WOOSTER, Ohio – The College of Wooster men's lacrosse team's run of winning its North Coast Athletic Conference opener continued Saturday afternoon at John P. Papp Stadium, as the Fighting Scots turned away DePauw University 17-10.
Wooster (7-3, 1-0 NCAC), which has won its conference opener every time since 2015, dominated on the stat sheet, in particular in turnovers (14-24), groundballs (48-26), and faceoff wins (20-11). Wooster's 14 turnovers marked a season-low, and the team's lowest count since having that many against Hiram College in 2023.
Three of Wooster's top five offensive weapons took over to pull the Scots away from DePauw (5-3, 0-1 NCAC) in the second period. Senior Vinny DiLeo, sophomore Lane Kellogg, and senior Ben Byars, who all rank in the top four on the team in points, scored five straight goals to give the Scots a 9-3 cushion seconds into the third quarter. Wooster needed just eight ticks on the clock to score after halftime, thanks to one of senior Jimmy Fisher's 17 faceoff wins.
DiLeo's 19th goal of the year came with 6:56 remaining in the first quarter, and that gave the four-year offensive juggernaut his 200th career point. DiLeo is just the fourth Scot to hit the milestone and the first since alumnus Tom Bennett graduated in 1993 with 206 points. The DiLeo-to-Byars score with 46 seconds remaining in the third moved the senior into the top-five all-time in assists, and his 96 are the most since alumnus Josh Herold passed out 98 from 2014-17.
Elsewhere, Kellogg pulled well ahead in the race to be the team's leading goal scorer on the year with six to give the sophomore 30 in 10 games. DiLeo followed with four, while Byars rounded out the Scots with hat tricks. DiLeo and Kellogg tied for high honors at seven points.
Fisher posted a 17-of-23 ledger on faceoffs, and scooped up the groundball on most of them, finishing with 12 to hit 75 on the year, a total that rates as the ninth-most since they started being officially tracked in 1999. As a team, Wooster had a caused turnover on 15 of DePauw's 24 turnovers, with no Scot having more than senior Casey Steffen's three. Senior Paul Chandler totaled 11 saves.
Despite giving up 17 goals Anthony Reinhardt came up big in goal for the Tigers, finishing with 21 saves. Matthew Garrigan scooped up four groundballs and had three caused turnovers.
Wooster outshot DePauw 55-35 and went 16-of-19 on clears to a 17-of-27 mark for the Tigers.
Next, Wooster plays at Wittenberg University (4-1, 0-1 NCAC) at 1 p.m. on Saturday, March 30.