NEW YORK – It’s already been a historic season for the University of Pennsylvania men’s lacrosse team.

Two weeks ago, the Quakers won their first outright Ivy League championship since 1986. Adam Goldner has also set a program single-season goals record with 50. Further, their undefeated streak of 11 games is now one away from tying the Penn record (12) for a season, set in 1984.

Penn can now add its second-ever Ivy League tournament title to that list of accomplishments, as the program from Philadelphia downed Yale 12-11 on Sunday afternoon at Columbia University.

Most remarkably, Yale didn’t hold a lead at any point, the first time that’s happened since a May 14, 2017, game against Syracuse. That streak ends at 44 games for the defending NCAA champion.

“Certainly never expected to not trail [during] 60 minutes against them,” Penn coach Mike Murphy said, drying off from a rain-soaked day along the Hudson River. “Obviously a very good team, and they’ve been the best team in this league for six or eight years. We ended up closing it out after they made a couple runs. … It speaks to the character of the group and the seniors.”

While Yale won the shot battle, 46-37, Penn senior goalie Reed Junkin was immense in the fourth quarter, making six saves. The Most Outstanding Player of the tournament finished with 16 stops, including several right on the doorstep. With 5:42 remaining, he made a save on Yale freshman Matt Brandau that Murphy called one of the best he’s seen all season.

As Yale struggled to solve Junkin, Shay called his performance “incredible.” But that was no excuse for a sloppy start that saw Yale trail 4-1 after the first quarter.

“I don’t have any issue from our effort really from the second quarter on, but we did get off the bus a little slow,” Yale coach Andy Shay said. “Against a team that good, you dig yourself a hole. The good news is we still play next week, and if we can learn from it, hopefully we get better.”

Yale faceoff specialist TD Ierlan was held under .500 (11-for-24) for the first time all season. He hadn’t finished below that mark since an April 22, 2018, game when he was an Albany sophomore facing, coincidentally, Yale.

Instead, Penn junior Kyle Gallagher went 15-for-26 in the battle of heavyweights, with those extra possessions chipping away. The Bulldogs had won five Ivy League tournaments this decade, the most of any program in the conference.

“We said it earlier in the year and I’ll say it again: TD is allowed to have an off day,” Shay said. “Gallagher is very good and he got little better than 50 [percent] last time and below it this time. … It needs to be a weapon, not a crutch.”

Ierlan drew a faceoff violation on the game’s first draw, and Shay and Murphy agreed that swayed the early momentum.

“TD is fantastic. He was MVP of our league for a reason, but Kyle is really good too,” Murphy said. “I don’t know, you pick three, five, seven faceoff guys in the country that are at the elite level. Those guys are two of them. Any given day, one guy can get the edge.”

The game was a rematch of a regular-season tilt on March 30 that Penn won 13-12 in triple overtime. Yet again, a single goal was the difference — this time with an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament on the line.

While Penn’s usual suspects came up big — Goldner, Sam Handley and Simon Mathias combined for eight goals and four assists — a secondary contributor stepped up on the season’s biggest stage yet. Sophomore attackman Sean Lulley, who entered with 27 points on the year, had a game-high five points. It’s fourth time this year Lulley has reached that mark, reflecting his hot-and-cold streaks.

Murphy said Yale was going to put attention on their big horses, so the Quakers tried to get more out of Lulley and sophomore midfielder Mitch Bartolo.

“I said something to [Lulley] before the game about just enjoying the game and imagining this as a game back on Long Island for Half Hallow Hills and just playing,” Murphy said. “I don’t know if that resonated with him or not, but he certainly seemed to be relaxed and played great.”

For both teams, attention now turns to the NCAA tournament and returning to their respective campuses to watch the selection show Sunday night.

Yale also lost the Ivy League final last year (14-8 defeat vs. Cornell), though Shay is careful about comparing the groups.

“We talked about that in the locker room,” Shay said. “It’s going to be very easy to compare the two [teams], but we can’t fall into that trap. That team did not play well at all for 60 minutes up here [last year], and they regrouped and fought like crazy and that propelled us a little bit. If we assume that’s going to happen again, that takes a lot away from what those guys did last year.”

Penn, meanwhile, plans on keeping it’s one-game-at-a-time approach that has firmly put in the rearview an 0-3 start. Junkin said the Quakers are approaching the postseason in groups of twos, and the first one is checked off with the Ivy League semifinal and final.

“This one was two games we needed to win, then we need to win two more games to make NCAA championship weekend, then win two games to win the national championship,” Junkin said. “We’re focusing on the next thing and grouping it together and trying to do our best to keep playing and keep all the seniors still around on campus.”

So far, so good for Penn.