Fort Wayne, Ind. — The Aquinas College No. 7 Men's Lacrosse team traveled to Fort Wayne, Indiana, for the final game of the regular season. This Top 10 match-up saw both teams looking to walk away with the victory to receive a final bump in the post-season standings and a bye in the quarterfinals of the WHAC tournament. After a fervorous four quarters, the Warriors of Indiana Tech outreached the Saints by three goals. 

Indiana Tech 16, Aquinas 13

The Saints started the contest within a flash as they scored three goals back-to-back within the first three minutes; TJ Murphy, Cade Linnemeyer from Cooper Nienhuis, and Brady Waling from Braeden Wiliams. The Warriors found an answer soon after making it 3-1. Nienhuis collected a pairing of goals back-to-back following the IT goal with assists from Waling. To end the first, Tech racked up two goals of their own as a rebuttal. 

The final horn of the first saw an AQ advantage of 5-3.

IT found the final two goals of the first and continued its answering with three more to open the second, making its goal streak spring alive to five straight. A total of eight goals were scored in the second, only two of which belonged to the Saints. Williams scored two goal with assists from Murphy and Waling. IT had begun its redemption march. The second quarter saw the script flip as IT now was ahead 9-7.

The Saints put their petal to the grindstone in an attempt to reel the contest back to neutral but the Warriors just managed to outpace them. AQ managed four goals to IT's five in the third. Scoring for the Saints: Nienhuis from Williams, Murphy from Williams (2), and Williams from Murphy. The IT advantage had grown by one, 15-11.

The fourth quarter saw the Warriors keep the Saints at an even challenge as both teams scored two goals. Williams from Linnemeyer, and Nienhuis from Linnemeyer. The final chime of the horn cemented the three-point advantage to the No. 9 Warriors of Indiana Tech.

This defeat puts the Saints at an overall of 10-2 (6-2).

By the Numbers

Williams had the helping hand as well as the serving hand as he found seven total points with four assists and a hat trick. Nienhuis notched four goals and one assist for five points. Murphy also claimed five points, a hat trick with two assists.

Walling went even with a showing of two goals and two assists. Linnemeyer collected three points: two assists and one goal.

Indiana Tech notched 47 shots to AQ's 28. AQ keeper Austin Hynote doubled the opposition with 19 saves to IT's 8. The Warriors found 50 ground balls to the Saints 39. The Saints had a total of 27 turnovers to IT's 16.

Up Next

AQ will lie in wait to hear about their post-season fate in the WHAC Tournament. The first round of play begins on Tuesday (Apr. 23), as details are still to be determined.