Stony Brook outplayed Lafayette on Saturday night as the Seawolves defense played outstandingly, and junior running back Miguel Maysonet exploded for a career-tying four touchdowns in one game to lead the Seawolves to a 37-20 victory.

The win was the first for the Seawolves season and took place at Kenneth P. LaValle Stadium with a packed Red Zone and a sold-out crowd of 8,278.

This was the second meeting between the schools as Stony Brook avenged a 28-21 loss suffered at the hands of Lafayette last season.

Head coach Chuck Priore, who has never lost a homecoming game, admits that the homecoming crowd contributed to their victory.

“I think it kept us in the game in the first half,” Priore said. “When you’re not playing well, you look to feed off something. We fed off it. That was as good a crowd that we’ve had since I’ve been here.”

The game started off slow for both teams, but Lafayette was the first to score when their kicker, Austin O’Brien, made a 30-yard field goal in the first quarter and a 24-yard field goal in the second quarter to give the Leopards a 6-0 lead.

Stony Brook made the scoreboard when Wesley Skiffington connected on a 37-yard and a 36-yard field goal to tie the game for Stony Brook at 6-6.

Skiffington has more than the win to be proud of. After the game he was given the title of all-time leading scorer amongst Stony Brook’s kickers.

Skiffington has broken Mike Soto’s record of 156 points, which was set back in 2003.

“I was making the best out of the opportunities I was given,” Skiffington said. “You can’t be thinking about last week. It’s not in my head at all.”

Despite a sluggish first half, the Seawolves picked up their game  in the third quarter and the team decided to prove to their home crowd that this homecoming would be one to remember.

Priore said that some adjustments were made before the second half of the game.

“We made a couple adjustments on both sides of the ball. We played as good a third quarter as we’ve played all year,” Priore said. “We came out of the tunnel after the second half and played like men.”

To say that the Seawolves played well after the first half might be an understatement.

To be fair, they exploded. Before the end of the third quarter, Maysonet managed 12 carries for 105 yards and two touchdowns.

“We did what we do best. We ran through them,” Maysonet said. “We finally got our first win.”

The defense deserves a lot of credit for the success of the Seawolves on Saturday night.

In particular, junior Dan Mulrooney played spectacularly with one interception, one forced fumble and one fumble recovery.

“I was in the right spot a lot of times tonight,” Mulrooney said. “I can attribute it to our defense.”

Lafayette scored midway through the third quarter when junior quarterback Andrew Shoop threw a 52-yard touchdown pass to senior wide receiver Mitchell Bennett to cut the Seawolves’ lead   to 20-13.

Skiffington kicked a career best 46-yard field goal before the end of the third quarter, putting the Seawolves up 23-13.

The fourth quarter consisted of complete Seawolves domination. Maysonet had a 30-yard touchdown run with 10:58 remaining in the fourth quarter, giving Stony Brook a 30-13, which was their biggest lead of the game.

Lafayette answered back with a five-yard touchdown pass from Shoop to sophomore wide receiver Mark Ross, which made the score 30-20.

Maysonet scored his fourth touchdown in the last five minutes of the game, and he acounted for all 44 yards on his last touchdown drive.

Priore gives an enormous amount of credit to the defense for contributing to the Seawolves win.

“Our defense made big plays all night and turned the ball over,” Priore said.

The defense had three interceptions in the game, and sophomore Jawara Dudley led the defense with nine tackles and two sacks.

Priore was very happy with the way his team played and is very confident in the way that they are performing.

“This isn’t going to be a team I ever yell at,” Priore said. “They never do anything wrong. I really wanted them to get this win.”

The Seawolves proved to be dominant over Lafayette for the majority of game.

Running backs Brock Jackolski and Maysonet combined for 297 yards, proving once again that Stony Brook’s running game is threatening to any opposing team.

“What happened in the second half needed to happen,” Priore said. “We needed to run the football and win the game.”

Stony Brook can now enter its bye week without the added pressure of getting into the win column.

After the week off, the Seawolves will resume play on Saturday, Oct. 8, when Stony Brook will host its first of six Big South conference game of the season against Presbyterian College at 6 p.m.

The Seawolves made quick work of the Presbyterian Blue Hose last season, beating them in their stadium 37-7,  and they hope to continue the trend this season by grabbing their second win in a row.