Three Runs Short Of Glory

It was three impressive runs by three Division I teams from the Old Dominion. All three advanced to the semifinals of their respective NCAA Division I College Cups. And each had shot at winning a national championship.

But in the end, each came up a win short of playing on Sunday for a title.

For the University of Virginia the 2-1 loss to UCLA was devastating. The senior-driven Cavaliers, unbeaten through 25 games, had been favored to win it all.

The University of Virginia men also lost in the semifinal round, falling to Maryland by a score of 2-1 After a 1-3 start, Cavs coach George Gelnovatch felt his young team might be a year away. The run to the semifinals was a bonus.

Virginia Tech had a magical season, proving game after game that the Hokies were just as good as anyone else, and better than most. Never before had they gone so deep into the national tournament. To end the season with the championship in sight was a huge disappointment.

Heartbreak On PKs

The Virginia women held a 1-0 lead with less than five minutes to play, when UCLA got the equalizer. Sarah Killion threaded a ball to Ally Courtnal, who slotted home her second goal of the season for the Bruins for the 1-1 tie.

Scoreless through overtime, the game went to a shootout. UCLA made four kicks, Virginia made three.

The Cavaliers ended the season with a 24-1-1 mark, setting a record for wins in a season. Virginia had reached the College Cup for the first time in 22 seasons, and along the way set school records with 78 goals, 80 assists, 236 points and 16 shutouts.

But it will be the one loss that will linger for a long time.

“That’s hard,” said Virginia head coach Steve Swanson, a couple of days after his soccer team had seen their dreams dashed. He thought about the three times his teams had lost in the national quarterfinals, never reaching the College Cup.

“And so you get to the College Cup and you’re thinking, ‘This is good.’ But it actually hurts worse.

“I felt where we were with six minutes to go, up 1-0, you couldn’t ask for anything more. I would take that situation time ane time again. I fe[show_disconnected][show_to accesslevel=’Subscriber’]lt we were right where we wanted to be. And that’s probably what’s most disheartening, that we didn’t close it out, didn’t finish it out.”

Virginia had entered the NCAA tournament ranked #1 and as one of the #1 seeds.The Cavaliers had eight seniors, as well as a redshirt junior, Churchill O’Connell, on the roster. Six were starters. They will be difficult to replace.

But Swanson does have talent returning. five of the team’s top six players return, including forwards Makenzy Doniak (46 points) and Brittany Ratcliffe (27) and midfielders Morgan Brian (46), Daniele Colaprico (23) and Alexis Shaffer (15).

“We scored more goals (78) than we gave up shots on goal (63),” Swanson said. “That’s a pretty impressive statistic.”

While the Cavaliers return talent, they will not have the experienced depth they had this past season.

“We have some really good pieces (coming back),” Swanson said, “and we have a good group coming in. I think we can still be quite good, but we’ll have some challenges. We won’t have the depth that we had this year.”

But while the hurt affects the coach, much of the sadness is for his players.

“I feel for the players, because you want your players to get everything they feel they deserve,” Swanson said. “This team, from the very beginning, has just worked so hard, they’ve done all the things we asked. But that’s the way life is sometimes.

“And that’s what’s so great about sports. It mirrors life. In life you don’t get all the things you want all the time, even though you deserve them.”

Looking To The Future

Sophomore Todd Whrton stopped and looked around PPL Park before heading to the locker room. Just taking it all in and wishing he had one more game to play this season.

“It’s a terrible feeling to lose like this,” said the Glen Allen, Va., native , whose Virginia Cavaliers had lost 2-1 to the Maryland Terrapins in an All-ACC national semifinals.

“But we made it here as a really young team. Personally, I think we outplayed ’em this game. The fact that we came out with a loss really leaves a bad taste in our mouth, but it only gives us more fuel for next year and the offseason to get better and get back here.”

The Cavaliers had made their 11th trip to the College Cup. Six times they won NCAA national championships. The Virginia head coach has been part of those teams, as a player and as the head coach.

