Dox Aitken saw the short stick matchup and attacked. He split dodged from his right to his left and raced down the alley. He drove closer toward the goal and scored on a textbook bounce shot. He shook his head afterwards in celebration as if to tell the defense, “You shouldn’t have done that.”

Dox does it again!! Aitken scores a left-handed goal on a dodge down the alley to give the Cavaliers the lead!

11-10 Wahoos#GoHoos

Watch the game LIVE on @accnetwork: https://t.co/FEyzMx362d pic.twitter.com/13Sb4rUXuO

— Virginia Men's Lacrosse (@UVAMensLax) March 20, 2021

Aitken’s third goal of the afternoon broke a tie at 10 and ignited a four-goal run that No. 8 Virginia (6-2) used to put away a Robert Morris (3-4) team that, entering the fourth quarter, looked as if it was on the precipice of clinching an upset at Klöckner Stadium.

The Cavaliers swayed but didn’t fall off. Payton Cormier scored five goals and added an assist, while linemate Matt Moore dished four assists and added a goal. Petey Lasalla won a career-high 23 faceoffs (out of 28) to became the fifth player in program history to record more than 400 career faceoff wins. The junior from Miller Place (N.Y.) has won 66.6 percent of his faceoffs this season. He went a perfect 8-for-8 in the fourth quarter.

“Petey won us the game,” said Virginia senior goalie Alex Rode, who made 15 saves. “He played amazing.”

The most encouraging development for the Cavaliers, however, might be Aitken’s re-emergence as a scoring threat. Through seven games, the two-time first-team All-American registered three goals. He looked like he was still finding his footing after he spent the fall running post routes instead of alley dodges with the Villanova football team. Aitken came back to Charlottesville in January given the uncertainty of spring football — the Wildcats have resumed play and are 1-1 — and took a step in the right direction today on the way to regaining his dominant form.

The hat trick brought Aitken’s goals total to 127 and lifted him past 2011 Tewaaraton Award winner Steele Stanwick to No. 8 all-time in Cavaliers history.

“He’s getting back to his old style and his old ways,” Lars Tiffany said of his fifth-year senior midfielder and captain. “I am completely not surprised by what we saw today because we were seeing it this past week in practice. For him to go out there and score three goals … I was telling everybody Dox is back. He made me look smart today.”

The Cavaliers entered the second half up 7-4 against the team they last saw in the first round of the 2019 NCAA tournament. Robert Morris did not start the bus. After last Saturday’s win in whiteout conditions against Air Force, the Colonials were stranded in Denver for the next two days. They finally arrived back at school around 3 a.m. on Tuesday morning. It was the latest obstacle for the team that embraces a “road warrior” mentality and has only two true home games this spring.

“You tell me the date, we’re willing to travel,” RMU head coach Andrew McMinn told every coach he called while trying to build a schedule as an independent in the midst of a pandemic. (Robert Morris left the Northeast Conference last summer and will join the newly reorganized ASUN in July.)

After trailing 9-5 a little more than midway through the third quarter, Ryan Smith (three goals, two assists) bookended a 3-0 run for Robert Morris with his 23rd and 24th goals of the season.

Seventh-year graduate attackman Jimmy Perkins (three goals, four assists) assisted all three goals in the run.

Smith found Corson Kealey (three goals) to tie the score at 10 with 12:24 left in the fourth. Smith, Kealey and Perkins accounted for nine of the Colonials’ 12 goals. Although Perkins scored consecutive goals in the final four minutes to cut Virginia’s lead to 14-12, the run that Aitken sparked proved the difference.

“For the whole lacrosse world that’s been asking, ‘What’s up with Dox?’ I said give it some time,” Tiffany said. “We saw it this week in practice and he proved it today on game day. Dox is back.”