MLAX hosts Cleveland State on Saturday in the Valley

MILWAUKEE – The Marquette University men’s lacrosse team hosts its second home game of the season on Saturday afternoon against Cleveland State at Valley Fields.

Saturday’s game is sold out, but airs live on FloCollege at noon Central time with Matt Yeazel (play-by-play) and Eric Simon (analyst) on the call. The game will be produced by MU’s Diederich College of Communications. Live statistics are available through GoMarquette.com.

MU will recognize late MU President Dr. Michael R. Lovell, who passed away in June after a long battle with sarcoma, a form of bone cancer.

MARQUETTE (1-2, 0-0 BIG EAST)

• The Golden Eagles are 1-2 on the season and own a Feb. 8 victory over Detroit Mercy in addition to losses at then-No. 15 Michigan and No. 1 Notre Dame.
• MU fell 22-9 at Notre Dame on Saturday in its last game. Sophomore Carsen Brandt and junior Matt Caputo each notched their first hat tricks of the season and Bobby O’Grady recorded three points on a goal and a pair of assists.
• O’Grady now has 142 career points and jumped past Jake Stegman‘s 140 in the game at ND. He is currently the program record holder with 120 career goals.
• Senior attackman Nolan Rappis is MU’s point leader (5-7-12) and set a program single-game record with 10 points (five goals, five assists) in the win over UDM. He was named to the USILA Team of the Week and earned BIG EAST Weekly Honor Roll recognition for his play against the Titans.
• MU is picked to tie for fifth place with St. John’s in the BIG EAST Preseason Coaches’ Poll and attackman Bobby O’Grady was selected to the league’s all-preseason team.
• O’Grady, senior midfielder Will Foster and junior short-stick defensive midfielder Peter Detwiler are team captains for the 2025 campaign.
• Former MU USILA All-American Jake Richard, a Team USA and PLL defensive midfielder, is in his first season as head coach at his alma mater. Richard has been involved with all 170 games in program history as either a student-athlete (2013-16) or assistant coach (2017-24). During his playing career, he led MU to the program’s first BIG EAST Conference title in 2016 and still ranks among MU’s all-time leaders in games played (fourth, 61), ground balls (fourth, 193), and caused turnovers (sixth, 38).

CLEVLAND STATE (1-2, 0-0 NEC)

• The Vikings claimed a 16-10 win over Bellarmine on Tuesday afternoon for their first win of the season. Redshirt sophomore Xander Johnson set a CSU program record with eight goals in the victory.
• Johnson leads CSU with nine goals in three games this season, while Jacob Lubrant has seven points (4-3-7) and Alex Van Voorhis (1-5-6) has a team-best five assists.
• The Vikings opened the season with a 14-4 loss at Ohio State on Feb. 8 and fell 24-6 at No. 1 Notre Dame in the middle of last week.
• Head coach Andy German led the Vikings to their best record in program history (9-8) last season.

HISTORY WITH THE VIKINGS

• Marquette is 2-1 all-time in three meetings against CSU, the last of which was a 10-5 win inside the dome at Valley Fields on March 27, 2021.
• MU won each of the last two contests against CSU in 2020 and 2021.

O’GRADY VAULTS UP MU RECORD BOOK

• Bobby O’Grady burst onto the scene as the 2022 BIG EAST Freshman of the Year and scored at an elite pace in his first three seasons at Marquette (2.65 goals per game). He’s a three-time All-BIG EAST performer and was named to the league’s all-preseason team in January.
• Through 46 games of his NCAA career, he’s the all-time program leader in goals (120) and man-up scores (22). He broke Ryan McNamara‘s program goal record of 102 against then-No. 13/12 Michigan on Feb. 24, 2024, in Naples, Florida.
• He turned in a record-setting season as a true freshman in 2022, setting new program records for goals (45) and man-up scores (13). He also recorded just the fourth 50-point season at Marquette and tied a BIG EAST record with eight goals at St. John’s on April 9, 2022.
• O’Grady (142 career points) is just 10 points from McNamara’s program points record of 152.

ANOTHER CHALLENGING SCHEDULE

• The Golden Eagles will once again face a difficult non-conference schedule in addition to the always-challenging BIG EAST Conference slate.
• In addition to the season opener at then-No. 15 Michigan on Feb. 1, the Golden Eagles faced the two-time defending NCAA Champion No. 1 Notre Dame on Feb. 15 in Indiana. MU also has road contests at No. 15 Harvard on March 1 and RV Utah on March 15.
• The BIG EAST Conference features two squads ranked in both polls in No. 13/12 Denver and No. 11 Georgetown, while Providence is receiving votes in the media poll. The Hoyas are the unanimous preseason league favorites, while MU was tied for fifth with St. John’s in the coaches’ survey.

BRANDT IMPRESSED AS FROSH

• Attackman Carsen Brandt played a large role early in his freshman season last spring and is expected to be a large contributor to the MU offensive unit. He notched his first hat trick of the 2025 season on Feb. 15 at No. 1 Notre Dame while being covered by USILA All-American close defenseman Shawn Lyght.
• The 6-foot-3 native of Edina, Minnesota was the No. 54 incoming freshman last season, according to Inside Lacrosse, and ended the 2024 campaign with 16 goals and 12 assists while starting all 14 contests. His 28 points were third on the squad.
• Brandt was mentored by former MU All-American and fellow Minnesotan Ryan McNamara and is one of the best prep players to come from the Gopher State. As a junior at Benilde St. Margaret’s, he set state records for most points in state tournament history (21), most points in a tournament game (10) and most assists in a state tournament (12) and most assists in a state tournament game (seven).

NEW FACES ON DEFENSE AND SPECIALTY UNITS

• The Golden Eagles lost a pair of starting close defensemen in Woodward and Noah Verlinde and must also replace all-conference faceoff specialist Luke Willams and goalie Caleb Creasor, who started every game last spring.
• Poles David Lamarca (44 career games entering 2025) and Mike Piraino (22 games) return as MU’s most experienced defenders and played both LSM and close defense last season. Ryan Kilcoyne served as MU’s fourth defenseman and started four games last year in addition to serving on MU’s man-down unit.
• Head coach Jake Richard, a former D-mid himself, will rely upon team captain Peter Detwiler to lead MU’s rope unit and contributions from younger players. Detwiler played in all 28 games (34 ground balls and seven caused turnovers) over his first two seasons at MU and grad student Jadyn Castillo redshirted last spring. Redshirt junior Brendan Boyle has also played both short stick and pole during his 25-game career.
• In net, Lucas Lawas returns after playing just 38 minutes last season behind Creasor. Lawas played big minutes at the end of his freshman campaign in 2023, which featured overtime losses to three top-12 teams to end the season.
• At the faceoff dot, native Wisconsinite Adam Slager (Stoughton) is the lone returner. Slager played in eight games in 2024 as a redshirt freshman, won 55.8% of his draws (43-of-77) and picked up 22 ground balls. All but one of his appearances came prior to the start of BIG EAST action.

Keep up with the Marquette men’s lacrosse program through social media by following on X (@MarquetteMLax) and Instagram (@MarquetteMLax) and ‘liking’ on Facebook (/MarquetteMLax).

NOTE: This press release was submitted to Urban Milwaukee and was not written by an Urban Milwaukee writer. While it is believed to be reliable, Urban Milwaukee does not guarantee its accuracy or completeness.