After two narrow defeats in a row and a fall from the nation's top ranking, No. 6 Virginia heads into tomorrow's match-up against No. 7 North Carolina desperate for a return to early season winning form.
"Its huge, its absolutely huge," senior midfielder Chris Rotelli said. "As far as I'm concerned, it's a must-win game. We need to turn things around."
The Tar Heels (5-3, 2-0 ACC) invade Klockner Stadium fresh off an 11-10 loss to No. 1 Johns Hopkins. Virginia (5-2, 0-1 ACC) also fell by one goal to the Blue Jays in an 8-7 squeaker in Baltimore, March 22.
Against another common opponent, ACC rival Maryland, the two squads fared much differently. North Carolina easily defeated the then undefeated Terrapins 10-6 at College Park, while the Cavaliers fell to Maryland 8-7 at home last Saturday.
The loss dropped Virginia to its lowest ranking of the year and marked the second straight game the Cavaliers had scored single digits. Virginia had tallied at least 10 goals in its first five games of the year.
"I don't think the offense has played well for three weeks now," Rotelli said. "I don't think we're working hard enough now on the offensive end, particularly with simple exchanges."
Statistically, the Cavaliers outperformed both Johns Hopkins and Maryland. Virginia took more groundballs and fired off more shots in both defeats and dominated the Terrapins 15 to 4 in faceoffs, but nonetheless fell behind early and failed to hold a second half lead in both games.
"Everybody is getting away from our team concepts and worrying about individual match-ups," Rotelli said. "Its not because we're selfish, we're just not thinking out there."
The Cavaliers looked like a team of destiny early in the year, defeating defending national champion Syracuse, and last year's runner up Princeton in early March to earn the nation's top-ranking. Virginia coach Dom Starsia said the Cavaliers' early success may have caused the squad to look past some lower ranked opponents.
"We may have become a little preoccupied with the big picture and lost track of the immediate," Starsia said. "Everybody's talking about playoff posturing and meanwhile we get beat by a team that wasn't probably thinking about national championship all week and just thinking about beating Virginia."
The Cavaliers will need to snap their first half scoring woes to have a chance against North Carolina. In the last two games, the Cavaliers have scored a grand total of two tallies and went into halftime trailing by an average of 4.5 goals. Virginia averaged six first half goals in its opening five games.
One part of the game the Cavaliers have not let up on recently has been faceoffs. Sophomore midfielder Jack deVilliers, the squad's main faceoff specialist, had a spectacular performance in the loss to Maryland, winning 15 of 19 draws for a career high 78.9 percent success rate. DeVilliers enters play this weekend holding a 62.2 percentage on the season.
North Carolina averages 10.6 goals a game but will be up against a Virginia defense that has continued to play at a high level, even during the team's recent struggles. The Cavaliers have held opponents to an average of 8 goals per contest this season.
The Tar Heels opened the season losing two of its first three games, but then reeled off four straight wins, including conference triumphs over Duke and Maryland.
North Carolina currently holds first place in the ACC and Virginia would need wins against the Tar Heels and at Duke next Saturday to earn a share of the ACC championship and the top seed in the conference tournament.
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