Box Score John Carroll rolled to an impressive 12-4 win over Otterbein University Saturday that not only secured a third consecutive Ohio Athletic Conference regular season title but also the number one seed in next week's conference postseason tournament.

JCU will share the regular season crown with Ohio Northern as both teams finished the league slate with record of 7-1, but a 9-7 victory by the Blue Streaks over the Polar Bears in Ada on April 21 is the reason the tournament is set to run through University Heights.

The Blue Streaks started relatively slow in the regular season finale, and trailed by a 2-1 count after one period of play. But an explosive second period set the tone for the rest of the afternoon.

Four consecutive tallies by Brendan Whitty, Logan Calhoun, Peyton Elliot and Skyler Blake turned a 2-1 deficit into a 5-2 John Carroll lead. Otterbein briefly cut the deficit to 5-3 on a goal by reigning OAC Player of the Week Connor Dziewit, but Blake answered with 1:16 left in the period with his second goal of the game to give John Carroll a 6-3 lead at halftime.

The issue was still in doubt midway through the third when Dziewit scored his second goal  at the 8:24 mark to cut the Blue Streaks advantage to 6-4, but that that would be the final tally of the day for the Otterbein offense. 

Blake. Kevin Hack and  MacGregor Roberts closed out the third period scoring for JCU to up the lead to 9-4. In the fourth quarter, Blake scored once more and Collin Rice finished off the last two.

It was a gold letter day for the JCU defense, as Otterbein was held to its lowest goal output of the season. Jacob Betz and Will Good combined to make ten saves.

John Carroll (11-4, 7-1 OAC) won the battle of the shots, 34-22, and was even on ground balls (20-20)

Otterbein (8-8, 5-3 OAC) will miss the OAC playoffs for the first time in its history.