Daily Tar Heel coverage: https://www.dailytarheel.com/article/2024/09/sports-womens-soccer-seton-hall-side-august-2024
I'm watching UVA v VCU. I think I just saw VCU's best player, Kendall Sarver, go down with an ACL. Just so f*cking innocuous. Sarver was just running, made the slightest turn, and crumpled, holding her knee...
How weird that UNC and Duke played out of conference when they are, in fact, playing in the ACC this year. How often does this happen? I can see scheduling this game in non-ACC years, but it seems strange to me to do the double otherwise.
Quite frequently. They have out of conference games seemingly once every other year, if not more frequently, in at least the last 10 years. I think it started because of the weird quirk of how the ACC was scheduled that UNC wouldn't play Duke at all, so Robbie and Anson both probably said "no we can't have that" and started scheduling each other, and then it just became a feature. This result doesn't look good for Nahas... a loss to Duke because your team didn't look to be in the right head space handling pressure ... anything less than a Championship at this point and I'm inclined to believe he gets replaced next season. His team look unprepared to deal with pressure against and at any point during the game he couldn't get them in the right head space. They were tripping over themselves, panicked half the time, driving up-field with the ball without certainty or purpose. It felt a lot like *go forward and figure it out when you get there*. There was good purpose and quality with pressing for and sustaining possession when that's what they set their mind to, but that's all it ended up being. Just good possession. There has been a constant theme to point to when Nahas tactics falter and the team is struggling. The complete and utter abandonment of the flanks, it was a problem last year for most of the year, but they did manage to fix it a bit at the end. I cannot remember if they had any corners at all in this game. I cannot remember more than two cut back cross' from near the endline in this game. I remember only those two because they are, and not by coincidence I think, the two best chances UNC had to score that night. One in each half, from Pennie to Aven Alverez who was wide open but scuffed her chance, but lead to a follow up chance from Sember from range. Another from Makenna Dominguez who put in more of a cross to the back post that caused all sorts of problems and lead to the most difficult save the Duke keeper had to make all night on a wicked shot from Ullmark. Maybe they got a corner out of that one? Duke wasn't the first team to be organized defensively against them, but this was also the first time they faced an organized defense manned by near peer, peer, and in some positions, superior athletes. It starts to become telling when a team has no direction and is just encouraged to "figure it out". It's concerning. In a lot of ways I hate modern football because of the pressure it puts on players to discover the direction themselves instead of giving them clear instructions on what should be their strategy for the game. That's what it felt like watching this game. They had lots of great tactics ... but no strategy. They were relying on their tactics to be the strategy. The team needs to get back to combining on the flanks. Get back to overlapping runs to the endline. Get back to overloading one side of the field to open up the other. It needs to be the priority. It needs to be the strategy. The bulk of what they do. Their bread and butter. It's what they do when this team looks at their best. The flank can't be the exception. It can't be a one off. It can't be the play action pass that the defense wonders when it might be coming. It has to be the run, and the Heels need to run the ball to set up everything else. What is everything else? Combining through the middle can't be their preference. Looking for Thomas or anybody else with their back to goal can't be plan A. Cutting inside and trying to set up their preferred foot for a ranged effort can't be what defenses expect. Layoffs to CB's shouldn't be where most of our shots come from. Get back to the flanks.
I believe this is the second or third time they’ve done it in the same number of years. It’s a cheap and easy SOS boosting non conference game to have and the fans love it (attendance numbers up).
FWIW, I watched a few feet away Rader being helped off the field. The knee seemed not to be the issue. They had put a boot on her foot.
Didn’t look that way to me, just seemed to be jostling for position, but others might see it different.
I agree with a lot of this, but Duke has 9 players who are grad students, 5th years, or seniors. We are exceptionally young. I wasn’t as dismayed as you. Granted, you seem to have a better “soccer eye”. The passing wasn’t great. But I thought for the pressure and age of our players, we held our own. We are missing Thomas, Shores, and Maddie. I’m hopeful that with everyone healthy and back together (and more time) we can improve. I believe in Nahas utterly and am impressed what he and Tracey Bates are able to do in these circumstances. They have little to no support and are working with short roster and very very green ladies. We will see what happens but I still have high hopes.
Recall that Duke called for a VAR inspection and the referee did go look at the slow motion video for about 3 or 4 minutes. His conclusion was that there was no foul play, showed the big box with his arms and pointed, at the center.
