The pre-game rankings only told half of the story as the No. 4 Duke women's lacrosse team downed No. 9 Virginia, 14-10, at Klockner Stadium on Saturday afternoon.
Duke (8-2, 2-1 ACC) came off the bench firing, going up 3-0 before the game was three minutes old. Those goals, topped off with a smooth bounce shot from Duke sophomore Kelly Dirks, gave the Blue Devils a lead that Virginia (7-5, 0-3) never chipped to less than two.
"Our team has a problem with getting down in the beginning," Cavalier midfielder Molly Cangemi said. "We'll get down and then we'll come back and cut their lead; but we could never take that next step and actually take control of the game."
"I'd like to say we've never been in that position before," Virginia coach Julie Myers said. "But that's a familiar position for us, unfortunately, and we need to make sure that we start games tougher."
The outcome of the contest was as good as predetermined once Duke took the lead. Virginia struggled with dropped passes and several missed shots until attacker Caitlin Banks and midfielder Jamie Haas scored on free position shots to put Virginia back into the game.
"When you start it sloppy, you usually end it sloppy, so I was disappointed that we couldn't regroup and catch the ball clean and take care of it a little better," Myers said.
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