BIDDEFORD — After controlling play for most of the second quarter to overcome a slow start and trail just 4-3 heading into halftime Monday, the University of New England men’s lacrosse team looked well positioned for a second-half comeback against Morrisville State on Monday afternoon.

But just when they needed, the Nor’easters offense went as cold as the 21-degree game time temperature.

Holding on to the slender one-goal lead at the break, the Mustangs came out and dominated from the second-half opening whistle, getting three quick goals for a little breathing space and marching to a 10-3 victory in a non-conference Division III game at the Big Blue Turf.

“It seemed to get away from us quickly,” UNE coach Charlie Burch said. “We thought we’d played a strong second quarter, and then it got away from us in the second half.”

Six different players scored for Morrisville (2-0), which led 3-1 after one quarter. It was the second slow start of the season for UNE (0-2), which trailed 7-2 after one half of its season-opener against Wheaton, an eventual 8-5 defeat.

The Nor’easters beat both Wheaton and Morrisville last season.

“It’s concerning. Morrisville has improved quite a bit, and Wheaton played a good, strong, tactical game, but we’ve started flat both games,” Burch said. “We’ve got to try to figure out a way to come out better in the first quarter.”

After Morrisville extended its lead to 4-1 on a Louie Geswaldo goal early in the second quarter, UNE closed the gap to one on goals from Pat Wolfe and J.T. Olivier, the latter coming on the man-up with 17 seconds left in the half.

But goals from Geswaldo, Jeremy Beresovoy and Brendan Shannon in a span of 2:04 put the Mustangs back in control early in the third.

“We got back in it, we rallied back well, but we came out flat again,” UNE senior midfielder Mike Allan said. “That’s a problem we’ve faced in both of our games, and it’s something we’re going to have to work on, not letting the foot off the pedal once we have the gas down.”

Morrisville’s run was augmented by the domination of the faceoff circle by John Petriello, who won 12 of the game’s 17 draws. UNE tried three different faceoff men on Petriello, but couldn’t find an answer.

“He was a good faceoff guy, and we couldn’t figure him out,” Burch said. “Usually that’s one of our strengths, but today it certainly wasn’t.”

Shannon led the Mustangs with three goals, including the only two of the fourth quarter to salt the game away, while Geswaldo and Beresovoy both had two. UNE goalie John Dusel made 11 saves on 21 shots on goal.

On the other side, Morrisville goalie Chris Fiore made 11 saves to post an impressive 78.6 save percentage. Fiore’s job was made a lot easier by the Nor’easters, who had 32 shots in total but only 14 on the cage.

“He’s a bigger guy and played unbelievably,” Allan said of Fiore. “But our shot placements weren’t the best, who didn’t really get the goalie moving. I think our team is normally a lot better with our shot selection, but we didn’t execute today and that was the biggest problem.”

“The shots that we got past him were the one’s where we got him to move,” added Burch. “He was very good, he held his post really well, and he’s a big kid who takes up a lot of the cage. And we didn’t challenge him nearly as much as we should have.”

UNE will now have a quick turnaround before hosting the University of Southern Maine ”“ yet another team the Nor’easters got the better of last season ”“ at 3:30 p.m. Wednesday.

Due to suspensions for disciplinary reasons, Burch hasn’t had his full compliment of players available in the first two games, but said he expects to have everyone available for the local rivalry game against USM.

“We’ve got to move some lines around again for Wednesday. We’ve got some freshman who are playing OK, but they’re making a lot of freshman mistakes as well,” Burch said.

“It is very important for our mental state of being to go out and play really well … It’s a non-conference game, but it’s a rivalry.”

— Staff Writer Cameron Dunbar can be contacted at 282-1535, ext. 323 or cdunbar@journaltribune.com.