North Carolina
Virginia
Tar Heels Drop ACC Opener At Virginia, 16-5
March 16, 2008 | Women's Lacrosse
March 16, 2008
CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. - The No. 3 Virginia women's lacrosse team used a balanced scoring attack and a strong defense to shut down the No. 7 North Carolina Tar Heels, 16-5, in Klockner Stadium Sunday afternoon. The win marks the seventh straight for the Cavaliers at home and improves Virginia to 6-1 on the season, 2-1 in ACC contests. The Tar Heels drop to 6-2 overall and 0-1 in conference play.
Corey Donohoe led the Tar Heel attack with two goals and an assist. Kristen Carr, Julia Ryan and Jenn Russell all had one goal apiece.
Junior Blair Weymouth led the Cavaliers' offense to a season-high 23 points as a team, scoring four goals and adding three assists. On the other end of the field, senior Kendall McBrearty collected 11 saves in goal to keep the visiting Tar Heels attack to a season-low five goals scored.
Weymouth's seven points marks a season-high for the All-America. Fifth-year Kaitlin Swagart contributed a career-high three goals, while junior Jenny Hauser also added three scores. Junior Ashley McCulloch had two goals and two assists and senior Megan O'Malley had two goals with an assist.
McBrearty put together a dominating second half to lead the defensive unit. Stopping 10 shots in the second half, including three within seconds of each other, McBrearty allowed only five goals for the visitors, a season-low in goals allowed for the goalie.
Although the Cavaliers let in the first goal of the game, 1:09 into play, they responded with eight straight to take an 8-1 advantage into halftime.
Led by O'Malley in the first 17 minutes of play, the senior assisted Swagart for Virginia's first score at the 27:58 mark and then tallied two straight free position goals at the 18:43 and 13 minute mark. Duff also contributed a score in the run, putting Virginia up 4-1.
Hauser and Weymouth took control from there, scoring Virginia's next four goals, two apiece, to lead the Cavaliers into the intermission.
Carolina came out of the break and recorded the first score of the second half, but three straight Virginia goals, from Weymouth, Swagart and McCulloch, pushed the Cavaliers ahead 11-2 with less than 16 minutes remaining in the contest.
The Tar Heels found the back of the net twice within a minute of each other, but four more Cavalier scores put the game out of reach for the visitors. Carr scored North Carolina's final goal at the 3:43 mark, and with only 1:18 on the clock, Swagart brought the final score to 16-5.
Carolina will return to action next Saturday when it hosts Duke at Fetzer Field.
