PHILADELPHIA – This time, the Virginia men’s lacrosse team didn’t need an improbable comeback. The Cavaliers took charge in the NCAA title game Monday with big runs in the second and third quarters and cruised to a 13-9 victory against defending champion Yale before a crowd of 31,528 at Lincoln Financial Field. It is Virginia's sixth national championship and first since 2011.

The third-seeded Cavaliers (17-3) controlled the game at both ends of the field. Matt Moore paced the attack with four goals and an assist, Michael Kraus added a hat trick and Dox Aitken and face-off man Petey LaSalla each scored twice.

Defensively, tournament most outstanding player Alex Rode made 13 saves in the Virginia goal. In front of him, Cade Saustad effectively shut down Yale’s leading scorer Jackson Morrill, who managed only a single assist. Matt Brandau managed a hat trick and two assists for the fifth-seeded Bulldogs (15-4), but Yale was held to its lowest goal total of the season.

“Fantastic, fantastic performance by Alex Rode,” Virginia coach Lars Tiffany said of his sophomore goalie. “Early on Yale found some openings, and our defense was still getting settled in, trying to figure out who Yale is. With one day to prepare for a team and not a lot of film to watch, it's a difficult scout for both teams. Alex made big saves early, when we made mistakes, when there were openings. That allowed our defense to grow more comfortable.”

The Cavaliers led 2-1 after a defense-dominated first quarter. A Matt Gaudet goal with 11:41 remaining in the second quarter pulled Yale even for what would prove to be the last time, as Virginia closed the half on a 4-0 burst.

Two quick tallies to start the second half gave Yale a bit of hope, but the Cavaliers scored five in a row to build the cushion to 11-4 to put it out of reach.

TD Ierlan was his usual dominant self at the face-off X as Yale won 19-of-25 draws, but the Bulldogs committed 20 turnovers to hurt their chances of a repeat.

“This is really hard, saying goodbye to this (senior) class and all that,” said Yale coach Andy Shay. “But at the end of the day it's still a game, and I get paid to do this in this country because of people that gave their lives. ... I wanted to mention that on Memorial Day. I want to congratulate Virginia on the incredible game they played today. I wish we’d fared better, but we will be back.”

The near wire-to-wire performance for Virginia contrasted from its last two tournament wins, in which the Cavaliers mounted late rallies for 13-12 overtime victories.

They rallied in the quarterfinals to beat Maryland in overtime after trailing by five in the fourth quarter. In its semifinal defeat of Duke, Virginia was down two with 1:25 left before forcing overtime. A goal by Ian Laviano in the second overtime set up the showdown with Yale.

“We're not usually winning -- as most of you know, we're more comfortable losing at halftime,” Tiffany said. “Not that we want to but we're more comfortable there. So we talked about it as a staff, what do we do? We don't want to stall, you can't do that in the shot clock era, but the men made us look smart. They understood shot clock awareness.”

As a side note, Virginia becomes the third school to pull off the rare men’s basketball-men’s lacrosse championship double in the same season. Not surprisingly, the other two schools also reside in the ACC. North Carolina did it in 1982 and Duke was the second in 2010.

“If you physically sit at my desk, there are five championship trophies on top of it, hanging over me. You feel that,” Tiffany said. “So we saw (basketball coach) Tony Bennett do it this year. You're provided what you need to win. Achieving this is a realistic objective. It's not a fantasy. So I'm just very fortunate to be in a position in an athletic department that really cares about its athletic teams.”