Ohio State men's lacrosse team advances to Big Ten Tournament final
The Ohio State men's lacrosse team will be playing for a Big Ten Tournament championship.
After defeating Michigan for the regular-season Big Ten title last week, the Buckeyes entered the Big Ten Tournament as the No. 1 seed and had to face off with No. 5 seed Rutgers, which got by the No. 4-seeded Wolverines earlier in the week. And ... as the Buckeyes have done all season long, they found a way to win with big stakes on the line to advance to the Big Ten Tournament final to face No. 2 seed Maryland.
Ohio State led throughout most of the game after getting on the board first when Alex Marinier got one in the back of the net. The Scarlet Knights answered with two straight goals, but Marinier scored again to tie the game, then again with 2:09 left in the first quarter to give the Buckeyes the lead again at 3-2. OSU never looked back.
There wasn't much scoring in the second quarter, but it all belonged to Ohio State, and Gannon Matthews, who tallied the only two goals at the 9:13 and 1:16 mark to put the Scarlet and Gary up 5-2 heading into halftime.
The Buckeyes scored three times in the third quarter, but the OSU defense continued to stand tall, holding Rutgers to three goals in the period as well. The Buckeyes went into the fourth quarter with an 8-5 advantage and added to that with the first two goals of the fourth quarter for its biggest lead of the game, 10-5.
Rutgers would try to mount a comeback by scoring the next two goals, but it was too little, too late, and Matthews scored again for the decisive 11-7 final margin.
Ohio State will now head into Saturday looking for its first conference tournament title. It finished as the runner-up in both 2015 and 2017. The Buckeyes are scheduled to get things going against the Terps at the U-M Lacrosse Stadium in Ann Arbor at 8:00 p.m. ET. Big Ten Network will have the broadcast and call of the game.
Contact/Follow us @BuckeyesWire on X (formerly Twitter) and like our page on Facebook to follow ongoing coverage of Ohio State news, notes and opinion. Follow Phil Harrison on X.
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