Diminutive senior Trevor Perea may have been the big man with his golden goal against Clemson Saturday, but a pint-sized, pimply-faced freshman and his classmates are starting to fill some big shoes of their own for the ACC's newest power, the 20th-ranked men's soccer team.
Danny Kramer, all 5-foot-8 and 145 pounds of him, scored twice--giving him a team-high three goals for the season--to give Duke the lead, and fellow freshman Blake Camp booted in what turned out to be the game-winner as the Blue Devils (4-1-1) came back to sneak by Radford (2-2-1) Wednesday night at Koskinen Stadium, 3-2.
"It's a good group," head coach John Rennie said of the freshmen. "They did a great job tonight, obviously. Everybody played well tonight. We just hurt ourselves by not scoring more goals."
The rookies put up all Duke needed to avoid an upset similar to two seasons ago, when Radford topped the Blue Devils in Durham in another mid-week game wedged between ACC showdowns. Following this victory, Duke and its fresh faces head to College Park to face No. 10 Maryland Saturday.
Things didn't look good for this weekend match-up when the Highlanders took advantage of a mistake by goalie Justin Trowbridge for an early 1-0 lead. The sophomore keeper got caught coming out too early, making what he called "the completely wrong decision" on a cross into the six-yard box, where Radford's Jeffrey Nicholas was in the right spot to put Duke down by a goal in the 15th minute.
But it took the freshman less than those 15 minutes to put together three goals of their own. Camp set up Kramer to the left of the Radford goal, where the speedy scorer blew past a defender with a quick left-to-right move before catching Highlander keeper Marc Smith leaning left and firing the ball across the goal into the right corner.
Only six minutes later, sophomore Owoicho Adogwa crossed into the box, where Radford found itself bombarded by the freshman once again. Ian Carey sent a touch pass to Kramer, who gave Duke the lead by tapping in his third goal of the season, good for fifth in the ACC.
"I don't think I'm really a big-time goal scorer," Kramer said with a smile. "I mean I guess I've got three goals now. It just feels good, but... as long as the team wins, whatever, it doesn't really matter who scores the goals."
With the Blue Devils' midfield struggling for the entire first half and the offense depending on Radford turnovers for scoring chances, Camp found himself at the top of the box for a two-on-one break with Donald McIntosh seven minutes after Kramer's second score. McIntosh pushed it ahead for Camp's blast into the front-right corner of the net for his first career goal.
"I think coming into the season [the freshmen] had a chance to bond, and we're familiar with how each of us plays," Camp said, "so I think that contributes a lot."
Whatever breathing room those contributions provided was erased early in the second half, when the Highlanders' Geraldo Hernandez burned the Blue Devil defenders. The Radford midfielder took Mark Mattern one-on-one at the six. He creeped in on the intimidating 6-2 defender, but then snuck back and fired across the net to turn the momentum in the 54th minute.
For the remainder of the game, Duke's imperfections began to show, while Radford, sensing an upset in one of their biggest games of the season, began sending balls over the Duke midfield with an aggressive attack before they got caught running back to chase Jordan Cila. Playing a three-man game with touch passes in the box, Cila hastily put one in the net over Smith, only to have it called back for an offsides infraction.
Ten minutes later, defender Andy Borman saved Trowbridge from being beat again with a save of his own. On Borman's pass back to Trowbridge, though, the keeper picked up the ball illegally. Though Trowbridge's action appeared to deserve being whistled for a handball and a penalty kick, the referee failed to react, sparing Duke from a Radford penalty kick that could have knotted the game at 3-3.
The Blue Devils failed to control the pace for the rest of the contest, but Borman and company cleared enough to hold onto a frighteningly close win provided by a couple of freshmen who give the team a few more pimples but hardly any blemishes heading north to face the Terps.
"It's a mid-week game against a team that this is one of the highlights of their season," Rennie said of Wednesday's nailbiter. "It's always tough between two ACC games. It's very difficult to play these games, but it's like a win is a win is a win is a win is a win."
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