Rebecca Moros has already had a good week. Scoring against No. 12 Wake Forest only made it better.
The junior midfielder netted Duke's second goal as the No. 6 Blue Devils defeated the Demon Deacons 3-0 Wednesday at Koskinen Stadium.
Moros scored two goals in the Blue Devils' 2-1 upset over North Carolina Oct. 9 and was named player of the week by TopDrawerSoccer.net, Soccer America, and the ACC. She now has four goals this season along with two assists, making her the team's points leader.
Wake Forest (8-4-1. 3-3 in the ACC) came out strong against Duke (10-2-1, 4-2) and put early pressure on the Blue Devil defenders. After turning the Demon Deacons away in the fifth minute, the Blue Devils began a strong offensive push that lasted the majority of the match.
"I think the team really connected well today," junior midfielder Lauren Tippets said. "We played quickly. We played with the same kind of intensity that we played with against Carolina Sunday."
Tippets netted the first goal for the Blue Devils on a free kick in the 20th minute. She sent the ball into the goalie box toward Duke players. Expecting a Blue Devil header, Wake Forest goalie Kaitlyn Doe mishandled the ball, letting it bounce off her arm and into the net, giving the Blue Devils the lead.
"We knew that they had a longer break than we did to get ready for the game," Moros said. "So we thought it was particularly important to come out hard for the first 20 minutes and make a statement that that wasn't going to make a difference, that they weren't going to match our energy."
Duke outshot their ACC foe 7-1 in the first half and 16-6 in the match.
"This is Wake Forest's best team in a while," head coach Robbie Church said. "Obviously we were worried, can we move on and how quickly can we move on [after the UNC game]. They came into our first practice Monday focused though."
The Blue Devils emerged from the locker room as the aggressor, dominating Wake Forest on both sides of the ball. Moros scored in the 67th minute off a pass from junior captain Darby Kroyer. The midfielder set Moros up on the right side of the 18-yard box. Moros beat her defender and the substitute Demon Deacon goalkeeper, sophomore Heather Currie, to the left side of the net.
Kroyer notched a goal of her own near the end of the game. In the 84th minute, senior forward Carolyn Riggs charged the Wake Forest net. Her shot was blocked by the Demon Deacon goalie but a foul was called outside of the 18-yard box. Kroyer connected on the ensuing free kick, lifting the ball over the Wake Forest wall and into the left side of the net to put Duke up 3-0.
Blue Devil goalie Allison Lipsher made four saves over the course of the contest but was never truly challenged.
"We had top performers all over," Church said. "We started to get tired in the second half. The real key of the game was to go deep in our bench, and we got good play out of our reserves."
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