We're back with a rundown of the Liberty Conference as five teams maintained unbeaten conference records with victories.

Empire Division

Syracuse remained unbeaten in the Liberty Conference with a pretty impressive 52-12 defeat of Binghamton.

The Syracuse backline rode roughshod through the Binghamton defense, scoring all of their tries. Wing Nick Merriam scored in the first five minutes, outside center Liam Kirkpatrick was over five minutes later, and then wing Peter LePorin was in with 11 minutes left in the first half. Binghamton scored a crucial try just before halftime, but any momentum they might have gained from that was lost when fullback Joe Hamm scored and then flyhalf Brady Thompson was over moments later. Binghamton did score another, but then Hamm got his second, scrumhalf Mark Dunckel and sub back Cesar Battle capped it off.

Thompson converted five and Dunckel converted two.

Syracuse struggled with penalties throughout this game so discipline is certainly a work-on. Defensively they tackled Binghamton behind the gainline and got in their face.

It was, said Merriam, who is also the club president, "a fun showing in front of a big crowd of alumni. Proud of ourselves but we know there's more to be done."

Keeping pace just ahead of Syracuse in the Liberty Empire was Nazareth, which beat Cortland 40-12. Kyle Decker, Curtis Raeford, Brendan O'Neill, and Thomas Tompkins all scored in the first half for a 26-7 lead (with O'Neill hitting the conversions). Cortland closed the gap with a try in the second half before late tries from Jonah Clarke and Tyreik Thomas finished it off. Nazareth is 4-0.

Buffalo is right behind those two after beating Oswego 29-11. Head Coach Mike Hodgins said his team needed the bye week the previous weekend to heal up and that's exactly what happened.

"The bye week was perfect for us to focus on recovery and conditioning as we were healthy one through 23," said Hodgins.

Senior inside center Matt Conforti was inspirational while having captain Omar Elabdouni back from injury was huge for UB.

MetNY Division

Iona returned to conference play with a victory to the tune of 86-27 over Stony Brook. That Stony Brook was able to get those tries speaks well for them but the Iona attack was too much.

The Gaels led 51-10 at halftime and Head Coach Paul Burke said the scores his team gave up were due to some defensive lapses. It wasn't until the reserves came on that SBU was able to score more.

"It was a complete game for us," said Burke. "We controlled the scrums, the lineouts, and the loose play."

Yeah, there's not much left after that, is there.

Fordham blew by poor Albany 128-0. Not a pretty sight. Santi Thompson, former EIRA standout from Greenwich HS, scored 58 points all on his own.

New England Division

Both Northeastern and Boston College continued their winning ways. 

After piling up big scores in their first two games, Northeastern battled a defensively strong Fairfield team and has plenty of issues getting through for points. It was only 7-3 at halftime—Coleman Jackson scoring the lone try. In the second half Dor Perhl scored for NU but Fairfield added a penalty and then a converted try to take a 13-12 lead. Matthew Urea's penalty kick and and Sammy Moyle's try late in the game pulled it out for the Huskies in dramatic fashion.

It was a little easier for BC. Two early tries from Connor Robinson paced the Eagles to a lead and his third sealed it at 38-7. 

Tufts claimed their first win of the season, coming back from a 10-7 deficit to beat UMass 17-15. Flyhalf Adam Pidedjian and fullback Rob Lester, who is also the captain, were excellent on the day. 

Coming up on a Thursday tilt of some note is Iona at AIC. AIC has just the one win, from last week against Albany, and so haven't played a lot (their seconds lost to Yale last week also). This week's game against Kutztown was canceled. So this will be an important test for the Yellow Jackets, and a chance for Iona to take control of the division.

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