With Sunday's 1-0 win over the visiting Miami Hurricanes, the Virginia women's soccer team improved to 9-2-1 on the season and remained undefeated in the ACC. The 4-0 start in the conference is the first ever for the Cavaliers.
Virginia opened the game with many key players resting on the bench. When the Miami defense proved hard to crack, however, Virginia coach Steve Swanson looked to the bench to provide a spark. He found it in sophomore Sarah Curtis and freshman Jess Ronstedt early in the second half. Capitalizing on a Miami turnover deep in its own zone, Curtis scored the game's only goal on a deft through-ball from Ronstedt.
"Jess definitely does a great job of bringing the ball up into the offensive third," Curtis said. "I just tried to get open for her, and it was right on my foot."
Virginia's talent advantage enabled the Cavaliers to dominate possession for most of the game and keep the pressure on Miami. However, Miami's defense frustrated the Virginia attack, preferring to play a very conservative game by packing the defensive zone. When Virginia finally broke through with Curtis' goal, Miami was forced to become more aggressive and bring more players forward.
"Especially in the beginning, they did drop back a little bit," Curtis said. "That makes it more difficult to move the ball around because they have more people around the ball."
With the 1-0 lead forcing Miami to play for an equalizer, the pace of the game quickened, allowing Virginia to play the faster game it prefers. Even with the more wide-open play, however, the Cavaliers struggled to find scoring chances, and the team's finishing woes resurfaced against Miami. Runs from Shannon Foley and Sarah Huffman were snuffed out in the penalty area. Centering passes from the wings were unable to find their targets. Many opportunities were stymied by Miami defenders as well as poor offensive execution that limited Virginia to only four shots on goal.
Swanson, while pleased with the win, also recognizes many areas the Cavaliers will need to improve upon before upcoming conference tilts against Clemson and No. 1 North Carolina.
"We feel fortunate with the win," Swanson said. "We're happy about the win, but overall there's a lot of things we can do a lot better."
Swanson credits Miami for slowing the game down and forcing the Cavaliers to play a more methodical game.
"They came out emotionally ready to go," Swanson said. "They more often than not imposed their style against ours. I'm not sure we were as sharp as we needed to be against it. I felt Miami was in good shape defensively, frustrating us, denying us good chances. We got shots, but I don't think we got enough quality chances."
The win marks the fourth straight 1-0 game for Virginia, which has yet to allow a goal in ACC play.
"We have some new players in the back, but I think we're doing a great job working as a team," sophomore goalkeeper Laura Comeau said. "Just being able to mesh really well, read each other, know what to do -- that's a huge part for our team."
Swanson emphasized the need for a balance of offense and defense.
"The big picture is that we can't expect this every time, that we're going to come out 1-0 and the defense is going to carry the load," Swanson said. "We've got to share the responsibility."
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