The 2013 season started 1-3, and Gelnovatch, with a team that included only one senior started to think the ‘Hoos were a year away.

“Before the season, I said, ‘OK, College Cup next year,” he said. “By the time we get to the end of this season, I’m thinking, ‘Gosh, we could win a national championship with this group of guys.'”

UVA was seeded eighth, but advanced by defeating St. John’s 2-0, Marquette 3-1, and Connecticut 2-1 before falling to the Terps.

“It’s crazy how far we’ve come,” Warton said.

For much of the match, play was fairly even. It came down to a couple of moments. Maryland senior Patrick Mullins, arguably the best forward in collegiate soccer, scored two goals and freshman goalkeeper Zack Steffen came up with several big saves.

“So I think this team was a little bit ahead of schedule,” Gelnovatch said. “Getting to this point and getting to the College Cup, and in my opinion, playing as well as we did tonight, with so many guys returning, we should be back here (in 2014).”

Virgnia finished the season 13-6-5 overall.

A Matter Of Inches

If you are going to lose, better that the winning goal be a brilliant one. The goal that gave Florida State a 3-2 win over Virginia Tech in the College Cup semifinals was less than that.

With the score tied 2-2 with under seven minutes left in regulation, FSU’s Jamie Fields floated a ball towards the far post that drifted into the upper-90, caromed off the post and deflected into the net off the back of Virginia Tech goalkeeper Dayle Colpitts.

Was it a shot, or was it a shot? Doesn’t matter, it was a goal. The game-winner.

The loss ended the Virginia Tech season at 19-5-3. Tech set new program records for wins in a season, goals (56) and wins over ranked opponents (6). They finished #5 in the final national poll.

“We were a bit unlucky,” said Tech coach Charles “Chugger” Adair, whose team defeated Duke 3-0 in the national quarterfinals to advance to the Women’s College Cup for the first time in program history.

“I feel unlucky,” said Colpitts, a senior from Canada. “It went off my hand, off the post, off me, back in.”

The Hokies lose four key seniors, starters Jazmine Reeves, Colpitts and Taylor Antonino and key reserve Ashley Manning. But they also return eight players who started over 20 matches this year, including Murielle Tiernan (11 goals and 5 assists) and Ashley Meier (9 and 2).

As one might imagine, it was an emotional end of a season, and for the seniors, the end of their collegiate careers.

“It’s the last game of your college career,” said Reeves. “If you have any passion about what you’re doing, you’re going to be emotional about it, so I was very upset.”

Twice in the game, with her team down a goal, Reeves first pounded a shot off the left post and then with less than two minutes left, hit the crossbar. A matter of inches from a tying goal.

“Can’t get much closer than that,” Reeves said of the two shots. “I’ll probably replay (her last shot) for the next three months. Who knows, I’ll probably think about it every day.”

The Hokies enjoyed their best-ever season, but it seemed that the roadblock for every run was Florida State. They played three times.

The first was a 2-1 regular season loss to the ‘Noles that snapped a nine-game unbeaten Tech streak. The second was a 1-0 loss in the ACC championship game. Then the College Cup

But along the way there were many successes, including a 2-1 win over UNC, and the 4-2 ACC tournament semifinal win over rival Virginia. It was the Cavaliers’ only loss of the season.

There was the shootout win over Santa Clara (3-1 PKs) in postseason play, and the 3-0 shutout of the Blue Devils.

If there were any doubts that this was a team worthy of its record and it’s national ranking, they had vanished by the time the final whistle blew to end the season.

The seniors won’t be there next year when the Hokies take the field again, but they helped set a new standard over the past four years.

“My teammates and I left evrything on the field today,” Colpitts said. “We set a new standard.

“I think the future’s bright for this program, I’m so proud of everyone and I’m so confident in the girls that are behind us in making it back here. So I think the experience is great to go through and to be here for the first time is great to be a part of.”