CARY - Paul Dudley lay face-down on the ground for several seconds, his last-chance header having just sailed wide left of the North Carolina net.
As the clock wound down on a 1-0 Tar Heel victory in the ACC tournament quarterfinals, Duke's season to date was captured in that one lasting image. The No. 21 Blue Devils (11-7-1, 4-4-1 in the ACC) came up just short, unable to cash in on their last-ditch scoring opportunities.
"We had a great chance there at the end with one of those storybook kind of deals with a header to tie it just before the buzzer, but it wasn't to be," head coach John Rennie said. "We put ourselves in a hole and didn't get out of it."
Dudley's header with 17 seconds remaining was not the only Duke chance in the final minutes. The third-seeded Blue Devils inserted forward Spencer Wadsworth and midfielder Zack Pope for defenders to increase their offense, and the team responded with scoring chances from midfielder Michael Videira, forward Mike Grella and Dudley.
But Duke was unable to convert against sixth-seeded North Carolina (7-7-5, 4-5-0) and was knocked out of the tournament, ending its two-year reign as conference tournament champions.
The Blue Devils started slowly, and the Tar Heels wasted little time in taking advantage. They got on the board in the 13th minute, as Scott Campbell drove down the right side and centered the ball to Michael Callahan eight yards from the Blue Devil goal. Callahan one-timed it past a diving Brendan Fitzgerald for the only score of the contest.
"We made a little bit of changes to where I have a little more freedom," Campbell said. "Bill [Dworsky] just played me a great ball through, and that's a goal 90 percent of the time."
Three minutes later, the Blue Devils sustained another blow, this one the latest in a season-long list of injury problems. Midfielder Cole Grossman, who started in place of the injured Videira, suffered a concussion on a Duke corner kick. He was replaced by Tomek Charowski and did not return the rest of the game.
"You're putting Band-Aids on problems," Rennie said. "You can't win big games if you have to do that very often."
At the start of the second half, however, the Blue Devils received a lift with the return of Videira. The senior midfielder had been out since Oct. 31 with a torn quadriceps. He was not at full strength, but his presence provided a psychological boost for the team, Rennie said.
"After watching the first half, I just wanted to get in and pick everyone up," Videira said. "It seemed like when [Wadsworth] came in, the play kind of turned around a little bit more in our favor toward the end of the first half. That's exactly the same effect I wanted to have on it."
The Blue Devils played more effectively with their senior co-captain back on the pitch, but they were unable to avoid their second consecutive loss to North Carolina. Duke lost a double-overtime 1-0 match in Chapel Hill Oct. 11.
The Blue Devils expect Videira and the rest of the team to be completely healthy when the NCAA tournament starts in nine days, a stretch that will give Duke some much-needed rest before Rennie begins his final quest for his second national title.
"It's part of the season-one-and-done," Rennie said. "Now we've hopefully got another one-and-done. So if nothing else, that means I can only lose one more game as a coach, so I guess that's a good thing."
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