No. 7 Deacs to face No. 3 Heels

By: By John Dell | JOURNAL REPORTER
Published: October 09, 2009

North Carolina and Wake Forest, two of the best men's soccer teams in the country, will meet at 7 p.m. today at Spry Stadium in a match that should have an NCAA Tournament feel.

North Carolina (8-1-1, 3-1 ACC) is ranked No. 3 by Soccer America, and Wake Forest (7-2-1, 2-1) is No. 7. The teams last met in the College Cup semifinals last December in Dallas, with the Tar Heels winning 1-0. That ended the Deacons' bid for a second straight national championship.

"It's a huge rivalry, and it has been ever since I've been here," said senior Zack Schilawski, the Deacons' leading scorer. "We have a lot of bitter feelings toward them for what happened last year in the final four. They took something that we thought was ours, so we want to set the record straight."

Tonight's winner will stay in the thick of the ACC race, but with the top four teams in the standings (UNC, Maryland, Virginia Tech and Wake Forest) already carrying one loss each, the battle for the regular-season title probably will go to the wire.

Coach Jay Vidovich has his Deacons playing well, and the return of defender Ike Opara should provide a boost. Opara missed the Deacons' last six games while playing for the U.S. national team at the Under-20 World Cup. The Deacons went 4-2 without him, with losses to Virginia (1-0) and UNC Charlotte (3-1).

"We lost two games with him gone, and who knows, we call him ‘The Ike Factor,' so we don't know what could have happened in those games if he was here," Vidovich said.

Schilawski said that getting a chance to play the Tar Heels again will be fun but challenging. UNC lost to Maryland in the NCAA championship game but returned most of its core players from last season.

"It's going to be huge with how the ACC is kind of unfolding," Schilawski said. "Right now, the top four teams in the league have gotten knocked off and have one loss, so I think this weekend is going to be kind of where the teams might separate themselves."

The Deacons have a 4-1-1 record in their last six games against the Tar Heels, who haven't won at Spry Stadium since a 1-0 overtime victory in 2005.

jdell@wsjournal.com.

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