Wake-up call

The North Carolina men's soccer team dominated 45 minutes of play Saturday against No. 1 Wake Forest.

But the final score wouldn't indicate that. The No. 7 Tar Heels fell 4-2 despite carrying a 1-0 lead into halftime.

(Wake Forest is) playing with a different level of confidence coach Elmar Bolowich said.

Everybody is gunning for them. Everybody wants a shot at it. They have their big target but they are dealing with it very well. You know" it's hard to rattle their cage.""

The statistics told a different story" as well. The Tar Heels held a 13-10 edge in shots and a 6-2 advantage in corners. UNC dominated the first half and did not concede a shot the entire opening period.

Sophomore Cameron Brown gave the Tar Heels (11-4-1 3-4 ACC) the goal advantage a minute before halftime thanks to some crafty give-and-gos from striker Brian Shriver.

The goal gave North Carolina the momentum heading into halftime" in front of the third-largest crowd in men's soccer history.

""Obviously in the first half" we did what we wanted to do senior Mike Callahan said. The second half we actually came out up until they scored" and we were doing really well.""

But as the old sports adage goes" good teams always find a way to win. Wake Forest (15-0-1 5-0-1 ACC) did so in a dominating and stunning fashion scoring three goals in a six-minute span.

In the 64th minute goalkeeper Jacob Wescoe came out of the box to challenge for a ball and Cody Arnoux chipped a shot over his head from nearly 25 yards out.

Just 53 seconds later Zack Schilawski buried his first goal off a through ball from Arnoux. And the Demon Deacons pulled the plug in the 65th minute when a Schilawski cross was deflected into the back of the net.

Wake Forest was awarded a penalty kick in the 80th minute and Sam Cronin buried it for a 4-1 lead.

The Tar Heels also were given a penalty kick two minutes later and senior Michael Callahan who played his final match at Fetzer Field" converted the spot kick to cap the scoring at 4-2.

""I'm not really sure (what happened)"" Callahan said. It just kind of fell apart. It really came down to a 15-minute lapse when they started scoring.

""It's just a matter of being able to bring the way we played in the first half and having the discipline to do that for 90 minutes.""

The loss put the Tar Heels below .500 in the conference again. But North Carolina will finish its regular season at Maryland on Friday"" looking to end a three-game losing streak — and to bounce back from this demoralizing loss.

""You want to grow" Bolowich said. You can look at it many ways. You can say ‘OK we gave up four goals and lost the game" the whole negative connotation.

""But you also got to look at the positives for us and say" ‘If we can play a half like that then how about next time" we're going to put 90 minutes into it?'""



Contact the Sports Editor at sports@unc.edu.