May 26, 2007
SEE ALSO: Stranger Than Fiction
by Andrew Scurria, Special to Lacrosse Magazine Online
PHILADELPHIA - When Duke goalie Kim Imbesi is on her game, her teammates call it "beach balls" - as in, the incoming shots look as big as beach balls.
Against Virginia in an NCAA Division I women's lacrosse tournament semifinal Friday, those shots went from beach balls to lacrosse balls to peas in a matter of minutes.
When the dust settled, Virginia had rattled off 10 unanswered goals to turn a 13-4 deficit into a 14-13 win that sparked a wild celebration at midfield and earned the No. 3-seeded Cavaliers a date with top-seeded Northwestern on Sunday with the national title on the line.
It was the largest comeback in NCAA tournament history, eclipsing the five-goal comeback by Dartmouth over Loyola in the 1998 quarterfinals.
"I can believe that it happened, but it was incredible," said Jess Wasilweski, who was forced to improvise in the final seconds when Virginia's set play broke down. She did it well enough, bullying through the Blue Devils' defense for the game-winning goal with nine seconds left, the exclamation point on the Cavaliers' season so far.
"The first word that comes to mind is 'wow,'" Virginia head coach Julie Myers said.
The Cavaliers (19-3) needed a 7-for-7 effort on clears and a 28-9 shot advantage in the second half to overcome the deficit. Ironically, they weren't even close to getting there until one of Duke's biggest weapons was muzzled.
And not by Virginia's doing.
Carolyn Davis, one of the Blue Devils' top offensive players, went down in a heap with a knee injury at midfield in the second half, and the Cavaliers finally woke up from their 40-minute stupor. Second-seeded Duke (16-4) had taken a nine-goal lead by dominating the midfield and making Virginia's offense look ill-suited to the final four. Imbesi had 10 saves in the opening frame, and the Devils looked well on their way to replicating the 19-goal outburst they produced against Virginia two months ago.
Ashley McCulloch had other ideas.
She intercepted a sloppy pass 30 yards out, streaked towards the goal, and dished to Kate Breslin for an effortless tally and 13-8 score.
The hardest game of the year suddenly became painfully easy for the Cavaliers.
"It was not perfect by any means, but we were always there coming up with loose balls," Myers said. "I think we really made Duke unravel, and when we see a team unravel, we get even more excited."
"It's tough. It's obviously just a devastating loss for us," said Duke head coach Kerstin Kimel, whose team has never advanced to the championship game despite four consecutive final four appearances. "We believed. We believed in ourselves to the very end, just like Virginia did, and unfortunately we just made too many mistakes to win tonight."
The sloppy passing became impossible to shake for Duke - Virginia caused 11 turnovers overall and won the ground-ball battle by a 16-10 margin.
"They just were sending swarms of people to the ball, and even if we won the ball initially, they were just checking it out of the stick and we couldn't get it back," Duke's Michelle Menser said. "They wanted it."
Six different players scored for the Cavaliers and seven different players caused turnovers, resulting in a 44-23 shot advantage.
Virginia needed every last one of them.
And when Megan Havrilla slung an underhanded bullet into the net to tie the game at 13 with 4:48 to go, the Cavaliers' sideline jumped simultaneously, then streamed towards midfield in anticipation of the final Duke timeout.
Said Myers: "I do always believe it will never rain on us."
