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TROY, N.Y. – Four student-athletes notched hat tricks and three others had multi-point games to help fuel Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute's (RPI) 16-7 win over No. 13 Ithaca College in a Liberty League men's lacrosse game on Saturday. With the win, the Engineers improve to 5-1 (2-0 Liberty League), while the Bombers stumble to 6-1 (1-1 Liberty League).

Junior midfielder JT Kelly led the way offensively for RPI, scoring three goals on six shots, and adding three assists. Senior co-captain Matthew Gilman scored four times on seven shots, and also had one assist. Junior Cliff Kigar scored three goals on eight shots and added an assist, while freshman Jason Bram scored three goals on a game-high 10 shots. Senior co-captain Zach Lukas, junior Lucas Bastarache and junior Will Killeen each had one goal and one assist for the Engineers.

Senior co-captain Oliver Kaija grabbed seven ground balls, in large part from winning 11-of-22 in the faceoff circle. Junior defenseman Keaton Ackermann caused six turnovers.

Ithaca had eight different point-producers, led by Stephen Morell, who notched a goal and an assist. Winston Wenham and Sean Seaberg each had six ground balls, and Seaberg was 10-for-15 in faceoffs. Morrell and Josh Della Puca also led the Bombers with five shots on goal.

While the faceoff battle was nearly even at 14-13 Ithaca, Rensselaer held the advantage in most of the other team statistics, leading in shots (43-26), ground balls 42-34) and extra-man opportunities, going 1-for-3. Ithaca was not given an EMO.

The first quarter brought plenty of action, with a total of nine goals scored between the teams. Ithaca opened the scoring at 3:48, but the Engineers responded just 20 seconds later.

After another RPI goal less than a minute later, courtesy of Kigar, momentum swung in favor of the Bombers, who scored the game's next four. Rensselaer cut the deficit to 5-4, thanks to two goals scored by Kelly in the final 1:09 of the first.

From there, Rensselaer scored the next eight goals. The second quarter was much more defensive than the first, as there were only three goals, two from Gilman. The Engineers added four in the third, including Kelly's hat trick goal at 11:13. Ithaca notched two goals in the final frame, but RPI topped that by netting five, including the hat trick goals from Gilman, Kigar and Bram, and three assists for Kelly.

Senior Parker Smith (5-1) made nine saves for the win. After scoring five in the first quarter, the Bombers struggled to solve Smith, who made six saves and allowed just two goals from that point. Ithaca goalkeeper Robby Atwood (6-1) also made nine saves, including four in the first quarter.

After losing their opening game, the Engineers have gone on a five-game winning streak, and look to build on that on Wednesday when they travel to Plattsburgh State to take on the Cardinals (4pm). Ithaca looks to get back to their winning ways on Wednesday at league foe St. Lawrence (4pm).