St. Joe’s run ends with loss to top-seeded North Carolina in the NCAA field hockey tournament
The Hawks and Tar Heels were tied entering the fourth quarter, but top overall seed North Carolina came away with the win in a rematch of last season's national semifinal.
After beating North Carolina in the semifinal of last year’s NCAA field hockey tournament, St. Joseph’s was hoping it could haunt the top-seeded Tar Heels with another upset this year, this time in the second round.
But the Hawks (12-10, 4-2 Atlantic 10) could not conjure the same magic they did last season in a Friday afternoon matchup in Chapel Hill, N.C. The Tar Heels (20-1, 7-1 Atlantic Coast Conference) beat the Hawks, 2-1, ending St. Joe’s season.
Ryleigh Heck opened the scoring for the Tar Heels with a goal in the game’s 26th minute. Laine Delmotte tied the game for the Hawks in the third quarter, but in the fourth quarter, Charly Bruder put the Tar Heels up for good with a strike off a penalty corner in the 48th minute.
Both of the Tar Heels’ goal-scorers are Philly-area natives. Heck hails from Ocean City, N.J., and graduated from Eastern Regional High School in Voorhees, while Bruder is from Malvern and played her high school hockey at Episcopal Academy.
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The Tar Heels outshot the Hawks, 14-7, and held a 6-5 edge in shots on goal and a 6-2 advantage on penalty corners.
It took both teams some time to settle into the game. North Carolina outshot the Hawks, 2-0, in the first quarter but was kept out of the net by the St. Joe’s defense.
North Carolina dominated possession for most of the second quarter and eventually capitalized on the shots it was creating. With 4 minutes, 17 seconds remaining before the half, Heck netted the first goal for the Tar Heels on the team’s sixth shot. The star senior forward controlled the ball in the circle, turned, and launched a shot into the left side of Paige Kieft’s net for her 18th goal of the season.
Kieft made two saves in the first half as the Tar Heels outshot the Hawks, 6-2. The Maryland transfer and Newton Square native recorded four saves in her final outing for the Hawks.
The Hawks had an easier time getting forward after the halftime break. Delmotte, a graduate transfer midfielder from Lafayette, whizzed a shot past Merritt Skubisz in the 38th minute for the first goal of her college career. The Hawks generated three shots in the third and kept North Carolina off the scoreboard to take a 1-1 game into the fourth.
“Our girls have had other games where we got scored on and panicked a little bit,” Hawks coach Hannah Prince said. “I just felt like today we knew there was plenty of time. We stayed composed, stuck to our game plan, and stayed the course like we have all season. It was great to get back on the board against them and tie it up.”
However, the deadlock did not last long. A Milou Kluyt foul awarded the Tar Heels a penalty corner less than three minutes into the fourth quarter. The Tar Heels sent the ball to Bruder at the top of the circle, and the junior forward whipped a shot to the left of an outstretched Kieft for her 18th goal of the season.
St. Joe mustered two more corners but couldn’t convert either opportunity. Prince pulled Kieft from the net to get an extra outfield player with 3:08 to play, but the Hawks were unable to pull themselves even again.
North Carolina advances to the tournament’s quarterfinals, where it will face Duke.
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Getting to the second round may have been some Hawks magic by itself. Prince’s team returned just eight players from its NCAA runner-up roster last season, suffered a four-game losing streak in October and entered the A-10 tournament as the conference’s No. 3 seed. The Hawks beat VCU in double overtime in the semifinal, then pushed past Richmond to claim its fifth-straight A-10 title.
St. Joe’s beat Drexel in the opening round of the NCAA tournament, 2-0, on Wednesday in Chapel Hill, N.C., to reach the second round. Carly Hynd scored both goals for the Hawks in the city rivalry, which also was the program’s fifth all-time tournament win.
“I think that they’re really proud of the way that they came together at the latter bit of this season,” Prince said. “To qualify for A-10s and then win A-10s and then win our opening-round game, and then have a really great performance today. Of course, not coming out on top is hard, and it stings, but I do think they can walk away from the season feeling proud of what they did.”