I agree with Stargell77. From the beginning of this season I have thought that Duke is going to have an excellent season given their very high level players. I personally think that Duke will end up being in the top 6 of the ACC and will go deep into the NCAA tournament. My personal view is that at this time the top 9 ACC teams are listed below. Things will change as the season goes on. Florida State Stanford Virginia Pitt Notre Dame Duke UNC Wake Forest Clemson UNC is a very young team with field players only two seniors starting last night (Bella Sember and Makenna Dominguez.) Dominguez for the first time ever, and Sember who has risen as a starter only this season. 3 juniors starting , no sophomores, and 3 frosh (Armstrong, Ullmark, and Gaetino). This leaves 3 new players who transferred in as graduates, late in the portal. I went to this game thinking that Duke would likely beat us 2-0 or worse on the basis of their experienced line-up and. I was surprised that the Heels matched up as well as they did. And yes, they panicked a lot in the second period, but time and experience should hopefully lead to better play later this season. 0-1 is not a bad score, especially as even as this game was with regard shots on goal which were essentially even. My understanding is that three of our more experienced players will come back at the end of September and in October. We will see how good we are at that time.
Disappointing loss but without Dahlien, Shores and Thomas it was more expected for me. With Thomas out for 2-3 weeks, we will definitely need players to step up. I really do miss the depth we had in past seasons, with 3 of our best players out currently we have even less depth with a team that barely had good depth.
Hey Babs, I like your analysis of the game, and I agree that this had some over matched UNC players with regard to athleticism and speed. However it sounds as though you are blaming much of the trouble on Nahas for not having inculcated more strategy for the players. I can understand that, but I do have a somewhat different view... and that is when being out paced and better organized will lead to a form of panic, and that is what we saw in the second half. It is not unusual, and there is not much the coach can do because the coach can not call a "time out" in this game. I'll let Stanford in the NCAA championship games be an example....starting with the premise that they are very well coached, and have excellent players. In 2009 Stanford, as #1 in the polls for the entire season, came into the NCAA Championship game with a 23-0-0 record and UNC came as the underdog with 3 losses and 1 draw. After an early goal by UNC, the game settled into a midfield game with UNC dominating and frustrating Stanford players. Near the end of the game frustration became an issue resulting with a red card and several blasts from 25 or more yards out with no success. Coach was cool and tried to calm down his players, but to no avail. Panic was a factor. And the same was true regarding the two relatively recent FSU vs Stanford championship games. Stanford comes into the games with a great record and confidence but collapses and panics. The 2018 NCAA championship game saw Stanford come with a undefeated record with a roster of 5 players who got called up to the senior team for international matches plus two other players who practiced with the senior team plus an additional 3 players who played internationally on U-20 teams. FSU was ranked 5th. As I recall,the score was 0-0 after the first half, but then, after a rain shower in the second half FSU managed a great shot from the 18 into the right corner, and this was followed by a Hail Mary from about 25 yards that slipped through the keeper's wet hands over her head into the goal. For the remainder of the game the Stanford offense seemed to repeatedly get the ball to Macario on the left side about 10 to 15 yards from the touch line and she would dutifully try to move the ball down field with one or two defenders on her and the result was repetitive, trying to clear her defenders to find a good forward pass to teammates . This seemed to be a panic response and multiple times the potential targets never seemed to loose their defender until time ran out. Watching this on TV kept me from hearing anything the coach might be yelling, but if he was, IMO the players were too panicked to execute or perhaps couldn't hear. The 2023 championship is the same. Stanford comes in with a season goals allowed record of less than 0.5 per game. Leaves with 5 goals allowed. While FSU played brilliantly, the Stanford defense panicked and collapsed twice. For instance, right after the penalty kick 28 minutes into the game, the the defense let in a goal less than 30 seconds later. But then in the second half two goals within 3 minutes happens. That's also a panic response IMO. Another panic response, in my opinion, was the end of the 2022 game where leading in the score, the Heels panicked trying to exercise a plan to kill time until time runs out. I kept thinking that if they just had kept up what they had been doing it would have ended differently.
