Sheamus Dalton
Sport Editor
After losing three straight games against NCAC conference opponents, The College of Wooster men’s lacrosse team rebounded with an impressive 14-3 victory over DePauw University on Saturday. In their first eight games this season, the Scots (8-4, 3-2 NCAC) were in good form, winning seven.
However, a two-week period that included losses to Adrian College, Oberlin College and Kenyon College dampened the Scots’ hopes of an NCAC tournament berth. Their win over DePauw revitalizes their season heading into their final three games.
Patch Henderson ’15 led the way for the Fighting Scots against DePauw, recording a season high six goal performance. Henderson has 20 goals on the season, tied for second-most on the team. Along with Henderson, Matt Parmelee ’17 recorded his most notable performance of the year, adding four goals on 12 shots.
The Scots opened the game with five unanswered goals in the first quarter from Parmelee, Henderson, Evan Albertson ’15 and PJ Dallman ’15. The Scots allowed DePauw to score only once in the first and built upon their multiple goal lead consistently throughout the game. The Tigers’ most productive spell was during second quarter when they scored twice.
Despite these offensive efforts from the Tigers, the Scots still led 8-3 going into halftime. Wooster’s defense locked down the second half as DePauw went scoreless in the final quarter. Boosted by their defense, the Scots added six more goals, including two more from Henderson, and one each from Parmelee, Pat McKay ’17 and Tom Herold ’15. At the game’s close, the Scots won comfortably, 14-3.
This win was an important victory for the Scots to regain momentum leading into a difficult schedule during their final games of the regular season. “We played as a team for the whole 60 minutes,” said Parmelee. “The last couple games, we struggled to close games out, losing them in the fourth quarter, but this was a good team effort to get a solid win in conference.”
The Scots’ defense has struggled through much of the season. A year ago, the Scots only gave up 95 goals to their opponents in 15 games. This season, however, the Scots have already given up 102 goals in 12 games as of press time with three more games to play.
Against DePauw, the Scots’ defense was able to string together a number of crucial stops against the Tigers. “Our offense feeds off of big defensive stops and getting goals in bunches off transition,” said Parmelee.
“We scored 14 against DePauw but most of that is because the defense made stops, giving the offense opportunities to capitalize.”
The Scots will look to build off of impressive performances from their offense and defense as they prepare for games against NCAC foes Wittenberg University and Ohio Wesleyan University. The Scots will play their next home game Saturday against Wittenberg at 12 p.m. at John P. Papp Stadium.
