PARKLAND – Machaela Graddy tied the match 44 seconds after Whitworth took a late lead, and Taylor Lunde scored the Golden Goal in the 94th minute of play to send the Pacific Lutheran women's soccer team to a 2-1 Senior Day win over Whitworth Sunday afternoon.

"What a weird game today," PLU head coach Seth Spidahl said. "The things that happened were just odd, but sometimes on a journey throughout a season you're going to have some stuff happen, and the fact that we showed the character to not let things out of our control was really good."

Blustery conditions impacted the match throughout, as the teams played 84 scoreless minutes before Lindsey Foster's 18-yard shot deflected off a PLU defender and into the goal. That didn't last, as Graddy responded for the Lutes less than a minute later for her 10th goal of the year on a long, low shot into the bottom left corner of the goal.

That sent the match to overtime, although it took less than four minutes into the extra period before Lunde made sure the Lutes capped their home schedule with a win. The sophomore midfielder took a pass in the middle from Megan Anderson and knocked it in from about eight yards out for the match-winner.

"She really found a moment to have a great strike on goal and finish the game off," Spidahl said.

PLU seniors Emily Hanna, Kailey Lyman, Jamie Hoffman and Nicoya Benham-Marin played their final home game in Lute uniforms Sunday, and Lunde cherished the opportunity to send them out with the walk-off win.

"I'm so happy that we can go out and do that and win the game for our seniors and for our team, because I've never been on a team like this one," Lunde said. "We all just love each other so much, and it's just so amazing to play with such an amazing crew."

While the two teams each tallied four shots in the first half, PLU out-shot Whitworth 13-5 in the second period and overtime. But the Lutes could not find the goal until Graddy's score in the 85th minute.

"Credit to Whitworth," Spidahl said. "They played really physical, really pressing and just made it hard for us to play and get into a rhythm."

The win improved PLU's record to 15-2-1 overall and 11-2-1 in conference play, while Whitworth fell to 6-10-3 overall and 4-8-3 in the NWC. PLU's 15 wins mark the team's most since 1992 and also mean PLU has improved its win total in four consecutive years. The Lutes remain tied atop the NWC with 13-time defending champion Puget Sound heading into the final weekend of the regular season. The Lutes will head to Oregon to visit Linfield on Nov. 7 before facing Pacific Nov. 8 in the regular season finale.

"I'm proud of the team," Spidahl said. "We've got to gather ourselves for our last week as we certainly have some things we need to look at, but it was a great character win today."