Norton, Mass. – Another year, another classic. For the second year in a row and the third time in the last five years, Clark University and Wheaton College played a heart-stopping New England Women's And Men's Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) men's lacrosse contest.

Unfortunately for the Cougars, Saturday was the first time the scoreboard didn't signal a victory for the Scarlet and White as the Lyons escaped with a down-to-the-wire 11-10 victory on a snowy Nordin Field in the conference opener for both teams.

Clark sees their brief two-game winning streak stopped and their record go to 5-3, while Wheaton improves to 6-2 and has now won three straight.

Things started off slowly for the Scarlet and White as they fell behind early on after Scott Whear (Duxbury, Mass.) scored the game's first two goals for the Lyons before Andrew Myhre (Middlebury, Vt.) sliced the lead in half at the 7:33 mark off a Nick Johnson (Amherst, Mass.) feed.

Goals by Griffin Phaneuf (Manchester, N.H.) and Will Morrison (Osterville, Mass.) had the Lyons in front 4-1 but Ryan Moore (West Hartford, Conn.) answered back before the period ended.

Johnson then went to work helping the Cougars first tie then take the lead in the second quarter. He set up Keegan Callahan (Tewksbury, Mass.) for his 50th career point and then found Jack Goracy (Lumberton, N.J.) for the equalizer 7:29 into the frame.

Wheaton got their only marker of the second when Ryan Gjerset (Austin, Texas) found the back of the net two minutes later, but Clark got goals from Peter Christiansen (Seattle, Wash.) and Alex Turgeon (Holden, Mass.) less than 30 seconds apart in the final two minutes of the half to take a 6-5 halftime edge.

The Cougar scoring spree continued into the third when Johnson connected with Rob Holden (East Longmeadow, Mass.) and then Ian Daly (Wantagh, N.Y.) scored a man-up goal midway through the period giving the visitors an 8-5 lead.

Wheaton, who lost to the Cougars in double overtime in 2011 and then in overtime a season ago, made their move over the next nine minutes as Morrison scored three of the next five goals with Matthew Hillman (Brookline, Mass.) and Gjerset adding the others. When the dust cleared, the hosts were back in front 10-8 with 11 minutes left to play.

Clark responded almost immediately, however, as Christiansen scored on an excellent individual move and Moore notched his second of the day with 6:03 left to play, evening the score at 10-10.

This time it was the Lyons who came up big, as Kyle Neale (Brooklyn, N.Y.) took a pass near the faceoff "X" and sprinted through the Cougar defense and fired and shot into the lower right corner for the eventual game-winning goal with 4:07 left in the contest.

The Lyons' defense then put the clamps down over the final four minutes of the contest going 2-for-3 in clear attempts, while compiling two saves and one blocked shot to go with two groundballs and one caused turnover.

Morrison led the Wheaton attack with four goals, while Whear totaled three of his own and both now have a league-leading 20 tallies on the season.

Ryan Clair (Bloomfield Hills, Mich.) had an up and down day in net for the Lyons, turning back a game-best 15 shots but he was called for a penalty and committed a game-high six turnovers.

Clark was paced by Johnson who handed out four assists, giving him a league-best 23 on the year, while both Christiansen and Moore had two strikes apiece.

Defensively, Drew Riopelle-Tyrrell (Northville, Mich.) made 14 saves in net for the Cougars, while Will Roberts (Holden, Mass.) scooped up a team-high six groundballs and Patrick Burke (New Canaan, Conn.) had five of his own and three caused turnovers.

The Cougars will play five of their final seven regular season contests at home beginning on Wednesday when they host out of conference nemesis Plymouth State. Faceoff is slated for 7:00 p.m.