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CARY, N.C. - The top-seeded North Carolina women's soccer team defeated fourth-seeded Duke, 6-1, on Saturday in the semifinals of the ACC Championship at SAS Soccer Complex in Cary, N.C. The Blue Devils fall to 13-6-1, while the Tar Heels improve to 20-0. North Carolina will next play second-seeded Florida State on Sunday in the ACC Championship at 1:30 p.m.
North Carolina jumped out to an early 1-0 advantage as Heather O'Reilly connected on her seventh goal of the season at the 5:17 mark. Duke had a run at the Tar Heel goal, but North Carolina goalkeeper, Aly Winget, was able to take control of the ball and send it down the field to teammate Alyssa Ramsey. Ramsey then hit O'Reilly for her seventh goal of the season.
The Blue Devils were able to even the match in 23rd minute of the contest as a North Carolina defender fed the ball back to Winget, but the sophomore goalkeeper slipped and allowed an own goal to tie the contest, 1-1. The Tar Heels came back and took a 2-1 lead just eight minutes later as Elizabeth Guess blasted a rebound off a Lindsay Tarpley shot for her fifth goal of the season.
At the end of the first half, North Carolina held a 12-5 shot advantage and Blue Devil goalkeeper, Thora Helgadottir, had two saves.
North Carolina added four more goals in the second half to earn a 6-1 victory, after Duke changed its formation to attack the Tar Heels. Collecting goals were Ramsey with two, Heather O'Reilly and Elizabeth Guess.
Duke will now await the NCAA Tournament selection show on Monday at 3:30 p.m. on ESPN News. The first round of the NCAA Tournament will begin on Nov. 14 at host sites.
Postgame Quotes
Duke Head Coach Robbie Church
"North Carolina is playing very well right now and at a very high level. I thought we came out and worked hard. We were unfortunate on a couple of things. Obviously, late in the game we changed our formation to a matchup formation to give us a chance to win. I am not concerned about what the score is. Our philosophy was we were going to come out and attack and try to win the game. I thought we tried to win the game. It got away from us a little bit at the end."
"We have had a great year and we now have to move on. We are going to be a top-16 team in the NCAA Tournament and looking forward to it."
"We could of made it 3-1, but we lose to 3-1. Why are we going to play to lose or play to keep the score respectable. We are going to play to win the game. The girls wanted to play that way and that is how we are going to play them. We would of had no chance to win if we stayed in the same formation that we were in. We went into an attacking formation and we are better that we went to that formation. When we walk out of the gate, this game is over with. We are getting ready for the NCAA Tournament and we are better because we played them. They are the best and we want to be the best to."
"I hope we play them again. If we play them again that means we have done something really well because we will see them down in the third or fourth round. That means we were very, very successful.
Casey McCluskey
"I thought we played a great first half and we started off the second half well, but North Carolina is a great team and finished off their chances. When they got up 3-1 against us with 20 minutes left, we had already decided that if we were in that situation we were going to adjust and go forward. Their lineup is obviously very attacking oriented and it kind of left some voulnerability on defense and they were able to capotalize on it."
"There is no doubt in my mind that we would of been able to hold a 3-1 game, but we wouldn't of been able to win the game. We were trying to win the game and I don't think that 6-1 is a reflection at all of what the game was."
Kate Seibert
"Whenever you play them [North Carolina] you are going to learn a lot. They have so many good players and you can learn so much from the runs they make. You can even learn things that can help our offense. I think we can learn a lot from this and move on to the next round."
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