With four minutes left last week at Richmond, the North Carolina Tar Heels were in perfect position to complete an impressive comeback that would bury a two-game losing streak.
After spotting the Spiders an early 8-3 lead — reverting to its recent form of sputtering on offense — Carolina caught fire in the second half. With senior attackman Matt Cunningham filling in admirably for the injured Timmy Kelly by scoring a career-high five goals, the Tar Heels regained their footing and drew within a goal of Richmond.
Then, sophomore midfielder Justin Anderson, one of the numerous new faces in the starting lineup in Chapel Hill, charged down the middle and scored on an overhand shot with 10:31 left in the fourth quarter. Anderson’s third goal and career-high fifth point of the night capped a 7-2, Carolina run and tied the score at 10-10.
Richmond attackman Ryan Lee then scored his lone goal of the evening by initiating a sprint dodge from behind the net and beating UNC goalie Alex Bassil on the left post to give the Spiders an 11-10 edge with 8:10 remaining.
That set up a maddening sequence for Tar Heel fans.
After forcing a Richmond turnover with four minutes to go, Carolina got a handful of great looks at the Spiders goal. The Richmond defense sagged, took away the crease, conceded the outside shot and leaned on sophomore goalie Blake Goodman to step up and preserve the lead.
Trouble was, Goodman never did step up, because the Tar Heels never forced him to make a critical save. Four times in a 40-second span that ended at the 1:50 mark, the Heels sprayed step-down shots that missed the cage — one each by Cunningham and Anderson and two by sophomore midfielder William Perry. With 1:20 left, Perry missed the goal once again badly to complete a personal, 0-for-12 game.
Carolina tried to get off two more shots, but Anderson coughed up the ball following a re-dodge near the Richmond crease. In the final seconds, senior Chris Cloutier attempted to deliver a tough pass from goal-line extended to Anderson on the crease, but the Spiders broke up the play and soon after began celebrating.
With that, Carolina was licking its third straight wound and staring at a 10-for-39 shooting night. That’s 25.6 percent shooting — the kind of night that has defined the Heels lately, the kind of night that goes against the Carolina grain under 10th-year head coach Joe Breschi.
“It’s a tough pill to swallow. We had six or seven chances to tie and possibly beat Richmond and couldn’t do it,” said Breschi, smarting at the Heels’ second straight loss to the Spiders. “We can’t cry about it, we’ve just got to keep pushing.”
“Schematically, we’re getting good shots. For whatever reason, we haven’t been hitting enough of them, and we’re missing the goal completely [too often],” said David Metzbower, the Tar Heels’ offensive coordinator. “It’s been going on for a little while. Slumps happen. But the Richmond game befuddled me.”
As Carolina (6-3) prepared to fly to Southern California to take on third-ranked Maryland (6-1) on Saturday night in the Pacific Coast LAX Shootout in Costa Mesa, the Tar Heels were relishing a start anew. The chance to tangle again with an old ACC rival and recapture some confidence following a nine-day break that came after a tiring stretch of five games over 15 days.
“It’s been great to get the guys some rest, get some guys healthy and get back to work on some fundamentals, like ground balls and shooting,” Breschi said.
The three-game losing streak, against Denver, Hofstra and Richmond, had poor shooting written all over them.
Against No. 5 Denver, the Tar Heels squandered a contest in which the Pioneers managed just 21 shots and committed 16 turnovers. On a day when faceoff specialist extraordinaire Trevor Baptiste did not dominate the draw, Carolina returned the favor by shooting 6-for-28.
Carolina barely showed up to face Hofstra, as the Pride, now ranked No. 13, scored the game’s first eight goals, shut out the Heels in the first half and led, 10-1, in the third quarter. Carolina lost 13 of 20 faceoff attempts. Its shooters offered little help by putting up a 6-for-27 stinker.
The Richmond loss completed a three-game showing the Tar Heels are trying to forget. They made just 23.4 percent of their combined 94 attempts and put only 51 shots on goal during the losing streak.
“When you’re in one of these slumps, you start trying to pick the right spot,” Anderson said. “You start thinking you can’t miss this next shot. When you release it, you’re thinking that it’s got to go in.”
With the schedule ramping up, it’s time for the Tar Heels to get healthier and plug some holes for the regular-season stretch run. After Maryland, UNC will face ACC opponents on four straight weekends, with the conference tournament to follow.
