Box Score

DELAWARE, Ohio – The Otterbein men's lacrosse team absorbed a road loss to begin its 2017 schedule Wednesday evening, falling by a score of 20-5 at nationally-ranked Ohio Wesleyan University.

The Cardinals will return home to finish out the week, looking to pick up a win by hosting Wittenberg University come Saturday afternoon inside Memorial Stadium. Start time is scheduled for noon.

The Battling Bishops, ranked 12th in the latest national poll, opened the game with two quick goals before Otterbein senior Nick Tholt got the visitors on the scoreboard at the 8:26 mark.

OWU opened a 5-1 lead nearing the end of the first quarter, but the Cardinals responded again with back-to-back goals from sophomore Ian Moews and Joe Sanfillipo to stay within 5-3. Sanfillipo, a Delaware native, netted his with just seven seconds remaining.

The second period was all Ohio Wesleyan, as the hosts out-shot Otterbein 16-4 and ultimately rattled off four-straight scores en route to a 9-3 halftime lead.

The hosts carried that momentum into the second half, string together another four-consecutive goals to open a 13-3 margin until Otterbein freshman Mike Brendle stopped the bleeding with his first-career goal.

Ohio Wesleyan rocketed 68 total shots in the game, converted all 15 clear attempts and won 17 of the 29 faceoffs. Conversely, Otterbein was held to just a 12 of 22 success rate on the clear and attempted 20 shots throughout.

Cardinal goalies James Gundling and Connor Hinson split time evenly, combining to stop 18 shots in the cage. Junior Connor Dziewit added a goal early in the fourth quarter to give the team five-different scorers.

Max Tennant tallied a hat trick to lead the Bishops, who received multi-goal efforts from four players.

Otterbein will now hope to bounce back after two-straight victories over Wittenberg, including a wild 13-12 come-from-behind triumph last season in Springfield behind six second-half goals from former attackman Robbie Guiliano.