When it rains, it pours.
The women's soccer team lost its second straight game on Sunday afternoon when it fell to Maryland, 2-1. After entering the season with extremely high hopes, the Blue Devils' record fell to 6-4 and 3-2 in the Atlantic Coast Conference after the loss--the worst start in the program's history. Their record leaves No. 7 Duke in a position it never expected to be in.
"[The losses] certainly put us in a situation where, if we even want to get into the NCAA tournament, we've got to win pretty much everything from here on in," head coach Bill Hempen said. "If we didn't put [the team] under enough pressure in the beginning with the games that we played on the road, then we certainly have created the pressure for ourselves by losing two games in the league. We'll stick together, and we'll see where we go from here."
His frustration was echoed by Duke's players.
"It's very frustrating because we almost mirror the same team as last year," senior forward Kelly Walbert said. "We only lost four seniors. They were great seniors, but we should be able to somehow pick it up. And we're just not doing it right now."
For the second straight game, Duke failed to put away its opponent early in the game. The Terrapins battled with the Blue Devils for most of the second half and took the lead with less than nine minutes left in the game, when Maryland freshman Emmy Harbo scored her second goal of the game on a low, hard shot from 15 yards out on the left side.
The score gave the Terrapins a 2-1 lead, and precipitated an offensive barrage from the Blue Devils, who attacked the Maryland goal with vigor--attempting to score the equalizer. But Maryland's freshman goalkeeper Kassie Knecht continued to stonewall Duke.
"She was great, wasn't she?" Hempen said. "If you get a goalkeeper in a situation where they make a save that they shouldn't make early in the game, then you just can't get one by her. She just got more confident as the game went on. She stepped up."
Knecht tallied seven saves on the afternoon, denying the Blue Devils time after time. Twice in the last eight minutes, she literally saved the game for the Terps.
The first time came off of a Duke corner kick. Knecht stopped the header off the corner, but the rebound came directly to Duke senior Deanna Kreidel. Kreidel's shot from point blank range was somehow saved by Knecht, who deflected it out of the penalty box.
Then with less than two minutes to play, Knecht came up with an even more impressive save. Junior defender Mandy Lehr sent a long cross in to the box, which senior forward Katherine Remy controlled with Knecht out of position. Remy turned and shot from the top of the penalty box, but Knecht, caught eight yards out of the goal, dove--and while fully-extended--deflected the ball away.
"She played a great game," Walbert said. "I think she was the difference out there with a couple of her saves."
Duke has now lost two games in a row for the first time since 1993. But it started off the game strong.
Walbert put Duke up 1-0 when she took a head ball from Kreidel nine minutes into the game and hit a soft left-footed shot into the net from near the top of the penalty box. The Blue Devils would only hold the lead for a little while, however.
With just over 20 minutes left in the half, a Duke defensive lapse let the Terps tie it. A bad header from the Blue Devils sent the ball into the box where Maryland forward Michelle Deville found herself one-on-one with Duke goalie Melissa Carr. Carr came off her line and was able to stop Deville. But the ball deflected to the right and Harbo smacked it into the empty net.
From there, both teams had opportunities until Harbo scored her second of the day. But the Blue Devils didn't impress Hempen on the day.
"They played hard today," Hempen said. "I still don't think they came out very enthusiastic. When they finally realized that they might just lose this game, then they finally started playing like the teams that I'm used to seeing out on this field.
"I didn't see the effort I wanted to out here. There's something missing in this group, and I don't know what it is. You hear [men's basketball head coach Mike Krzyzewski] talk about a `special team', and I don't know what it is right now. We're in a funk."
The good news for Duke is that it has almost a week to prepare for its next games. The Blue Devils will be searching for the answers this week in practice.
"The bottom line is there's something on the inside that's missing," Hempen said. "And I'm gonna find out where it is and get it out."
"We have many more games in the season, and we can do one of two things," Walbert said. "We can quit or we can keep fighting. Like [Hempen] says, `We should keep fighting."'
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