Drew Adams stood on the field, alone, waiting for the rest of his team to come back to join him for the second half.

The freshman goalkeeper stood there and looked around as the Penn State men's lacrosse team came back onto Jeffrey Field after halftime against No. 7 Massachusetts on Saturday.

With the score tied at 3, Adams and the rest of the Nittany Lions (4-3, 2-1 ECAC) knew that he would need a big second half for his team to pull off the upset.

Luckily for the Lions, Adams did not disappoint, as Penn State went on to defeat UMass 7-5 for the team's biggest win this year.

Even as a freshman, Adams was fully aware of how big this win was for his team.

"Oh, it was huge," Adams said. "Being in ECAC competition, we knew we had to win this one. We came into it as a playoff game."

After the first quarter ended with the Minutemen up 1-0, the game was back and forth throughout with the two teams going into the second half tied.

One of the focuses of the game was shutting down UMass attacker Sean Morris, one of the top lacrosse players in the ECAC.

Penn State men's lacrosse coach Glenn Thiel devised a game plan in order to neutralize Morris by not allowing him to run down the side to score.

Morris only managed to score one goal, but captain Nate Whitaker wasn't too impressed with the impact of last week's ECAC Offensive Player of the Week.

"Sean Morris is a great player," Whitaker said. "But one player cannot be a whole team."

Whitaker himself was an offensive force in the game, scoring four goals.

With the score tied at 5 in the fourth quarter, Whitaker took a dynamic underhand shot that gave the Lions a 6-5 lead.

"I came down the back side where I get open most of the time," Whitaker said. "Luckily this time I stuck my shot for once."

But the talk of the game was not the offensive output of the team, but the play of the freshman goalie who impressed everyone, even his team.

"In the past couple years we really didn't have a keeper who can make those incredible saves," Whitaker said. "The saves he made weren't just the regular ones, they were just ridiculous."

A key save in the second quarter saw a UMass attacker taking a wide-open shot and Adams diving backwards to make the save.

Adams was not as impressed by his save as the rest of the team was.

"I kind of just fell backwards," Adams said. "The ball hit me and I made the save."

By keeping his team in the game by sprawling and diving all over the crease to make saves, Adams gave the Lions an opportunity to get down to the other side of the field and score.

The win for the Lions is something Thiel hoped his team expected to do, and he stressed the importance of the win for the overall season.

"This is when you better start winning," Thiel said. "Hopefully we keep it going, every game is tough."

When the final horn sounded, Adams was no longer alone on the field. The entire team swarmed Adams, and the Lions celebrated the landmark win.

With the veteran Whitaker putting the points on the board, he acknowledged the rookie who kept the points off them.

"Five goals, man," Whitaker said as he pointed toward the field. "That's Drew's game."