Machine gives up late lead, falls in overtime

Ty Thompson scored with 3:56 left in sudden-death overtime, giving the Rochester Rattlers a 12-11 win over the Ohio Machine in a Major League Lacrosse game at Fortress Field in Obetz on Saturday night.

Ohio (2-1) appeared to have the outcome in hand when Mark Cockerton scored a power-play goal with 1:03 left in regulation to give the Machine an 11-10 lead.

But following a timeout, Jordan Wolf scored with 11.5 seconds left to force overtime.

Cockerton scored four goals and Peter Baum added two for the Machine, which was MLL runner-up a year ago.

Rochester won the opening faceoff and took control of the tempo.

Just 40 seconds into the game, Wolf made a nifty spin move from behind the goal and put the Rattlers ahead 1-0.

Jake Bernhardt tied the game for Ohio with a goal, but Rochester answered with three straight goals for a 4-1 lead.

Struggling to execute near the crease in the early going, Ohio finally gained its footing toward the end of the first quarter as Cockerton and Baum hit the back of the net in the final two minutes to cut the deficit to 4-3.

The Machine pulled even on Baum's second goal early in the second, but it was short-lived as Wolf nailed his third goal at the 9:32 mark.

Ohio rookie Mike Birney scored his first MLL goal with 8:37 left in the half to make it 5-5.

The Machine grabbed its first lead, 6-5, on a goal by Kevin Cunningham, but the Rattlers' T.J. Neubeuer evened the score with goal whole falling down.

A Cockerton goal sent the Machine to halftime with a 7-6 lead.

Patrick Kelly scored early in the third quarter to push Ohio's lead to 8-6, but the Rattlers tied it at 9 by quarter's end.

Kip Urban fired in a shot five minutes into the fourth quarter as Rochester regained the lead 10-9.

After a Machine drought of 10:45, Cockerton forced a 10-10 tie with 6:30 remaining on a sensational shot from a bad angle just before the shot clock expired.

Cockerton hit go-ahead goal on the power play with 1:03 left, but — after a timeout — Wolf tied it to force overtime.

Both teams' defenses stiffened in the second half, resulting in longer possessions and fewer shots.

The home opener marked a ground-breaking of sorts for Fortress Field, which is still in developmental stages and is being billed as the first stadium in the world designed exclusively for lacrosse. Eventually, high school football playoff games, concerts and other community events will be held in the 6,000-seat facility.

There were only a few hundred fans on hand for the opening faceoff on a chilly, windy evening.