The 2018 fsu - Stanford game was a semifinal and both goals came in the first half. The first with Gabby Carle cutting across the top of the box from her right back position and slotting a ball into the bottom right corner while sitting girma on the ground. Stanford looked very dangerous in the opening couple minutes and then fsu settled into their possession game and squeezed them. They didn’t know how to manage it. The title game last year…. That was a great fsu team. And they proved it against the best defense in the college game. I don’t think anyone was going to be able to keep up with those front five on a night they were feeling it.
Yesterday's game was a good comeback compared to Thursday's. Columbia is better than their record would offer, and the Heels played well given that we are now down 4 of out top starters. The ball control was good and the offense played together and spread the attack well. (None of the up-the-middle panic we saw at Duke.) So at the moment we are down 2 attackers (Maddie Dahlien and Olivia Thomas), 1 midfielder, (Evelyn Shores), and one defender (Emerson Elgin) - all of whom will be starting when they are on the field again. Maddie will be back at the end of this week from U20 duty. I am hoping that Emerson will be back in a game or two --we really need her in the back field. Olivia and Evelyn are unknowns in that their injuries may need more (or less) time to heal. In the mean time, we may struggle. Wake Forest (with 2 ex UNC starters) will be a good test to see where we are.
Wake jumped on Carolina right away, was clearly the better team for most of the first half. Don’t know the game well enough to say how Wake was controlling everything, they just seemed quicker to the ball, more confident, crisper passers, more aggressive. UNC was tentative at best. The Heels’ goal was a reminder that soccer can be a cruel game, the score is not always a fair indicator of the play. But give Fassee all the credit in the world, she had her one chance and she took advantage of it. And the goal really seemed to help Carolina gain its composure. Second half was essentially even and by the last 15-20 minutes UNC was in control, playing their game. Trinity Armstrong is terrific. Wake is good, could easily have won the game. Would like to have Emily Murphy back in Chapel Hill.
I had to leave at half time, and I agree with your analysis of the first half, Bosco, I too was flabbergasted that the Heels were some how in a daze, slow, poor passing, and giving up the ball a lot. It was embarrassing to watch. It didn't help to have a poor (IMO) referee...it was "let them play and tackle hard and then hand out yellow cards."
I watched the replay today and got angry all over again at the officiating. It was not just the center official, but one of the AR's had a bad day with calls as well. The center official, however, took "bad day" and went one step farther. He didn't respond well to the idea that he was mistaken *at all* and really took it out on the players and coaches on both teams as much as he thought he probably could have without going to far. Honestly, there was a few times I still think he went too far. He called Gaetino over in the second half after she made what looked like a routine challenge against Murphy, who was well aware that Gaetino was on a yellow. The official responded to Murphy's entreaty with a time stoppage and an emphatic "no more" hand waive, and then engaging in conversation with Gaetino. During the conversation, which he clearly initiated, he seemed to get really upset with something Gaetino was saying and chopped his hand intensely in the air and turned his head to the side in an absolute posture of unquestionable authority. It was beyond ludicrous and a clear indicator of his head space. From a technical standpoint, the center official and far side AR struggled with their understanding of the rules. The AR's issues were more understandable. There were three touch tight offside call, one of them just flat out wrong, against UNC in the second half. The current rules regarding video review now allow attacking sequences to be checked for offside, so the message should be as it is at the higher level ... give the benefit of the doubt to the attacker if it's close. The AR killed 3 promising over the top attacks by UNC on touch tight calls that could not be discerned on the replay to have actually been offside. All three attacks should have been allowed to run their course and then checked in the same manner in which a Faasse goal was reviewed in the previous game. The biggest issue I had with the center official was something Soccerhunter has already pointed out. I'll add the biggest incident to it, where Trinity Armstrong was nearly flipped head over heels by the force of a tackle from behind. It left her on the ground in clear agony, the crowd in utter disbelief that a foul wasn't called, and the center official jogging over to the UNC bench with yellow in hand for something Damon had said to the 4th official about the challenge. In the ensuing conversation that the center official tried to leave from quickly, Damon clearly could be heard discussing the force of the tackle, I'm pretty sure he said "it was too much force" ... the center official replied under his breath but with a clear hand gesture for "ball". It is totally unacceptable than an official at this level believes in and/or perpetuates the myth that any tackle can be made and be "legal" as long as a touch on the ball is made. It's also a frustrating response to see when you