Duke women's lacrosse overpowered by Maryland offense

Despite a valiant effort, two runs of five or more unanswered goals by the Terrapins proved to be too much for the Blue Devils, as they dropped their second straight home game.

After clawing its way back into the game, Duke was unable to prevent a potent Maryland offense from racking up the goals Sunday afternoon at Koskinen Stadium as the Blue Devils dropped their ACC opener 19-10. No. 6 Duke struggled to keep up with the No. 3 Terrapins' high-octane offense from the opening draw, as Maryland jumped out to a 5-0 lead in the first 7:15 of play.

"Right at the beginning of the game they went on a large streak and that obviously isn’t how we want to play and how we want to start a game, so I think that’s what went wrong," defender Gabby Moise said. "We were going hard off the draw, I just didn’t think we got back in fast enough for them to be man up that many times.”

Junior midfielder Beth Glaros led the way for Maryland (6-0, 1-0 in the ACC) with six goals, including three in the early five-goal spurt. While the Blue Devils (3-2, 0-1) were able to partially neutralize normal threats like redshirt junior attacker Brooke Griffin, who averages 2.8 goals per game, they couldn't withstand the Terrapins offensive depth. Five Maryland players scored multiple goals by the time the final buzzer sounded.

"Maryland played a great game, and they have a lot of threats," head coach Kerstin Kimel said. "We had a hard time, but I think we did a good job neutralizing [Brooke Griffin.] But we let [Glaros] score five or six goals. It’s hard, you shut down one big threat and then you have four or five others to deal with. I don’t think we got ourselves started on a very good foot today, which I think hurt our confidence."

The Blue Devils entered the half trailing 9-5 but seemed to find their composure in the locker room, as they came bursting out of the gates with two early goals to open the second half to cut the lead to two and put the game within arm's reach. But once again, the Maryland offense proved to be too much for Duke.

"In the second half, we came out, got the draw quick, and we were able to convert on those opportunities," attacker Kerrin Maurer said. "The reason why we did so well in the second half was because of the draw and then we ran the offense that we worked on in practice. It was just the opportunity to have the ball that helped us score the goals in the second half."

With the score 9-7 with 28:39 left in the contest, the Terrapins completed their second run of five or more goals on the day, reeling off six straight in a mere eight minutes to push the lead to 15-7. This would prove to be insurmountable for the Blue Devils, as the closest they were able to cut the score to following the Maryland run was six goals.

The Terrapins were able to put up such gaudy numbers due to the fact that they largely controlled the tempo for the majority of the game. Duke was outshot by Maryland 23-40 and lost the battle of the draw 21-9. With so many scoring opportunities for the Terrapins, the Blue Devil defense just could not hold them off all game.

"Defensively, we have to find a way to tighten up because we came out slow," Kimel said. "That’s the best way to put it. I think we can’t afford that against teams with high power offenses. We have to do a better job of protecting [goalkeeper Kelsey Duryea.] And then just doing the little things and the basics well."

Duke closes out its three-game home stretch Wednesday when it hosts Georgetown. The Blue Devils will look to put an end to their two-game losing streak and get things back on track before getting into the thick of conference play.