Two of the nation’s hottest field hockey teams met Saturday afternoon in Durham, with the No. 11 Louisville Cardinals taking a hard-fought 3-2 victory over No. 5 UNC.

It was the first loss in the last nine outings for the Tar Heels, who received goals from Malin Evert and Feline Guenther.

Guenther’s goal came in the second half, and tied the game at 2-2–but Louisville responded just two minutes later when Taylor Stone carried the ball into the center circle and fired it into the back of the net.

The Cardinals (11-4, 4-1 ACC) have now won seven games in a row, while also surpassing UNC in the conference standings with the victory on Saturday.

“I’m very disappointed with the outcome,” UNC head coach Karen Shelton said after the game. “You have to give credit to Louisville – there’s no question they outplayed us in the second half.”

After Evert scored off a 23rd-minute penalty corner opportunity to give the Tar Heels an early lead, Louisville stormed right back to things up before the halftime break.

From there, the Cardinals scored two of the final three goals in order to secure the huge win on the road.

Up Next:

UNC now has just three games remaining in the regular season, starting with Sunday’s game at VCU.

“The whole season is to prepare yourself for postseason and hopefully we learn from this and get better from the experience,” Shelton said. “It wasn’t our best day, but there’s a lot more hockey to go.”

 

 

Photo via Jeffrey A. Camarati (UNC Athletics)