When Amy Bokker arrived at Ohio State in June 2019, her goal was clear: Get the Buckeyes in the mix. Prove they could compete in the Big Ten.

This season has been an opportunity for Ohio State to do just that with its schedule of conference-only games. The Buckeyes took another step last weekend, taking down then-No. 10 Penn State not once, but twice — a 15-12 win on March 26, then an 11-9 comeback victory on March 28.

The two wins over the Nittany Lions broke a stretch of six straight losses. Ohio State made program history with its Feb. 21 win over Michigan, its first over its rival since 2016, but hadn’t added to its win column since.

Its mid-season stretch was full of close opportunities — three of those six games were decided by one goal, but never in the Buckeyes’ favor. So they shifted their mentality and mindset, away from a focus solely on results or outcomes and instead toward competing and getting better. And the dam finally broke against Penn State.

“We were giving ourselves a shot in each and every game, competing at a high level,” Bokker said. “We just thought, ‘We need to keep our nose to the grind and keep working hard,’ and if we did that, we’d get the results that we wanted.”

Their success over the weekend started in the circle. The Buckeyes won the draw control battle in both matchups, and even as the Nittany Lions built an early first-half advantage in the Sunday game, Ohio State controlled possession and earned 19 draw controls to Penn State’s three.

The draw had powered the Buckeyes in that early win over the Wolverines, but they’d only won that battle once in the six games since. The Nittany Lions averaged around 14 draws per game coming into the weekend, but junior midfielder Chloe Johnson came in for Ohio State and nearly topped that number on her own, winning 12 in the first matchup — the most for any Buckeye in a single game since 2016 — and seven in the second.

“We wanted her to own that throughout the whole weekend,” Bokker said. “She contributed a little bit everywhere, but obviously her impact was really felt on the draws, which was awesome for our team and gave us a lot of possessions that we needed.”

As Johnson dominated one circle, fifth-year goalie Jillian Rizzo did the same inside another. Rizzo finished with 19 saves across the weekend, adding to her career total of 758 — the most among all active goalies — and earning Big Ten Defensive Player of the Week honors for the third time.

“She’s really gotten our defense to a different place than where we were when we started the season,” Bokker said. “She gives them a lot of confidence and belief, and knowing that she’ll make stops allows them to play a little more free.”

In another quirk of the Big Ten’s 2021 scheduling, Ohio State’s regular season will wrap up the same way it started — first against Northwestern, then against Michigan.

Bokker said she’s seen the growth the Buckeyes have aimed for this season, both on a small scale from game to game and in a larger sense for the program’s trajectory. As they enter this final stretch, they’re focused on continuing to move forward.

“They’re laying the foundation for our future, and most importantly, they’ve upped the standards for what we expect for ourselves,” she said. “I give a lot of credit to the players within our program right now who have really changed the mindset and have shown that they can compete at this level.”