Queens, N.Y.- The Villanova men's lacrosse team defeated the St. John's Red Storm 22-9 on Saturday afternoon.  The Wildcats move to 6-3 on the season and 1-0 in the BIG EAST while the Red Storm fall to 2-8 and 0-1 in league play. 

Villanova had a strong opening quarter scoring eight goals, seven of those coming in a row.  The Red Storm scored the opening goal and then the rest was all Villanova.  Luke Keating dished it inside to Brett Baskin for the opening goal at 10:43. It would be J.P. Basile who would set up Mason Reale for the second just seconds later, both goals were successful extra man opportunities.  Basile a minute later sent a strong shot into the back of the cage to put the Wildcats up 3-1.  Senior Matt Campbell got in on the scoring followed by Baskin netting his second to put Villanova up 5-1.  Again, both goals were successful extra-man opportunities making the Wildcats 4-4 in the first quarter.  Gavin Burke got in on the action scoring at the 5:58 mark follow up by Baskin completing a hat trick to make it 7-1.  St. John's scored twice to end the run but Keating would score with just three seconds remaining on a dish from Tyer Boes to give Villanova an 8-3 lead.

The Wildcats offense kept going in the second quarter with Campbell and Will Wheeler scoring the first two goals to put Villanova up 10-3.  Tucker Goodelle set up Patrick Daly and then Daly dished it to Basile to put the Wildcats up six.  Basile and Campbell both scored one more before the half, completing hat tricks, to make it 14-5 at halftime. 

In the third quarter the Wildcats and Red Storm both scores only two goals.  Daly and Matt Licata netted the Wildcats pair while Connor Kalmus scored his third and fourth goal of the game to make it 16-7 with 15 minutes left to play. 

Villanova offense got hot again in the final quarter scoring six more goals, with four coming in a row to open the fourth.  Reale dished it to Daly to start, Goodelle ran down and netted an unassisted goal at 11:37, followed by Baskin and then Austin Fraser scoring to make it 20-7.  Jonathan Huber completed a hat trick at the 2:50 mark, giving St. John's one of their two goals in the fourth.  Lucas Kopecky won the faceoff, went down, and score his first career goal and Gavin Derham netted the final goal for the Wildcats with a behind the back shot.  St. John's scored with just seconds remaining to make the final 22-9.   

Will Vitton got the win in goal and finished with nine saves in 53 minutes of action while Brendan Haggerty finished the game and had a pair of saves.  From the faceoff x the Wildcats were 23-of-34 (.676) with Justin Coppola winning 15-of-21 of them. 

The Wildcats will return home to take on the Denver Pioneers on Saturday, April 9^th.  First faceoff is scheduled for 1:00 P.M. and can be seen on FS1.