Friday could not have gone significantly better for Penn State senior lacrosse star Mac O’Keefe.
The attacker broke the NCAA’s all-time objectives report within the second interval of the Nittany Lions’ 14-13 additional time win over the Michigan Wolverines, a part of a six-goal day, and scored the game-winning objective with three seconds left within the further interval.
O’Keefe entered the sport with 211 profession objectives, one behind the report. He tied former Duke star Justin Guterding shortly, scoring simply 2 minutes, 10 seconds into the primary interval.
He broke the report on the 7:33 mark of the second interval.
“I form of blacked out within the second, to be sincere,” O’Keefe mentioned. “However, it was very particular. It was very particular. There was lots of build-up. I have never tried to let it have an effect on me an excessive amount of however to do it now and after the sport to mirror a bit of bit, and watch these movies from all these individuals congratulating me. It is actually superior and I wish to share this second with my household and all my teammates and transfer on from there, and hopefully win some video games after this.”
O’Keefe, who graduated in 2020, was granted an additional yr of eligibility by the NCAA as a result of his senior season was minimize brief due to the COVID-19 pandemic. He set the report in his 64th profession recreation, 11 video games quicker than Guterding, who held the report since 2018.
O’Keefe’s six objectives gave him 217 for his profession, with Penn State’s season finale in opposition to Ohio State nonetheless to return and at the least one recreation within the Huge Ten match.
Penn State coach Jeff Tambroni lauded O’Keefe’s capacity to have a “killer intuition” and “nice humility” concurrently, which the coach described as a “uncommon mixture.”
“It was a storybook type of ending at the moment for each us and him,” Tambroni mentioned. “To have the ability to do that at residence, to have the ability to do that on Senior Day, to have the ability to rating a recreation winner. I believe these sorts of moments favor the hardworking younger males or girls of the world.
“It is no shock that that younger man has put himself within the place to be right here at the moment after which took benefit of it. Lots of us is likely to be on this place and be overwhelmed by the second. So, I do not suppose it might have gone any higher, however I additionally do not suppose it could not have been any extra applicable for the younger man.”