There is plenty to work on. The Tar Heels, who hope to get Timmy Kelly, junior faceoff specialist Charles Kelly and freshman midfielders Sean Morris and Colin Munro (four straight misses) off of the injured list soon, have experienced an uneven ride so far in 2018.
That was not unexpected, not a year after Carolina lost a deep senior class that featured nine players who gobbled up starting roles or significant minutes — led by attackman Luke Goldstock, defenseman Austin Pifani, faceoff man Stephen Kelly and goalie Brian Balkam.
It didn’t help that, three games into this season, the Heels lost veteran defenseman Joe Kenna to a season-ending injury or promising freshman goalie Luke Millican to a concussion, from which he has yet to return.
While the Tar Heels were getting out to a 6-0 start, the signs of a young team in search of an identity were there. With an unsteady defense and faceoff game, UNC squeaked by much-improved Furman and Lehigh in overtime to get to 3-0.
At Johns Hopkins on Feb. 23, sophomore goalie Jack Pezzula made 13 saves and the Tar Heels overcame dominant Hopkins faceoff man Hunter Moreland (18-for-27) by playing efficient offense. Led by Timmy Kelly’s four goals and a hat trick by sophomore midfielder Tanner Cook, the Heels converted three of four extra-man chances and left Homewood Field with a 13-11 victory.
A 14-7 rout over Mercer followed. Next up was a 9-8 squeaker over St. John’s that provided a glimpse of what was to come. The Tar Heels took a 7-5 lead at half then proceeded to miss 20 of 22 shots in the second half. UNC ended up taking 45 shots, converting only 20 percent of them.
During the losing streak, the Tar Heels have taken excellent care of the ball, but they’ve also been out-worked. In the losses to the Pioneers and Hofstra, Carolina lost the ground battle by a combined 25.
“The biggest area of improvement [needed] I think is in the middle of the field,” said senior defensive midfielder and co-captain William McBride. “Whether it’s off the faceoff wings or giving our offense a better chance by picking up more ground balls to get them going, we have to be tighter there.”
The Tar Heels are winning nearly 50 percent of their faceoffs. The defense is allowing 9.5 goals in the past five games. Carolina goalies have produced barely nine saves per game this season.
None of those totals are stellar, but under Breschi, the Tar Heels have been built to get by without a suffocating defense or an All-American goalie. But the number that simply must improve substantially? The Tar Heels are shooting 30 percent as a team, which ranks 34th nationally and is pedestrian by Carolina standards.
Ever since Breschi arrived to coach at his alma mater, the Tar Heels have never missed an NCAA tournament, largely because UNC has rolled out a stable of good shooters that set the tone for an up-tempo offense.
When the Tar Heels regrouped with an 8-6 record and ran off four wins in a row to win the school’s fifth NCAA title in 2016, they did it with an offense that ended up ranked 10th in Division I in shooting percentage (.326).
A year ago, when the Tar Heels staggered through parts of the regular season and barely qualified for the NCAAs by winning the ACC tournament — only to finish the year at 8-8 by losing to Albany in the first round — UNC’s shooters finished at 28.9 percent, 33rd in Division I.
At the midpoint of the 2018 season, the Tar Heels are growing with a young defense and inconsistent showings at goalie and in the faceoff game. But they are still good enough to make a run, as long as their shooters find their touch once again.
Cloutier, the senior and MVP of the NCAA tournament in 2016 and the ACC tournament last year, remains formidable with 23 goals, but needs to raise his game (30.7 percent shooting). Junior attackman Andy Matthews (four goals, 17 assists) is a great feeder who needs to shoot more. Kelly (13 G) might have his best games ahead of him.
Perry, Cook and Anderson could be the first midfield of the future and present. They’ve combined for 37 goals and 51 points, but are shooting a collective, 27.6 percent.
“Some of [the shooting problems] are because we’re taking ill-advised shots. Some of it has been a hot goalie. Some of it is just us missing open looks,” Metzbower said. “We were shooting close to 40 percent going into the Hopkins game. The drop-off has taken a toll on our offense.
“The teams that tend not to stay in slumps are the teams that grind things out,” he adds. “I have a lot of people in the stable. They don’t have time to worry about woulda, coulda, shoulda. I would like to avoid these predicaments. They’ve got to work their way out of this.”