Overtime Is O’Grady Time: Marquette 12, Utah 11 (OT)

MU’s all time leading scorer had just one goal on Saturday in the mountains, but it came when the Golden Eagles needed it the most.

Saturday’s trip to the Rocky Mountains was always going to be an interesting test for Marquette men’s lacrosse. The Golden Eagles had been idle for a week and a half and they were going on the road against a Utah team that hadn’t quite been living up to hopes and expectations so far this season after beating a ranked Ohio State squad in their opener. At worst, it would be a measuring stick of where Marquette was in the seventh game of Jake Richard’s tenure as head coach. At best, it had the chance to turn into the best win of Richard’s first season so far.

It ended up a little bit of both as the Golden Eagles had to rally back from not just down three in the second quarter but bounce back after giving up a game tying goal in the final minute of regulation. They did both things, and Bobby O’Grady tacked on to his program record for points in a career with this game winning strike in overtime:

But let’s skip back in time a little bit.

The first quarter was very much not going Marquette’s way, even though they were generating scoring chances. Shots on goal favored Utah 8-6 after 15 minutes, but the scoreboard liked them even more, by a margin of 4-1. That’s not ideal, nor was Marquette going quiet on the offensive end after tallying the first goal of the second quarter. After Nolan Rappis made it 4-2, Marquette couldn’t get things going quite right, and a goal from Utah’s Chase Robertson on his way to a hat trick on this day made it 5-2 Utes with 7:39 left before intermission.

Carsen Brandt broke into the net with a goal, and then Utah started having problems on faceoffs. They kept committing violations, which kept giving Marquette the ball back, and SHOOOOOOP, four straight from the Golden Eagles in less than five minutes got them out in front 6-5. The first power play goal of the game was the last goal of the half, and that went for Utah to tie it at six each at intermission.

It’s not fun to give up that goal with 35 seconds left, but it’s way better than trailing by three, y’know?

After the rest of Brendan Boyle’s unreleasable penalty expired, Marquette punched in a goal to make it 7-6 Golden Eagles. That’s good news, but ultimately the two teams just traded markers for the third frame. 8-all heading to the fourth.

Hey, remember Chase Robertson? Yeah, here’s where he finished off his hat trick, scoring twice in the first four minutes of the frame to get the Utes up two, 10-8. Marquette had answers though. Will Foster was left unattended on the left side for an easy catch and shoot out in front, then Carsen Brandt powered his way up from underneath the goal line on the same side, shooting it far post to tie the game at 10 just over two minutes later.

I shouted NO at my TV when Foster went around a fallen defender and threw it to Matt Caputo in traffic. It seemed like such a bad idea, but the pass was received cleanly, and Caputo’s shot got off cleanly, even as he went careening to the turf, flying past Colin Lenskold for MU’s 11th goal of the game and a lead with 4:41 to go.

Lucas Lawas made his 15th save of the game with a shade over two minutes to play, and Marquette was going to get to burn off most of the rest of the contest…. but not all of it….. and even less of it when Rappis got called for warding with 1:05 to play. That gave Utah one final chance, and even though four inches of snow was cleared off the field pregame, and even though the sun came out periodically throughout the contest, there was still a liiiiiitle bit of slipperiness to the field. Two Golden Eagles defenders went tumbling, Utah’s Ryan Stines got his hands free, boom, goal, and after Lawas’ 16th save stopped the Utah attack in the waning seconds, we’re going to overtime.

It took TWENTY SECONDS for someone to finally come up with the faceoff in the extra session, but the guy in question was MU’s Adam Slager, winning his 15th draw on 18 attempts and earning his eighth ground ball of the game. That gave Marquette the first try of overtime, and, well, you saw O’Grady’s goal up top. The actual assist from Will Foster is pretty great, but the unrecorded assist by Nolan Rappis as the screener on a designed curl & cut for O’Grady is pretty awesome, too.

Matt Caputo’s four goals led the Golden Eagles here, and he had a helper for a game high five points. Will Foster’s assist on the winner gave him three in the game and four points in total.

Up Next: Marquette will return to the midwest, but not Milwaukee for their next game. On March 22, they’ll be at Loyola Academy in Wilmette, Illinois, for a neutral site contest against Air Force. First draw is set for Noon Central, and I’m guessing there won’t be a streaming option available. The Falcons are 2-5 on the year after falling 16-11 on the road against #9 Duke a week ago, and that’ll be their most recent contest when they face MU for some bird-on-bird violence.