BALTIMORE — Cassidy Weeks nervously chuckled. Her cheeks reddened.

Mere minutes after thrusting her way into the national spotlight by scoring the game-winning goal against Maryland in the second of two NCAA semifinals Friday at Homewood Field, Weeks was the natural focus of much of the postgame conversation.

With the score tied at 16 and less than a minute remaining, the ball sat in the stick of Charlotte North. Who else would have the ball in such a critical moment, right? North took a stab at dodging toward the crease but was met with a double. She settled the ball at X.

Instead of gearing up for another attempt, she passed to Caitlynn Mossman on her left. Twenty-two seconds left. With four sets of eyes on the Maryland defense staring down both Mossman and North, Weeks came cutting down from the top of the 8-meter. Mossman saw her immediately.

By the time the Maryland defense could react, it was too late. Weeks caught the high pass from Mossman and connected, sending it past Emily Sterling for a thrilling 17-16 win in front of 7,694 fans.

Now on the spot in the postgame press conference, Weeks deferred all credit.

“At the end of the game, I knew that anyone on our team could score. Everyone was ready for the moment,” the senior midfielder said. “I just saw the chance, the opening. I knew Caitlynn would throw it, and I just put it away.”

Hollie Schleicher won the game’s final draw, allowing Boston College to kill the remaining time and celebrate a fifth straight trip to the NCAA championship game. The defending champions will play top-seeded North Carolina on Sunday at noon Eastern on ESPN. The Tar Heels have taken both matchups (16-15 and 16-9) against their ACC rival this spring.

“Anything goes. It’s anyone’s game,” attacker Jenn Medjid said. “We played them twice and lost both times, but I think we learned so much from both of those losses.

Medjid (three goals, two assists) contributed her most important score with 6:58 remaining. Boston College trailed 16-13 to a young Maryland team that received 14 of its goals from players who are sophomores (in terms of eligibility) or younger.

Even Maryland head coach Cathy Reese admitted that the moment might have caught up with the Terps, a team with just two players still remaining from its 2019 national title (Grace Griffin and Torie Barretta). When the final moments came, Reese sensed some hesitancy.

Medjid’s pivotal goal made it 16-14 with 6:58 to play. North stepped up to score the next two, with the equalizer coming with 3:06 left.

The late run was made possible in large part by a gutsy showing in the middle of the field. Maryland held a 23-14 draw advantage for the game and a 23-9 draw advantage after the first quarter. In the fourth quarter, Shaylan Ahearn helped the Terps win nine of 13 draws.

But BC’s relentless pressure on clears and on defense forced Maryland into 17 turnovers, a backbreaking number for a young team looking to punch its ticket to the NCAA championship game.

“BC does a good job of pressuring, and it’s all over the field,” Ahearn said. “Another thing that we were prepared for and we practiced, but I think in the heat of the moment, a few didn’t go our way. I thought they did a good job of coming out, pressuring us, getting on our hands and making us do something different than we normally would.”

“When it got a little tight, I thought we were a little hesitant,” Reese added. “We struggled clearing the ball toward the end of the game there, and sort of got caught on our heels instead of forward on our toes.”

Maryland rose to the pressure early. Down 6-3 after North’s goal with 5:33 left in the second quarter, the Terps scored five unanswered. It wasn’t enough to completely take control, but it was enough to maintain a two- or three-goal lead for essentially the remainder of the game.

That is, of course, until Boston College scored the last four — punctuated by the soft-spoken Weeks.

Just prior to Weeks’ heroics, she survived a triple team clearing the ball. Walker-Weinstein said she contemplated pulling her for a breather.

“I looked at her twin sister [Courtney] on the sideline, and I said, ‘Does your sister need a break?’ And she said, ‘No,’” Walker-Weinstein said. “Thirty seconds later, she scored the winning goal.”

Weeks has started all but two games in her Boston College career. She was limited in eight games combined in 2019 and 2020 (her 2019 season ended with an injury after one game, and 2020 was shut down due to COVID-19), but she emerged last season as a do-it-all middie on a national championship team.

She’s elevated her play in 2022, producing career-highs in goals (27) and assists (10). She might not be the first, second, third or even fourth option on the Boston College offense, but North said the group is a “seven-threat offense,” maybe even more.

North patted Weeks on the right shoulder after she nervously giggled her way through breaking down the goal that prolonged Boston College’s season. Walker-Weinstein said the moment couldn’t have happened to a harder worker.

“She is equipped for this because she has such long-term grit,” Walker-Weinstein said. “The kid is always grinding every day. Four seasons, 12 months a year. This is kid is the hardest working kid ever. She rarely gets any credit. She is a true two-way middie who prioritizes their defense. To see someone like that, in a game like this, to come out and be able to get a little bit of the spotlight, she’s so deserving of it. She’s unquestionably our hardest working player.”