Head coach Kerstin Kimel and many of the Blue Devils are heading home, in a way, for the team’s first road game of the season against Maryland.
With former Terrapins Kimel and assistant coach Alex Kahoe as well as several Maryland-native Duke players, the No. 3 Blue Devils (3-0, 0-0 in the ACC) will look to make this a successful homecoming as they take on the defending national champions this Saturday.
“Playing the defending national champions is really just a great opportunity,” Trappe, Md.’s Christie Kaestner said. “For a lot of us, it’s closer to home. I know there’s going to be a lot of fans, and there’s obviously a lot of hype over the game.”
No. 1 Maryland (3-0, 0-0) is coming off a convincing win in which the Terrapins allowed just two goals against then-No. 16 Penn State. Led by ACC defensive player of the week Brittany Poist, the Terrapins give up just over five goals per game. If the Blue Devils are to find holes in Maryland’s defense, according to Kimel, they must maintain possession.
“I think the key to the weekend is winning the fifty-fifty ball and having possession,” Kimel said. “What has hurt some of these teams in watching film is that they don’t have the ball very much because Maryland wins the draw. Then they get antsy on offense, and run down the field and just turn the ball over.”
Duke will rely on Kaestner to lead the attack. She leads the Blue Devils with 18 points, but Kimel insists she does even more than what appears on the stat sheet.
“Christie’s kind of like our quarterback, it’s almost like having another coach out there on the field,” Kimel said. “She does a great job communicating and understanding the flow of the game.”
Kaestner, however, is quick to stress the importance of her teammates against the Maryland defense.
“I think we have to play as a unit,” Kaestner said. “Everybody’s a threat, everybody’s dangerous and no matter who has the ball on the stick, they’re going to make things happen.”
Defensively, Duke will look to try and limit a balanced Terrapin attack, led by Karri Johnson and Katie Schwarzmann. Schwarzmann leads the Terrapins with 13 goals, while Johnson just had her streak of 47 games with a goal snapped.
“Maryland has a lot of threats,” Kimel said. “Yet they don’t run a lot of set plays, they’re tendency heavy. So defensively, it’s going to be a matter of anticipating what they’re trying to do. You have to be able to sustain long stretches of defense and stay sharp mentally and physically.”
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