Duboe, Slaughter Tabbed to All-Ivy League Second Team

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. – The Ivy League announced Wednesday that five Harvard players have been recognized on the conference’s all-league team, as chosen by the seven Ivy head coaches.

Junior midfielder Jason Duboe and senior defenseman and co-captain Sam Slaughter earned spots on the second team, while freshman attacker Jeff Cohen, sophomore attacker Dean Gibbons and junior defender Billy Geist received honorable mention.

Duboe, a first-team honoree a year ago, ranked tied for third on the Crimson with 19 points on 11 goals and eight assists. A native of Long Grove, Ill., Duboe played in all 13 contests and netted the game-winning goal against Hartford March 13. He tallied three man-up goals during the spring, coming against Stony Brook Feb. 28, Penn March 21 and Princeton April 11. Duboe recorded a season-high five points in a win over Yale April 25, as he scored two goals and assisted on three other tallies.

Slaughter, making his second straight appearance on the All-Ivy second team, started all 13 games for the Crimson, which ranked third in the nation in scoring defense (6.69 goals allowed per game). Slaughter, who hails from Wilton, Conn., stood third on the team with 27 ground balls, including four against Duke Feb. 22 and at Princeton. With his standout defensive play, Slaughter helped the Crimson allow more than 10 goals on only two occasions and finish with the first winning record for the program since 2004.

A three-time honoree as the Ivy League Rookie of the Week this spring, Cohen, who appeared in all 13 games, led Harvard with 34 goals, 41 points and five man-up tallies. Cohen’s 34 goals rank ninth on the Crimson’s all-time single-season list and placed him third in the conference and eighth in the nation in goals per game (2.62). A native of Syosset, N.Y., he also stood tied for the Harvard lead with three game-winning tallies coming against Penn, Holy Cross April 18 and Yale. Cohen had six hat tricks, including three in a row to close the season, and had a career-high six goals in the Crimson’s victory over Holy Cross, the most for a Harvard player in a game since 2007.

Gibbons, a product of Garden City, N.Y., netted 21 goals and handed out six assists in only 10 games during his sophomore campaign, ranking second on the Crimson in goals and points. He tied Cohen for the team lead with three game-winning tallies, coming against Stony Brook, Presbyterian March 27 and Dartmouth May 2. Gibbons posted seven multiple-goal games, including a career-best five tallies against Presbyterian.

Geist, a junior from Arnold, Md., started all 13 games at defense in 2009. He picked up 20 ground balls and caused 11 turnovers, ranking him second on the Crimson. Against Holy Cross, Geist snared a season-best four ground balls and caused four turnovers en route to an 11-4 Harvard victory at Harvard Stadium.

The Crimson finished the season ranked No. 18 in the United States Intercollegiate Lacrosse Association (USILA) national poll and posted an 8-5 overall record, its most victories since 2002. The team also went 3-3 in the Ivy League, good for fourth in the standings under John Tillman, the Frisbie Family Head Coach for Harvard Men’s Lacrosse, who completed his second season on the Crimson sideline.