compare it to the many aerial challenges UNC players won with their heads cleanly only to have a foul called against them for being too forceful or dangerous. He was wildly inconsistent in this game about force and when it was acceptable to be applied. I'm fairly certain it's the same thing the WFU bench got a yellow complaining about. Now, about UNC. I had been holding my breath since the Duke game. I know a lot of people on here and out there had disagreed with my "strong" dislike of how this team had played and what I was seeing in between the lines. I did not see any improvement in that regard vs Columbia. I'm not sure how to describe what I was seeing beyond just saying that UNC was in a poor head space. In retrospect I think it was most likely that the Heels were trying to play faster than they needed to up and down the field. They were tight, they were rushed, it didn't feel like panic so much as they were really wound up and simply trying to do too much and do it too fast. Yes Duke and Columbia and WF (so many Seniors!) were all a tougher midfield with more experienced players... but the spaces were still there, the windows still there, and the timing on the plays were all still within ranges that we know these players have the skill to compete in. It lead to simple passes being missed and poor decisions being made over and over. In both games and at the start of the WF game, this was just not the same UNC team we saw pre-Duke. ... and then the Faasse goal vs WF happened, and ... it stopped. The UNC team that we saw before Duke randomly reappeared. It's not to say that the team hadn't been completing passes or creating combinations before, or that they were immune to it happening after ... but the consistency and quantity returned, and the inexplicably bad play was more than just fewer and farther in between. I don't understand momentum at all. I don't even know if this had anything to do with momentum. One of many speculations was that the team realized that the defense was playing so well that it didn't need to try so hard and could just "relax" and play soccer. Whatever it was, I was glad to see the UNC team that had given me so much confidence and hope before the Duke game return. The whole gosh darn defense is so unbelievably impressive to me right now. A graduate transfer in goal, a graduate transfer at outside back, a freshman at CB, and two early commitment Freshman in the other spots. A completely new back four to start the last few games while Emerson deals with injury or sickness or both. While I do think that Emerson was a beacon of quality and composure on the back line when she did return in this game, the other four players were excellent and tons of praise should be heaped on them and whoever is coaching them. Is that Leone? I saw Olivia Thomas bouncing and dancing on the sideline before the game. She shouldn't be too far away. I have no idea about Shores. I suspect Elgin might still be on limited minutes for a while, but I'm not worried about that at all. Nagai looked fine after leaving the last game with an ice pack on her ankle. It's just Dahlien then and that could be a pretty wide swing depending on how quickly she is able to get back and be available once the US is "done" at the U20 World Cup. That "done" will either be this weekend on Sunday for their quarterfinal match vs Germany, or it could be next weekend. Win on Sunday, and the US will reach the semifinal and be guaranteed one final game after that, either the 3rd place game on the 22nd or the Final on the 23rd. With that being said, this feels like a well timed and much needed week off. The game vs Pitt should be interesting. Waldrum really out-coached the Anson/Damon combination last year. Let's see if the Heels remember, because that loss stung.
I saw something similar in 2010 when UNC's Brittani Bartok was streaking down the left side unchallenged with the ball well ahead of her. I was in the stands on the opposite side of the field and heard a distinct "POP" and she collapsed instantly to the ground. Her soccer future stopped right there. Yes indeed. Quite sobering.
So I watched the U20 game vs Germany last night. As you guys know, I'm checking up on my Noles. You may or may not know, Germany went up 2 late in the game and everyone thought it was over. Not so fast my friend. There was about 9 minutes of stoppage time and Dudley scores one with about 2 and 1/2 minutes left, then Alley Sentnor (you know this woman?) scored the 2nd with about a minute left. We played 2 15 minute scoreless OTs and the US won 3-1 in PKs. Teagan Wy was a stud in goal and that Sentnor woman scored the first PK for the US. As a side note King and Sentnor played the whole time. King was a Tiger in defense thwarting numerous runs down their right. Thought you might be interested!
The ending of regulation was insane. I’m don’t remember the last time I saw two goals scored so late to tie the game.
Wake ran UVa yesterday, they were up 3 - 0 at the half and to be frank, it could have been 5 - 0 before the break. Virginia had more play in the second half, but that mostly due to Wake taking their foot off the gas and sitting back more. Wake has a lot of team speed, so yeah, they out-aggressed Virginia across the pitch as well. They return 19 fourth and fifth year seniors, have 29 returners over all and return something like 90% of their scoring and minutes from last year. This is their year, and they know it. Plus, having Colton is big for them and she could be the most significant transfer in the ACC this year.