WINTER PARK, Florida - The Embry-Riddle men's lacrosse team dropped its Sunshine State Conference opener on Saturday evening at Barker Family Stadium, falling 13-7 to the No. 12 Rollins Tars. The Eagles (3-8, 0-1 SSC) played very evenly with the Tars (8-0, 1-0 SSC) until a late second-half push by the hosts.

The Blue and Gold shrugged off an early goal by the Tars, taking a 2-1 lead in the first quarter after back-to-back scores from Coleman Jacobs and Lars Hoeg, but the home team evened things up before pushing in front with a little over two minutes left in the period. The Tars then got a crucial last-second goal to take a 4-2 lead into the second quarter.

The momentum stayed with Rollins as it pushed its lead out to 6-2 with two quick goals in the opening 60 seconds of the second period, but the Eagles responded, scoring two of their own goals within 60 seconds, the first by Connor Bullock, and then the second by Joe Anderson, cutting the deficit to 6-4.

The two teams again traded two-goal swings, the Tars going in front 8-4 before Jacobs and Pete Abbes scored in succession to make it an 8-6 game. RC scored the final goal of the half with six minutes to go and took a 9-6 advantage into halftime.

The second half was much more defensive, with just five total goals scored, but four of those came from the hosts, and one from ERAU's Christian Hofer, as the Tars took the 13-7 decision.

Lucas Fraser made nine saves for the Blue and Gold, while Mark Urso went 12-for-20 on face offs and collected 10 ground balls.

Embry-Riddle wraps up its five-game road swing next Saturday, April 2 when they travel to Lakeland to take on Florida Southern at 1 p.m.