fortunately, today our transition looked great. Our set offense definitely needed some work. We just made some sloppy errors, whether it was throwing the ball away or setting moving picks, a lot of things didn't go our way."
Liberty stretched its lead to 5-0 late in the first quarter when freshman long-stick midfielder Derrick Fay picked up a ground ball near midfield and started a fast break. The Flames executed tic-tac-toe passing to junior attack Easton Cahill (3 goals), who set up freshman midfielder Branson Isaacs for a point-blank finish in front of UConn goalie Noah Logue.
Carvajal, protected by a stingy defense, kept the Huskies off the scoreboard with a few spectacular saves in the first quarter before sophomore middie Will Morris made a strong run down the right side of the box to extend the Flames' advantage to 6-0 early in the second.
Branham capped a quick counterattack with a leaping shot over a defender that bounced past Logue to pad Liberty's lead to 8-1 with 5:11 to play in the first half.
The Huskies cut the deficit to 8-2 on a sharp-angled shot from the left side by middie Patrick Dunn off an assist from Ian Roberts at the 1:48 mark.
Graduate middie Ezra Anderson (3 goals) scored off an assist from freshman middie Jeffery Pitcher before Morris extended Liberty's advantage to 11-2 with 10:12 to go in the third.
Dunn's running finish down the left side of the box into the top-right corner of the cage pulled the Huskies within 11-3 before Cahill finished a feed from sophomore middie Josiah Hoopman with a high driving shot from point-blank range.
UConn's Brady Gould ripped a shot from the left side of the box into the top-right corner of the net with 4:49 left in the third. But Branham answered with a behind-the-back finish down the right side of the box off an assist from Hoopman to stretch the edge to 14-5 at the 2:46 mark.
Later in the fourth, Branham scored his fifth and final goal of the game with a turnaround shot in the right side of the box, padding the lead to 15-7 at the 3:34 mark before the Huskies answered with the final score.
"It was a man-up play, and I was about 10 yards off the crease," Branham said. "Josiah Hoopman was above me, threw the ball down, I just turned my back right away, kept it low, and shot it bottom-right. That's how I scored most of my goals today."
Next Saturday at 5 p.m., the Flames will host the University of South Carolina, which is off to a 5-0 start after winning MCLA DI national titles in 2019 and 2022.
"Last year, they were probably undervalued and under-ranked, and didn't make the national tournament," McQuillan said. "This season, they've got a lot of guys coming back, and they've got some transfers, so we've got to make sure we get things buttoned up before then. That's going to be our toughest test of the season so far by a lot. We've got to be really well prepared because the level of competition takes a pretty significant jump next weekend."
