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North Carolina women beat Wake Forest 4-2 in soccer
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Published: October 6, 2008
Casey Nogueira proved yesterday why she is a candidate to be named ACC player of the year after scoring three goals and adding an assist to help No. 2 North Carolina defeat No. 16 Wake Forest 4-2 at Spry Stadium.
Nogueira, a junior, has 12 goals and five assists to give her an ACC-leading 29 points.
"I've been playing pretty good," Nogueira said. "Honestly, I've been playing for the team. The points -- I don't care who gets the points. For me if it's Nikki (Washington) or Courtney (Jones), it doesn't matter who gets the points. I just want us to keep doing well."
Nogueira scored the first goal for the Tar Heels (11-1-1, 4-0) at 14:25 after she took a pass from Tobin Heath on the left-hand side and fired it from 10 yards to the right of the goal past goalkeeper Laura Morse.
The Tar Heels, who out-shot the Deacons 13-2 in the first half and 23-5 overall, continued to pressure the Deacons. The Tar Heels scored again when Yael Averbuch took an assist from Nogueira and shot it in the right side of the net past Morse at 19:34 to push the lead to 2-0.
The Tar Heels appeared to be pulling away when Jill Hutchinson of the Deacons changed things. Hutchinson took a pass from Sarah Winslow from about 25 yards and shot it over the head of goalkeeper Anna Rodenbough to trim the lead to 2-1 with 3:26 left in the first half.
Hutchinson's goal ended a string of 20 straight goals for North Carolina against Wake Forest. The last time that Wake Forest had scored a goal against North Carolina was Nov. 2, 2002, when North Carolina defeated Wake Forest 3-1 in Chapel Hill.
"We came out (yesterday) really competitive, and this is a great team. We're still building," Hutchinson said. "It's not the best result, but it's something to work from."
The string of games against the Deacons is just another piece of dominance for the Tar Heels. The Tar Heels lead the series 22-1 against the Deacons.
"I want to credit (Coach) Tony (da Luz) and his kids for making it a really difficult game for us," Coach Anson Dorrance of North Carolina said. "Nothing was easily given. They really went at us. I really like the way they play; they keep the ball really well. They've got some people that can finish. I thought their first strike was world-class."
Neither team scored in the second half until Nogueira took a pass from Washington and fired it in the upper-right side of the net to push the lead to 3-1 at 75:56.
"We kind of had trouble holding the ball because Wake Forest was putting really good pressure on us," Nogueira said. "So we were kind of struggling. We got a lucky break. Nikki played me a great ball and I just scored on it, and that kind of got us back into it, I think.
"That kind of knocked their spirits back a little bit. They came after us a lot, and they played great."
Wake Forest converted on a corner kick with 8:32 left. Hutchinson took the corner, and Caitlin Farrell took the ball and passed it to Amy Smerdzinski. Smerdzinski took the loose ball in front of the net and flicked past goalkeeper Ashlyn Harris, who came in for Rodenbough.
"We've seen Carolina in their recent games, and they've kinda had a dip in the second half," da Luz said. "You can't maintain that level of pressure for 90 minutes. It's really not possible, so when that starts to run down then you can play. We took advantage of that in the second half."
Any chance that the Deacons had of coming back was quickly erased when Nogueira scored 3:28 later to make it 4-2.
"Winning by a goal against them was not comfortable," Dorrance said. We couldn't really get a hold of the ball. They were pressurizing us a bit; we were coughing it up a bit because of their pressure. When they attacked, their frontrunners were very good with their back to goal. Whenever they got a ball with one of our defenders on their back, they didn't give it up easily."
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