To reflect on the year, Chapelboro.com is re-publishing some of the top stories that impacted and defined our community’s experience in 2023. These stories and topics affected Chapel Hill, Carrboro and the rest of our region.
If UNC field hockey star Erin Matson had left Chapel Hill and never come back after 2022, she’d still be a Tar Heel legend. Matson ended her final year as a player with a fourth NCAA championship in five seasons, scoring the game-winning goal in the final. With her Carolina playing career over, it seemed Matson’s days dominating collegiate field hockey were done. Then her head coach retired.
In the last days of 2022, UNC field hockey head coach Karen Shelton sent shockwaves through Chapel Hill by announcing her retirement. Shelton had spent the last 42 seasons at Carolina and had led the Tar Heels to a record 10 NCAA championships, the last four of which came with star player Erin Matson.
The program immediately set about on a national search to find Shelton’s successor. Less than two months later, it made its choice: the 22-year-old Matson. Her hiring made her by far the youngest head coach at Carolina and the youngest in any NCAA sport across the nation.
“Erin is an outstanding leader who has a deep and thorough knowledge of the game, understands the balance it takes to be a successful student and athlete, and is determined to expand and propel the winning tradition of Carolina Field Hockey,” UNC athletic director Bubba Cunningham said. “She knows how to inspire, listen, teach and win – all qualities that that will translate well to the sidelines and make her a terrific head coach.”
Said Matson: “I will do whatever it takes to continue the excellence that is UNC Field Hockey.”
Setting off on an unprecedented journey, Matson faced numerous challenges in her first weeks as head coach: completing a likely awkward transition from teammate to leader, navigating the ever-changing transfer portal and replacing a talented group of departing players. Ironically, Matson’s biggest challenge may have been trying to win with a team which didn’t include her on the active roster.
Still, Matson remained relentlessly positive throughout the offseason.
“I really can’t wait for everyone to see the team and how hard they’ve been working and what they can do,” she told 97.9 The Hill during the summer. “Hopefully we can walk away feeling good about it and with a good amount of wins under our belt.”
A record crowd of more than 1,700 fans packed into Karen Shelton Stadium – the cutting-edge on-campus facility named for Matson’s predecessor – to watch Matson’s coaching debut against No. 4 Michigan. One of the most memorable moments of Matson’s playing career came against the Wolverines, when she scored the game-winning goal in overtime to win the national championship on the Shelton Stadium turf in 2021. With the star now on the sideline, the result was no different: a 3-2 UNC win to start the Matson Era off with a bang.
“The atmosphere here tonight, with the fans and under the lights and the energy the team brought, it was just incredible,” Matson said afterward.
The highs of the regular season were accompanied by lows as well: home overtime losses to Iowa and Liberty, as well as a loss at Virginia in which the Tar Heels led 2-0 at halftime. But Carolina buckled down when it mattered most, defeating Duke 2-1 in the regular-season finale to clinch the ACC regular season crown, then beating the Blue Devils again in the ACC Championship to win a seventh consecutive ACC Tournament title. That victory also earned the Tar Heels the No. 1 overall seed in the NCAA Tournament for the second straight season.
The conference championship brought Matson publicity not normally afforded to collegiate field hockey. The Wall Street Journal, The Athletic, CBS and NBC were among the national outlets to shine a light on the now-23-year-old’s accomplishments. She couldn’t yet rent a car, but she was climbing up the leaderboard of the most noteworthy individual on campus.
“Every single story, every single text I get, every single tweet there is, it is about the sport,” Matson said. “It is about this program… [Field hockey] is great internationally, we know that. But in America, anything we can do helps. Whether it’s a story in the newspaper, a sold-out crowd here, some cool social media stuff, it’s been nice to see people paying more attention.”
Matson’s team had an easy enough time in its first three NCAA Tournament games, cruising past William & Mary, Harvard and Virginia to reach the national championship, once again hosted at Shelton Stadium. The opponent was a familiar one: No. 2 Northwestern. The Wildcats defeated Carolina in the tournament’s first round in 2021 on their way to the title, then fell to UNC in the 2022 championship in Matson’s final collegiate game. Matson scored the game-winning goal late in the fourth quarter.
The 2023 matchup would once again come down to the wire. With the teams tied at a goal apiece after regulation, the game went into sudden-death overtime. Ryleigh Heck missed what would’ve been the game-winning goal on a penalty stroke, and momentum swung heavily toward Northwestern when the Wildcats found themselves in a 2-on-1 opportunity in front of the UNC cage. Only a clutch stop from goalie Maddie Kahn – recruited out of the transfer portal from Lehigh first by Shelton, and then by Matson – kept the Tar Heels alive.
After two scoreless overtime periods, the championship would be decided in a penalty stroke shootout. Northwestern took the early advantage by stopping two of Carolina’s first three shots, but Kahn once again came to the rescue by stopping the third, fourth and fifth Wildcat attempts. In the sixth round, Kahn made another save, putting the match on Heck’s stick again.
Matson, whose vocal demeanor on the field was one of her trademarks in years past, remained stoic on the sideline, as she had for all of the afternoon’s tensest moments.
“A piece of it is that the team is calm and feels that steadiness,” Matson said. “But at the same time, [I’m] freaking out. You want everything to go right, and it’s purely because you want it so badly for them.”
Matson was watching along with everyone else as Heck strolled up to the spot, faked to one side and then slotted home the winning penalty stroke, giving Carolina its 11th national championship. For Matson, it was her fifth career title – and first in the big chair. She’s the only person ever to win national championships at UNC as both a player and a head coach.
“I had my five years, they were phenomenal,” Matson told reporters afterward. “This program, this university, Coach Shelton, she gave me everything. But now it is my job for these guys to feel that, and to know they’ve worked so hard and deserved it and finally earned it.
“It’s just peace. I’m so proud. I just want them to re-live this moment forever.”
The championship win did nothing to quiet the growing notoriety around Matson’s program. The Today Show on NBC discussed Matson the next morning, and more features from the likes of USA Today, the Philadelphia Inquirer (located about an hour away from Matson’s hometown of Chadds Ford, PA) and the Raleigh News & Observer made their way into print.
Ryleigh Heck, still practically glowing after scoring the championship-winning goal, had this to say about her head coach:
“She is showing people all over the world that she’s doing something impossible.”
Featured image via UNC Field Hockey on Twitter
Chapelboro.com does not charge subscription fees, and you can directly support our efforts in local journalism here. Want more of what you see on Chapelboro? Let us bring free local news and community information to you by signing up for our biweekly newsletter.
Comments on Chapelboro are moderated according to our Community Guidelines