Seventeen straight wins to open the 2013 season! The Virginia Cavaliers, ranked #1 in the nation, are the last unbeaten, untied women’s collegiate soccer team in the United States.
Those 17 consecutive wins are a new school record for Virginia, which opened the 1990 season with 16 straight. They set the new mark with a 4-0 win over Miami before a home crowd of 2,838 despite miserable weather conditions.
Win #16 came in Chapel Hill, 2-0 over the UNC Tar Heels. It [show_disconnected][show_to accesslevel=’Subscriber’]was a game won when Virginia’s best player, Morgan Brian, was away with the U.S. WNT in Texas.
The Tar Heels were also without their star, senior Crystal Dunn, who was a starter on defense in a 4-0 victory over Australia in San Antonio. Brian came in as a second-half sub.
The Wahoos have two regular season games left before the ACC tournament, which will be played Nov. 8 & 10 at WakeMed Soccer Park in Cary, NC,
Both of those games, Florida State and Virginia Tech are at home in Charlottesville. Either could go either way.
Going into the matchup with #3 Florida State, Virginia has posted four consecutive shutouts. In fact, the only goals allowed over the last seven games were two to Notre Dame in a 3-2 overtime victory.
Brian, who is tied with Makenzy Doniak (Chino Hills, Calif.) for the team scoring lead with 31 points and scored against Miami, isn’t satisfied with the way her team has finished off scoring opportunities.
“I think on Sunday (against Florida State) we’re going to have to finish our chances a little better,” said Brian, a junior from St. Simons Island, Ga.
Virginia head coach Steve Swanson agrees.
“We’ve got to do a little better job finishing games out earlier than we do,” he said. “For as many chances as we had tonight, and we had some really, really good chances, we didn’t even get some of those on frame.”
Virginia won the ACC championship in 2004 and 2012. They beat Maryland 4-0 in last year’s title match.
However, the Cavaliers have never won the national championship, and only once, in 1991, have they reached the College Cup semifinals. They have played in the NCAAs over 25 seasons, and have lost three times in the quarterfinals.
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