WESTERVILLE — Fifth-year senior Max Graham scored four goals to go with three each from senior Nathan Lewis and junior Zach Mulligan to lead the Otterbein men's lacrosse team to a 17-14 win over Mount Union in a tightly contested Ohio Athletic Conference battle on Saturday afternoon. With five points in the game, Lewis surpassed the 100-point plateau in his Otterbein career.

The Basics

• Records: Otterbein (6-5 overall, 4-1 OAC), Mount Union (8-4 overall, 2-3 OAC)
• Venue: Memorial Stadium - Westerville, Ohio

Otterbein Stat Leaders

• Graham added three ground balls to his team-high four goals.
• Nathan Lewis finished with a team-high five points on three goals and two assists.
• Mulligan had four points on three goals and one assist.
• Junior Marcus Wright and sophomore Andrew Lewis netted two goals each.
• Senior Dom Dean tallied two points on one goal and one assist.
• Senior Carson Rainone and sophomore Jack Regruth scored one goal each.
• Junior Sam Becker had a team-high eight ground balls.
• Sophomore Zach Courie played all 60 minutes in goal and recorded eight saves.

Game Highlights

• First Quarter: Mount Union opened the scoring just one minute into the game and scored three of the first four goals. The lone Otterbein goal in that stretch came from Mulligan and tied the score at 1-1. Trailing 3-1, the Cardinals netted three unanswered goals in just over a minute of game time, getting one each from Mulligan, Graham and Andrew Lewis. After Mount Union tied the score at 4-4, Otterbein responded with back-to-back goals from Graham and Nathan Lewis for a 6-4 lead with 3:04 left. The Purple Raiders capped the scoring in the period with a goal with 1:38 remaining to trail 6-5 going into the second.
• Second Quarter: The Cardinals opened the second-quarter scoring with a goal from Rainone just 57 seconds in, but Mount Union answered with a trio of goals to go up 8-7 with 7:57 left. Otterbein responded with a pair of goals in the span of 43 seconds, getting one from Dean on an assist from Nathan Lewis and one from Wright. The Purple Raiders closed the half with two unanswered goals over the final 3:41 to take a 10-9 halftime lead.
• Third Quarter: The back-and-forth scoring continued in the third quarter, as Nathan Lewis scored on an assist from Dean just 54 seconds in before Mount Union answered to retake the lead. Otterbein again tied the score, this time at 11-11, on a goal from Regruth assisted by Nathan Lewis with 7:27 left. The Purple Raiders came back with two goals, but Otterbein scored again courtesy of Nathan Lewis with 2:57 remaining to send the Cardinals into the final period trailing by just one, 13-12.
• Fourth Quarter: The Cardinals scored the first four goals of the final quarter to make it a 5-0 scoring run going back to the third period. Mulligan opened the fourth-quarter scoring and assisted on the next goal, courtesy of Andrew Lewis. Graham and Wright added goals of their own to put Otterbein up 16-13 with 8:23 left. Mount Union closed the gap to 16-14 with a man-up goal with 7:50 remaining, but another goal from Graham extended the Cardinals' lead back to three with 2:40 left. The Purple Raiders attempted a pair of shots over the final 1:08, but one sailed wide and the other was blocked as the Cardinals secured the 17-14 victory.
• Key Team Stats: Otterbein out-shot Mount Union by a 52-45 margin, and the Cardinals finished with a 33-28 edge in ground balls. Otterbein won 19 of the 35 faceoffs. Otterbein committed 15 turnovers to 22 for Mount Union.

Notables

• Graham has 112 career points on 85 goals and 27 assists.
• Nathan Lewis has 101 career points on 63 goals and 38 assists.
• Rainone has 85 career points on 69 goals and 16 assists.
• Senior Luke Farthing has 395 career saves.
• Graham entered Saturday ranked eighth in the OAC in goals (30) and ninth in points (38), and Dean was tied for seventh in assists (13).
• Head coach Colin Hartnett is in his 16th year at Otterbein and has an all-time record of 139-112 at the helm of the Cardinals.
• This year's 4-1 record is the Cardinals' best mark through their first five conference games since 2021.
• Otterbein is 12-0 against Mount Union dating back to 2013.