The No. 11 Virginia men's lacrosse team travels to the Sunshine State this weekend to kick off the ACC tournament, looking to get back on track after a roller coaster regular season.
The fourth-seeded Cavaliers (5-5, 1-2 ACC) will face top seed Maryland (9-1, 2-1) tonight at 6. in the first semifinal game at Disney's Wide World of Sports Complex in Orlando, Fla. In the other semifinal, third-seeded North Carolina (5-5, 1-2) looks to avenge its regular season loss to second-seeded Duke (8-4, 2-1) at 8:30.
The semifinal winners will square off Sunday, at 2:30 p.m.
"There's not one dominant team in the conference," Virginia coach Dom Starsia said. "Every team has a legitimate shot at the title. Every team has a real chance to win, to succeed. As far as we're concerned, this is really our chance to turn things around. We've got a goal to shoot for, but talking about [winning] and actually doing it are two different things."
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"ACC competition is just different," senior co-captain David Jenkins said. "It doesn't matter what team it is, or what their rank is. Everyone just gets up a little more for this. Everyone wants to win their conference - it's just a bigger game. We need to play the way we know how to play, and then we can beat anybody."
After riding a four-game winning streak that included victories over No. 1 Maryland and No. 5 Johns Hopkins, the Cavaliers have dropped two straight decisions to conference foes North Carolina and Duke.
"Confidence has been a big factor for us all season," Starsia said. The team's confidence level "took another shot against Duke. But we still have a chance to achieve all the goals we set out to reach at the beginning of the season."
"The team just wasn't ready to play" against Duke, Jenkins said. "It's not that we didn't prepare correctly or that the coaches didn't have us ready, it's that we didn't show up as a team that day. If that doesn't happen, you can't expect to win a game. We didn't come out ready to play UNC or Duke. We can't afford to let that happen this weekend - we need to be ready."
In the first meeting between the two teams March 31 in Charlottesville, the Cavaliers put on defensive clinic as they rolled to a 7-2 victory over No. 1 Maryland. Freshman goalkeeper Tillman Johnson recorded 16 saves on the day - several of the spectacular variety - and held the Terrapins scoreless for the first 35 minutes, 51 seconds of the game.
A major factor in the win was the Virginia defense's ability to contain the nation's leading scorer, senior attackman Andrew "Buggs" Combs. Combs, who averages 3.40 goals, was only able to score with 26 seconds remaining in the game.
The status of the Cavalier first midfield is questionable for Friday's game. Senior midfielder Hanley Holcomb has not practiced in two weeks since suffering an injury during the regular-season meeting with Maryland. Sophomore midfielder Billy Glading did not play against North Carolina, and his status for Friday is also questionable.
To compensate for his hobbled starters, Starsia moved sophomore attackman A.J. Shannon into Holcomb's slot and inserted freshman Justin Mullen into the starting attack.
"We're talking about two teams in emotionally different places right now," Starsia said. "Maryland has had a great season, and they've earned the top seed in the tournament. We're coming off two disappointing losses - we just need to get some confidence back and get on a roll."
"We can do anything we want to do right now," Jenkins said. "Nothing is lost. If we play the way we know how to play, and the way we're capable of playing, nothing is out of reach. All our goals are still in place - they're still there to take. A few bad games aren't going to destroy our season as long as we can pick it back up again"
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