Duke denies field hockey ACC Championship four-peat

A crowd of nearly 600 paid little attention to the final horn sounding at the Field Hockey & Lacrosse Complex on Friday afternoon, knowing full well the game was far from over. The clock showed nothing but zeros, and yet all in attendance had their sights set on the drama still unfolding before them.

Trailing Duke by one goal with the 70-minute regulation period already expired, the Terrapins field hockey team lined up for an untimed penalty corner that, if successful, would send the ACC Tournament semifinal game into overtime.

The Terps weren't able to get a shot off on their first opportunity, but again, it didn't matter. A Blue Devils foul gave the Terps one more chance.

So forward Katie Gerzabek sent in the penalty corner one last time, with the ball eventually finding its way to midfielder Jemma Buckley's stick. The Terps' leading scorer fired a shot at Duke goalkeeper Samantha Nelson, only to see the ball — as well as the Terps' chances at a fourth straight conference title — trickle out of bounds.

The Blue Devils flooded the field in celebration as the reigning ACC champions walked off the field solemnly, stunned in defeat. The No. 2 seed Terps would not get a chance to defend last season's championship, falling to No. 3 seed Duke, 2-1, in the tournament semifinals.

"There's a lot of pressure on the individuals in those, especially with no time on the clock, so we do the best that we can," coach Missy Meharg said. "I don't think there's anybody on our team who can look in the mirror and say they have any regrets."

Though the scoreline didn't reflect it, it was the Terps (15-4) who controlled the early part of Friday's contest, dominating possession in the first 20 minutes. Defender Colleen Gulick best capitalized on those opportunities, taking a rebound off Nelson's pads on an early penalty corner and netting the game's first goal less than 10 minutes in.

But as halftime neared, the Terps' early supremacy seemed like a thing of the past. The Blue Devils (13-7) converted their only penalty-corner opportunity of the half when midfielder Rhian Jones took a pass from Emmie Le Marchand and snuck a ball past Terps goalkeeper Melissa Vassalotti, evening the score at one entering the break.

"Duke's one of the leading defensive units in the country," Meharg said. "Maryland was doing a very good job of controlling the game, but again, it's about penetrating and maximizing your opportunities, and we're still working on that."

After the Terps' near-complete control for much of the first half, Duke quickly began to own the second. Le Marchand netted what would be the game-winning goal less than two minutes into the second half, converting a penalty corner to give the Blue Devils a lead they would never relinquish. Duke outshot the Terps, 7-4, from that point on in the second half, limiting its hosts' chances until the game's waning seconds.

As desperation set in with just more than five minutes left, Meharg pulled Vassalotti from the net and inserted little-used sophomore defender Christine Knauss into goal, a ploy the Terps had tried only once before this season in a game against Drexel.

The strategy began to pay dividends for the Terps, who forced the issue offensively near the end of regulation. Three of the Terps' four second-half penalty corners came in the final minute of the contest.

"We haven't been in a position where we needed to do it this year, but the concept, obviously, is to have more field players," Meharg said. "We didn't necessarily take advantage of that right away, but when we figured it out and bumped up, we were very effective."

But even with their chances late in the game, the Terps failed to capitalize.

"We have had a mission since walking off the field last weekend at Rutgers to win the Atlantic Coast Conference," Meharg said. "We're still digesting the fact that we're not going to."