The women's lacrosse team entered spring break searching for the first win in the program's history. Three games later, a frustrated Blue Devil team is still looking for win number one, as it lost all three of its matches.
Duke opened the break with a 12-1 loss to defending national champion Maryland. The Blue Devils then lost two heartbreakers in a 10-9 defeat against Lehigh and an 8-5 loss to George Mason.
Head coach Kerstin Kimel said the team's mood is pretty sour after starting the season 0-4. And while she's disappointed about not having her first win, she's more concerned with the team's intensity in both practice and during games.
"For any game, for us to win we have to play a good game, and we haven't done that yet," she said.
Sophomore Kristen Lonergan said at this early point in the season, Duke expected to be 3-1. A season opening loss to Colgate and the two losses over break to Lehigh and George Mason were games the Blue Devils expected to win. Freshman Kendra Basner added that in those games, Duke entered with the mentality that it didn't have to prove itself, but that instead it was supposed to win.
Kimel said her players weren't necessarily overconfident entering the games against Lehigh and George Mason, but rather they underestimated the effect of being a first-year program. While Duke may have the same athletic ability of many of its opponents, it lacks the chemistry of a more experienced team. Still, Lonergan said the Blue Devils just want to focus on capturing that elusive first win.
"We've been setting up plays, and our shots are not going in," Lonergan said. "I think everyone is ready to prove we can win. I know that it's going to come."
In the game against the Terrapins, Maryland took advantage of Duke's inexperience from the outset, scoring 10 first period goals before the Blue Devils were on the scoreboard. Sophomore Amy Murnick scored Duke's lone goal with 6:32 remaining in the first half. Despite the lopsided score, Lonergan said the team was pleased with its performance overall, holding such a strong team to only 12 goals. She added that the most satisfying thing about the Maryland game was that everyone played with a lot of heart.
"We had the ball a lot on attacks, but we made stupid mistakes and they were all over us," Lonergan said.
Kimel considered the game against Maryland to be the team's best performance of the break. She said the team entered the game knowing it had a slim chance of winning, and thus was much more relaxed during warm-ups. In the second half, even though they were down 10-1, the Blue Devils played a very intense 30 minutes, limiting the Terrapins to under 50 percent shooting for the second half.
In the next game against Lehigh, the Blue Devils kept the match close for the first half, only trailing 6-4 at intermission. But in the first 10 minutes of the second stanza, Lehigh scored two goals to up its lead to 8-4. The Mountain Hawks had a 10-6 lead entering the final three minutes before Blue Devil junior Claire DiLorenzo went on a scoring tear and netted three goals. Still, her effort left Duke a goal short of a win.
"In our Lehigh game, because of our inexperience, we weren't making good decisions," Kimel said.
In the final game, the Blue Devils had a pregame advantage in scouting George Mason. Duke assistant coach Theresa Ingram coached the Patriots last year, so Duke knew a lot about the team before the game. Still, the final game of the break had the familiar pattern of the Blue Devils falling behind early. George Mason shut out Duke in the first half while taking a 5-0 lead. Five different Blue Devils scored in the second half, but that effort was not enough as the Patriots scored three times in the final period to seal the 8-5 win.
With four losses in its first four games, some of the players are feeling the pressure of winning their first game. But that pressure isn't coming from the head coach. The Blue Devils will have three chances this upcoming week to capture that first win, and Kimel thinks with an increase in intensity during practice that may be possible.
"I want this week to be a turning point for us," she said.
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