Women’s lacrosse tops No. 17 Eagles

The No. 5 North Carolina women’s lacrosse team thought it had clinched a win when it led 15-7 with three minutes to play against No. 17 Boston College on Saturday, until something struck the team’s players as funny.

“It was pretty absurd,” senior attacker Corey Donohoe said. “It was on a draw control and Brittney (Coppa) came up with the ball and somehow Kara (Cannizzaro)’s foot ended up in her stick. It was a stick, and a ball, and a foot. She was literally dragging Kara around.”

With the comical tangle up momentarily distracting North Carolina (8-2, 2-0 ACC), the Eagles slipped in three goals in 53 seconds. Even so, the Tar Heels had done enough work on the other end of the field to ensure a 15-10 victory.

“We were looking forward to scoring a 16th goal and finishing the game 16-7 instead of 15-10,” UNC coach Jenny Levy said. “I wasn’t real happy with the last two minutes. We run a draw with a 1:30 left and a funny situation happened on the field.

“And we had a lot of our young kids losing focus. That turnover led to a goal, and we went back to the draw circle, led to another goal and another goal.”

Curiously, the UNC victory came despite the Tar Heels being outshot, winning fewer draw controls and having three more turnovers than Boston College (7-3, 0-3 ACC).

“We were able to score in a multitude of different ways from transition to settled,” Levy said. “I just thought our poise and patience all over the field was very good.”

Starting seniors Mia Hurrin, Katy Fitzgerald, Taylor Chumney and Donohoe exuded composure, completing high-pressure passes despite double coverage and keeping ball movement fast on the outside.

Donohoe drew two BC defenders, which opened scoring opportunities for the rest of the North Carolina attack. With six unassisted goals, the Tar Heels proved they can drive hard to the cage and finish, even while they’re double teamed.

Freshman attacker and midfielder Abbey Friend also managed three goals and two assists in her second ACC match as a Tar Heel.

“The ACC is probably the most competitive conference, so every ACC game is going to be good. We go into every one knowing it’s going to be tough,” Friend said.

Five is a relatively low number of saves for North Carolina goalkeeper Lauren Maksym. In the match against Cornell she had 13.

The low save count is indicative of the number of off-target attempts Boston College took, and serves as a testament to the strength of the rest of UNC’s defense, which recovered missed shots quickly and forced sloppy offense from the Eagles.

Although the end of the game came closer to a tie than the Tar Heels expected, their composure and ability to find the back of the cage individually and as a team secured the victory.

“This is one of the more complete games we played,” Levy said. “From possession in the midfield to defensively then offensively, I was really happy with our effort.”

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