It was a cold night at Klöckner Stadium as the Virginia women’s soccer team matched up against Duke. The offenses of both teams were kept as cold as the night air by two of the country’s best defenses, with neither team managing a goal in the 90 minutes of regulation nor the two periods of overtime. Although the game ended in a 0-0 draw, the Cavaliers were able to rattle off 22 shots to the Blue Devils’ six.
“With the way the game went our team is disappointed it didn’t come away with 3 points tonight,” Virginia coach Steve Swanson said. “We clearly had our chances. We did enough good things to win the game. But we didn’t take our chances well.
A Virginia set piece in the 82nd almost gave the Cavaliers the edge as a shot that deflected off the Duke goalie almost dribbled across the goal line but was called null because of a Cavalier foul in the box.
“We are usually pretty good on our set pieces,” Swanson said. “I thought we were dangerous at times. From the run of play we have to get a little sharper and make a little bit better decisions, and that will make the difference.”
Virginia kept up the pressure and gave itself another scoring opportunity just three minutes later in the form of a cross from freshman forward Lauren Alwine that was headed wide by sophomore forward Meghan Lenczyk.
“You couldn’t say that we were pressing the issue and you couldn’t say that we had the energy tonight and you couldn’t say we had the effort tonight,” Swanson said, adding, “certainly the result is disappointing given the way the game went.”
Six more shots from the Cavaliers in overtime couldn’t secure a Virginia victory. The Cavaliers took another set piece from just outside the 18 and managed a shot on goal that took a diving save from Duke goalie Cassidy Powers to keep the game alive.
“Its always frustrating when your team’s getting shots on goal but can’t put them away,” senior defender Alli Fries said. “But that’s soccer — it’s a game of inches. [You] can’t really count on the shot count; it’s got to go in the back of the net.”
As frustrated as the coach and players on the Cavalier side of the pitch might be, against a team as good as Duke, Swanson saw positives from the outcome and, as always, things from which the team can learn.
“I’m very proud of the kids to shut down a team like Duke,” Swanson said. “I thought the defense played overall for the majority of the game extremely well. We did a great job; we generated a lot of chances. I think there are a lot of things we can learn from the game heading into the game Sunday against Wake Forest.”
The orange and blue now look to their last game of the season Sunday. The Demon Deacons sit at sixth on the ACC table with a 3-5-0 in conference record, 10-6-0 overall.
“Tomorrow at practice we will definitely be talking about it,” Fries said. “It’s out last game at Klöckner — our last guaranteed game at Klöckner ... definitely we need to put it all out there. It’s senior day and so we need to work hard for everyone.”
Tonight Wake Forest secured an ACC playoff berth by defeating Virginia Tech in Blacksburg. Momentum will be in the Deacons’ favor Sunday, but Swanson feels prepared and confident.
“Everybody knows that these last four games were always tough games,” Swanson said. “There’s nothing that we didn’t know. The big challenge for us is to get regenerated, get recovered and go out and get back and finish what we didn’t do tonight. I’m confident; I think our team can beat anybody any given day.”
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