Villanova scored five straight goals late in the second period and then held on for a 10-9 victory over Towson to capture the Colonial Athletic Association tournament title at Johnny Unitas Stadium on Saturday night.
The win gave the Wildcats (11-5) an automatic bid to the 16-team NCAA Division I playoffs. Seedings for the tournament will be determined Sunday night. Towson finishes its season at 7-10.
The Tigers, who trailed by five goals at halftime, pulled within three several times in the second half and cut the lead to 10-9 on two straight goals, the last by sophomore attackman Tim Stratton with 43.3 seconds left. But junior midfielder Brock Armour's shot with 4.5 seconds left sailed over the top goal post by about 6 inches, and he was later called for stepping into the crease, which ended Towson's comeback attempt.
"They won the first half and we won the second half, but they won the game," Towson coach Tony Seaman said. "We didn't do well on faceoffs tonight. We could have folded being down 8-3 at the half, but we fought back and made it a game. It was exciting there for that last minute and half.
"We were a young team, and we improved by leaps and bounds through the year. This was the same team that beat us 13-4 three or four weeks ago."
Villanova was too quick and fast for Towson in the first half, and the Tigers had trouble finding the Wildcats' cutters down the middle as Villanova built an 8-3 halftime lead. The Wildcats scored five goals in the second half of the second period - including two man-down goals - to take control of the game.
Villanova led 2-1 at the end of the first period as attackman C.J. Small scored on a bounce shot with 6:56 left and fellow attackman Mark Scioscia scored about four minutes later. Towson's lone goal of the period came from midfielder Justin Schneider with 1:39 left.
Towson tied the score at 3 on an extra-man goal from midfielder Randall Cooper with 8:52 remaining in the second period. But the Wildcats converted on man-down goals from Scioscia and midfielder T.J. O'Donnell for a 5-3 lead with 7:29 remaining.
V 2 6 1 1 - 10 T 1 2 2 4 - 9
Goals: V-Small 3, O'Donnell 2, Scioscia 2, Brennan, Cunningham, Driscoll; T-Schneider 3, Stratton 3, Armour, Cooper, McCutcheon. Assists: V-Cunningham 3, Fritts, Macdonald; T-Armour, Domanic, Schneider. Saves: V-Diloreto 10; T-Wheeler 15.
