On April 22, the Kenyon men’s lacrosse team hosted Oberlin College in its penultimate regular season game, though nobody could have predicted it would take two days, seven periods and a lightning storm to settle. While the Owls won, they then fell to The College of Wooster on Saturday, clinching a five-way share of the regular season NCAC Championship but failing to qualify for the NCAC Tournament.
Oberlin surged into a commanding 4-1 lead before David Chintala ’26 sparked a remarkable turnaround. The senior scored twice in the second quarter, leveling the contest at 5-5, before Mike Kapral ’26 finished off a beautiful Tanner Lewis ’27 delivery to give the Owls a 6-5 halftime lead. The newfound momentum was cut short, however, as the skies opened and the remaining half was postponed until Thursday.
Despite the new day, it was the same Chintala. He picked up right where he left off, and with Kapral also on the score sheet again, Kenyon led 8-6 after three quarters. Oberlin hit back with three unanswered goals to go ahead 9-8 in the fourth, but Harrison Curtiss ’28 tied things up before striking again with just over a minute remaining to put the Owls up 10-9. Remarkably, the drama didn’t stop there, as the visitors notched an equalizer with 1.8 seconds on the clock, sending the game into overtime.
Two scoreless extra sessions followed before a fateful offside call in the third overtime swung everything. Ben Devitis ’27 scooped up the loose ball and found Gavin Gumucio ’26 streaking through the middle of the zone. Gumucio took the pass in full stride and buried it top left as the crowd erupted at the Owls’ victory.
The win moved Kenyon into sole possession of first place in the NCAC standings with a 6-1 conference record, setting up a season finale at Wooster with the outright title on the line. The final chapter of Kenyon’s regular season had everything: a record broken, a championship clinched and a postseason berth cruelly snatched away in the same afternoon.
On Saturday, the Owls ran into a stone wall in the form of the Fighting Scots’ goalie, who finished with 17 saves in a dominant 13-6 Wooster victory. Kenyon outshot the hosts 51-32 and dominated the ground ball battle 43-31, but none of it mattered on a day where nothing would go in.
Amid the defeat came a moment worth celebrating. Adam Hall ’26 set a program career saves record in the second quarter, surpassing the mark of 772 set over half a century ago. Hall reflected on the bittersweet nature of the milestone in an email to the Collegian. “I knew I had a chance to break it, but I never really reflected on how long that record had stood. Fifty years ago the sport was very different, so I am proud to have surpassed the mark.” He added that the team’s struggles made it hard to savor the moment. “Unfortunately we were struggling as a team at that time so I didn’t get to enjoy it as much as I would have liked,” he wrote.
In perhaps the most remarkable occurrence of the season, Kenyon’s 6-2 conference record was good enough to earn the Owls a share of the 2026 NCAC regular season title, the program’s third title ever, yet a tiebreaker points system denied them a place in the four-team postseason tournament.
Reflecting on the season, Hall said it best: “It ended too soon and went by too quick.”