GETTYSBURG, Pa. – Ninth-ranked Gettysburg College out-scored visiting Washington College 4-1 in the fourth quarter and closed out the regular season with a 12-8 victory in Centennial Conference men's lacrosse action at Shirk Field at Musselman Stadium Saturday.
 
Gettysburg (13-3, 7-1 CC) finished tied atop the conference regular-season standings with Franklin & Marshall College (12-4, 7-1 CC), but the Diplomats seized the No. 1 seed with a win over the Bullets earlier this season. Gettysburg will be the No. 2 seed and hosts Dickinson College (11-5, 5-3 CC) on Wednesday, May 1, in the semifinals of the CC Championship. F&M will host Ursinus College (11-3, 5-3 CC) in Wednesday's other semifinal. The two winners will play at the highest remaining seed for the conference title next Saturday. Game times for the playoff games will be announced on Monday.
 
The Orange and Blue received four goals from junior Brian Kolen (Bridgewater, N.J./Bridgewater-Raritan), who also moved into fifth on the program's list for goals in a single season with 55. Sophomore Jack Fletcher (Charlotte, N.C./Providence Day School) posted three goals, two assists, and four ground balls, while junior Michael McCormick (Lorton, Va./Paul VI Catholic) tallied two goals and three assists. Senior Jack Harvey (New Providence, N.J./New Providence) picked up two goals and two assists and freshman Elon Tuckman (Princeton, N.J./Princeton Day School) provided a spark off the bench with a goal and two assists.
 
Freshman goalie Scott MacMillan (Berwyn, Pa./Conestoga) stopped nine shots and junior defenseman Mitch Wykoff (Fairfield, Conn./Fairfield Ludlowe) tracked down four ground balls as he climbed into a tie for fifth on Gettysburg's career list with 219. Freshman Joe Persche (Summit, N.J./Summit) won 14-of-21 face-offs and grabbed six ground balls.
 
Casey Grieves paced Washington (7-9, 4-4 CC) with three goals and Kevin Trapp and Zachary Gorrasi each posted two tallies. Chris Del Rosario made eight saves in goal.
 
Gettysburg controlled the action for most of the first half of play with Kolen putting the Bullets on the board off a feed from McCormick just over two minutes into the game. Tuckman found McCormick for a score three minutes later to push it to 2-0.
 
Following Washington's first goal by Gorrasi, Fletcher tossed in a pair with the second coming in transition following a caused turnover by sophomore Connor Leach (Wolfeboro, N.H./Brewster Academy) to give the Bullets a 4-1 advantage.
 
The Shoremen sliced the deficit down to one with back-to-back goals at the end of the first quarter and the beginning of the second. Fletcher picked up his third goal just 16 seconds after Washington's second tally, igniting a 4-0 run by the Bullets. Gettysburg went into halftime with a seemingly comfortable 8-4 advantage.
 
Washington blanked the Bullets in the third quarter, while Greives accounted for all three goals to once again cut the margin to one goal at 8-7 entering the final frame.
 
Senior Jackson Mumford (Ocean City, Md./Stephen Decatur) knocked the ball away from Gorrasi early in the fourth quarter and the hosts capitalized on the turnover with McCormick taking it to the cage himself. An interception by MacMillan on the Shoremen's next possession set the stage for McCormick to find Harvey for the score and a 10-7 lead with 9:50 remaining.
 
Trapp scored a man-up goal to pull Washington back within two goals and the two sides settled into a war of attrition over the next eight minutes with neither offense finding pay-dirt. That changed with 71 seconds to go with Harvey finding Kolen for a goal. Just seven seconds later, the Bullets struck again as Persche seized the face-off and passed the ball to Tuckman for the final tally with 1:04 left.
 
Gettysburg led in shots (48-35), ground balls (35-33), and face-offs (15-8).