Though the Cavaliers bid farewell to senior Lauren Elstein, the team still has its postseason ahead of it. Photo by Toby Loewenstein.

The No. 3 Virginia field hockey team closed out its regular season with a come-from-behind 2-1 victory against No. 13 Duke Saturday afternoon at University Hall Turf Field.

The 16 regular season wins for Virginia are its most since the 1997 season, when the Cavaliers advanced to the NCAA championship semifinals. Virginia’s only losses this season have come against No. 1 Maryland and No. 2 North Carolina.

“The numbers speak for themselves,” Virginia head coach Michele Madison said. “It’s a tribute to what the kids have done and how strong they are as a team.”

The Blue Devils (9-9, 0-5 ACC) opened aggressively against the Cavaliers (16-2, 3-2 ACC), and Virginia fell behind in the 21st minute, when Duke was able to convert on a penalty corner. For the game, Virginia had a 7-5 advantage on penalty corners but was unable to convert any of them. Overall, the Cavaliers also out-shot the Blue Devils 15-8.

“The plays are designed perfectly and we weren’t getting any goals off of them, which was a little discouraging,” Madison said.

The Cavaliers began the second half quickly, though, scoring only five minutes into play. Sophomore midfielder  Paige Selenski tied the game off a cross from sophomore midfielder Michelle Vittese. Selenski’s 22 goals this regular season tied for the second highest total tallied by a sophomore in program history.

Four minutes later, the Cavaliers took the lead on a Vittese goal. Sophomore back Floor Vogels caught the Blue Devils off guard as she pushed the ball downfield to Selenski after a failed Duke corner. Selenski then dribbled into the circle and dished it to Vittese, who notched her sixth goal of the season.

Though the Cavaliers bid farewell to senior Traci Raguskas, the team still has its postseason ahead of it. Photo by Toby Loewenstein.

“I wasn’t totally pleased with today,” senior forward Traci Ragukas said. “We pulled it out and stepped it up when we had to, but we need to come out strong.”

Saturday was also Senior Day and the team’s two seniors, Ragukas and back Lauren Elstein were honored after the game. Ragukas has accumulated 50 career goals, which puts her in a tie for sixth in program history, while Elstein has totaled seven career goals.

“You can see the last four years and how it led up to this and how hard we have worked and how far we have come,” Elstein said. “We are a program in the making. It’s great what we have done, but there is still more work to do. We hopefully have eight more games.”

The Cavaliers’ next task will be the highly contested ACC Tournament, which will take place Thursday through Sunday at the University Hall Turf Field. The Cavaliers will face the Blue Devils again in the first round.