Virginia advances to semis

The No. 3 Virginia women’s field hockey team defeated No. 14 Duke 3-1 Thursday night in the first round of the ACC tournament.
The Cavaliers (17-2, 3-2 ACC) advance to play No. 2 North Carolina in the semifinals today at 6 p.m. at the University Hall Turf Field.
No. 1 Maryland and fourth-seeded Wake Forest start semifinal action at 4 p.m. The Demon Deacons beat fifth-seeded Boston College 4-3 Thursday to advance.
This is the fourth consecutive season the Cavaliers have advanced to the semifinals of the ACC tournament and Virginia needs only two more wins to tie the program record for the most wins in a single season.
“We are excited with the result,” Virginia head coach Michele Madison said. “Performance-wise, we had to make some adjustments with Duke. They play a different kind of style. We struggled a little bit with that but overall, once we got our attack going, we were able to create some opportunities.”
The win against Duke (9-10, 0-5 ACC) was the second against the Blue Devils in as many weeks. This week’s game had a lot of the same atmosphere, however, there were also postseason implications on the line.
The Blue Devils came out strong as they had in their previous outing against the Cavaliers, making it tough for Virginia to get the ball into the circle. The Cavaliers were able to strike first with sophomore midfielder Inga Stockel converting on a penalty corner off of an assist from senior forward Traci Ragukas 13 minutes into the game. Corners were key for Virginia throughout the game, as the Cavaliers were able to earn seven to Duke’s two.
In their previous meeting, Virginia was unable to convert on any of their corner opportunities, which has been a problem for them most of the season. This time all three of Virginia’s goals came off of corners. The Cavaliers were also able to outshoot the Blue Devils 11-5.
Duke, unfazed by the Virginia defensive pressure, tied the game just two minutes later as
freshman defender Abby Hassinger was able to convert on a penalty corner off of an assist from Lauren Miller. For the next 20 minutes both teams traded shots and looked to enter halftime knotted at 1-1.
The turning point in the game came right at the end of the first half as Virginia was able to earn a corner with 35 seconds left. Sophomore midfielder Paige Selenski scored off an assist from sophomore midfielder Michelle Vittese putting the Cavaliers up
2-1 at halftime.
“Knowing that they needed to win that game to make it to NCAAs, we knew we had to come out strong at halftime,” Selenski said. “I think it was important to maintain the same mentality coming out in the second half.”
As the second half began, the Blue Devils had a prime opportunity to score when senior forward Amie Survilla stole the ball from sophomore back Flor Vogels. Survilla then passed it off and the shot just missed the goal, as it deflected off the post. From that point, the Cavaliers were in control of the game, earning several
corners as they continued to attack the beleaguered Duke defense until finally they were able to gain an insurance goal.
Selenski scored her 24th goal of the season off of an assist from Stockel with 46 seconds left to play to seal the win for Virginia.
“We weren’t satisfied with just two goals,” senior back Lauren Elstein said. “We didn’t just play defensively, we kept fighting for it. We had a couple of shots and aggressively drew corners. We wanted to keep scoring.”
With the loss, Duke has been eliminated not only from the ACC tournament, but also is unable to qualify for the NCAA tournament as a result of its losing record.
“We knew Duke was going to be fighting for their life,” Madison said. “Their backs were against the wall. If we had given a little bit of breathing room we wouldn’t be playing North Carolina next.”