The new-look, younger Blue Devils had the opportunity to write a new chapter in their rivalry against the Terrapins, one that Maryland has dominated in recent years.
The Terrapins narrowly defeated Duke twice last season in heartbreaking fashion, including a 12-11 win in the 2009 ACC championship game.
Unfortunately for the Blue Devils, No. 2 Maryland (3-0, 1-0 in the ACC) continued its dominance over its conference foe.
The Terrapins easily coasted to a 17-4 victory over No. 5 Duke (4-1, 0-1) at Koskinen Stadium Saturday in both teams’ ACC opener. Maryland jumped out to an early 4-0 lead and did not look back for the rest of the afternoon. Saturday’s lopsided loss was not, however, indicative of the Blue Devils’ play from their first four games.
“The hard thing for me to wrap my head around today is we really did not execute and Maryland clearly did. They didn’t do a whole lot wrong on the field,” head coach Kerstin Kimel said. “We made mistakes that we haven’t been making, and you just can’t do that against Maryland. They made us pay for just about every mistake.”
Duke appeared to briefly regain momentum when junior midfielder Sarah Bullard netted a goal at 10:51 to put the Blue Devils on the scoreboard and trim the deficit to three, but Maryland freshman Katie Schwarzmann responded a minute later with a score on a free position shot. Schwarzmann proceeded to post one more goal in the first half as she led her team to a 9-1 advantage at the intermission.
The Blue Devils did not fare any better in the second period, and the Terrapins continued their dominance on the attack. Even though Bullard added two more goals and Duke did make some encouraging defensive stops, it is difficult to highlight any one player’s performance in such a tough loss.
On a more positive note, playing against a team as strong as Maryland did give the young Blue Devil squad some more experience against high-caliber competition.
“We have a lot of experience under our belt for just being in February,” Kimel said. “We have played both national teams and a lot of good opponents up to this point. I felt we were really ready going into the Maryland game and unfortunately that didn’t show on the field.”
Kimel’s squad played like a completely different team Saturday compared to earlier in the season. Duke did not execute nor develop a solid rhythm. The Blue Devils’ usually high-paced attack had posted more than 16 goals in each of its first four games and had not allowed more than 10 scores in any contest, but both streaks were broken Saturday.
“Any time you play a great team like Maryland, you use it as a good measuring stick, whether you win or lose,” Kimel said. “Clearly, we have a lot of growing to do from here and this is hopefully one of those games where we watch the film, learn a lot and then throw it away.”
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