Syracuse’s first-round matchup in the NCAA tournament will be a rematch with Bryant.

In one of the two national tournament play-in games, Bryant (15-4, 5-1 Northeast) staved off Siena (11-6, 6-0 Metro Atlantic Athletic) to prevail 9-8 late Wednesday afternoon at Bryant’s Bulldog Stadium in Smithfield, R.I. For the second season in a row, the Bulldogs will be Syracuse’s first-round opponent in the NCAA tournament. They’ll visit the Carrier Dome on Sunday at 7:30 to battle the second-seeded Orange.

Last May, Bryant’s Kevin Massa tormented the Orange with a 22-for-23 performance at the X, but Syracuse managed to triumph by five goals and advance.

“They remember last year’s game with Bryant in the playoffs,” SU head coach John Desko said of his team on Monday, “and they gave us everything we could handle, especially their faceoff guy.”

This season, Massa tops the nation with his 71.4 faceoff percentage and 11 groundballs per game.

But through three quarters of Wednesday’s game, that prowess was not on full display.

The Bulldogs, inefficient when they did have the ball in the first half, committed 10 turnovers and trailed 4-3 at the half.

Siena’s Casey Dowd — who fared just 10-of-23 against SU on Feb. 10 — had Massa beat at the X, 9-4, heading into the fourth quarter. Although Dowd captured all four of the faceoffs against Massa in the third, Bryant rallied to take a one-goal lead into the final frame.

But in that fourth quarter, Massa finally figured out Dowd, and at the perfect time. He won six of the seven draws — he finished 10-of-20 overall — and grabbed six of his eight groundballs in the fourth quarter. With that, Bryant was able to bury enough shots in the back of the net to hold off Siena’s comeback attempt.

The Saints fired three potentially game-tying shots in the final 30 seconds, but none were on net.

Bryant rushed the field, ecstatic to be the team to step up and advance to face Syracuse on Sunday.

“Everyone needs to be on their toes,” SU attack Kevin Rice said on Monday. “No one’s going to have an easy road. We’re just fortunate that we were able to get one of the top two seeds and we know we’re going to play four tough games.”

Published on May 7, 2014 at 7:16 pm

Contact Phil: pmdabbra@syr.edu | @PhilDAbb