As Duke women's soccer prepares for the NCAA College Cup, the Blue Zone offers a preview of the tournament's final games:
As the days get colder and shorter, No. 1 Duke women’s soccer heads towards the end of its historic 2024 campaign, one way or another. After easily dispatching of Howard, Texas Tech, and Michigan State, the Blue Devils welcomed ACC rival Virginia Tech to Koskinen Stadium Nov. 30, knocking the Hokies off in a tight 1-0 victory.
As expected from the country’s top team, head coach Robbie Church’s group has advanced to the College Cup, three final matches between the country’s four best teams. The College Cup is hosted locally in Cary, N.C., and there will undoubtedly be a strong contingent of Blue Devil faithful in the stands, pulling for their side.
Unfortunately for Duke, there won’t be any home-field advantage in its first game Friday, as it will be matching up against local archrival North Carolina. The Tar Heels are one of two sides to have beaten the Blue Devils this season, taking them down in the semifinals of the ACC tournament. The conference tournament win for head coach Anson Dorrance’s squad must have been cathartic after falling twice to Church’s group twice in the regular season.
The first matchup for Duke against North Carolina featured a single goal from Maggie Graham, and Graham added another rivalry score, along with a pair from Hannah Bebar, in the team’s second regular-season matchup. In that game, North Carolina’s star Kate Faasse knocked a goal home, one of her team-leading 19. The Blue Devil defense, headed up by ACC Defensive Player of the Year, Cameron Roller, and ACC Goalkeeper of the Year, Leah Freeman, will have its hands full with Faasse again, and shouldn’t take its eyes off of the talented Bella Sember either.
On the other side of the ball, Graham and the outstanding Mia Minestrella have led a balanced Blue Devil attack in goals, with Mia Oliaro and Ella Hase dishing out the most assists. This dynamic group will take on a North Carolina defense it’s become quite familiar with, a unit that features two freshmen in Trinity Armstrong and Aven Alvarez — both playing big minutes as relatively inexperienced collegiate players.
This will undoubtedly be the most high-pressure competition that any of these players have seen in their careers, and whichever side keeps cooler heads should prevail in the national semifinals.
“We’re a team [that] really wanted to be playing in the ACC Championship, but knew we couldn't. We had to prepare for this,” Church told The Chronicle after defeating the Bison in the first round of the NCAA tournament.
A semifinal loss to their archrivals was more than enough motivation to earn another shot at them, and the Blue Devils could get revenge with a sweeter type of semifinal victory.
However, whoever survives and advances will have to play another, even higher-pressure game. The other side of the bracket features two other conference opponents, fellow Tobacco Road rival Wake Forest, and one of the newest members of the conference, Stanford.
The Blue Devils easily dispatched of the Cardinal in California earlier this season by a score of 4-1, and beat the Demon Deacons on the road as well, 2-0. Both matchups featured outstanding individual performances, with Graham scoring a hat trick against Stanford, and Oliaro netting a pair against Wake Forest.
Both potential opponents have had significantly harder times scoring than the Blue Devils, with Stanford only scoring 35 goals this season, barely more than half of Duke’s 68. Wake Forest had scored 45 times, but its offense has been quite heliocentric, with Caiya Hanks being involved in 22 of them. An individual star can present a challenge and rise to the occasion of a potential national championship, but Duke has proven able to defend the best teams and players in the country before, and should be used to it at this point.
The Demon Deacons will have an undeniable home-field advantage against the Cardinal, but either Duke or North Carolina will have a dominant crowd in the national championship.
In Church’s final season, his team will take on its archrivals Friday at 7:30 p.m., for a chance to play in the national title game Monday at 7 p.m.
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