The Cavaliers came out ready to defend their home turf last night against the Wolfpack. After two straight weeks on the road, Virginia defeated N.C. State in a 6-0 bludgeoning, securing its first 3-0 conference start since 2005.
Freshman forward Lauren Alwine scored a goal in the 38th minute and then assisted junior midfielder Jess Rostedt in the 40th minute to give Virginia (9-1-1, 3-0 ACC) a 2-0 lead against the Wolfpack (8-4, 0-2 ACC) going into halftime.
“We’ve been in positions before where we’ve been up two-nothing and we haven’t put teams away,” coach Steve Swanson said. “So that was a challenge that we put forward to [the players]: Let’s see if we can put them away; let’s see if we can score some more goals here.”
The Virginia players answered that challenge in the second half with four more goals from four different players.
Alwine also garnered two more assists to give her an ACC-leading 10 on the season.
“I like assists better than goals,” Alwine said. “It’s a good feeling creating them and setting my teammates up. But it was good to get a little bit of both tonight, though.”
Sophomore forward Meghan Lenczyk hit the back of the net for her ninth goal — five of which have been assisted by Alwine — to become the lone leading scorer of the ACC.
“Those two have seemed to go on their own kind of page early, which has been great for us,” Swanson said. “I thought they both did a good job coming off the bench when the game settled in a bit and gave us a spark.”
Rostedt, a 2006 All-ACC honoree, made her first start of the 2008 season after missing much of last season because of injury.
“When you are on the field you are actually contributing,” Rostedt said. “On the bench you are contributing too, but it just feels good to actually play with the girls on the field again.”
After taking seven shots in 50 minutes against Florida State last Thursday, Rostedt scored her first goal since the 2007 season opener.
“It felt really good, especially at Klöckner, since I started playing two games ago we’ve been on the road a while,” Rostedt said. “It’s good to be back at Klöckner.”
Undefeated so far this year at home, the Cavaliers will travel away from Klöckner Sunday to face coach Hershey Strosberg’s Clemson squad. Strosberg is in his first year at Clemson (4-4-1, 0-1-1 ACC) after leaving his seven-season assistant coach spot at Virginia last year.
“From my perspective, our players have to understand it’s Clemson we’re playing,” Swanson said. “Obviously we know a couple people on the sidelines there. They know us quite well; they know our personnel. At the end of the day, it’s going to be 11 players against 11 players.”
With a win Sunday, Virginia would remain at least tied at the top of the ACC standings with North Carolina.
“Our depth showed tonight, which was nice,” Swanson said. “As you do in every ACC game, you have to be ready to play. We’ll enjoy this for now, but we’ve got a big game Sunday.”
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