After three consecutive ties and six on the season, head coach Robbie Church had resigned himself to the nickname "Mr. Tie."
His own daughter, a forward for UNC-Wilmington, even chided him for showing up to her game today, which the Seahawks finished in a 2-2 tie with Georgia State.
"She called me, and I said, 'I apologize, Mr. Tie showed up on your field,'" Church said. "I don't know if they have even had a tie all year."
Fortunately for the Blue Devils, Mr. Tie stayed down in Wilmington, and Duke (8-3-6, 3-2-4 in the ACC) scored more goals against an ACC opponent than it had since September 30, 2004, taking down Miami 4-2 Thursday night at Koskinen Stadium.
At first it looked like the same old story for the Blue Devils as the Hurricanes (9-5-4, 4-3-2) opened up the scoring halfway through the first half. But it took Kelly Hathorn and the rest of the team less than a minute to fire back and tie the score at 1-1.
"That was huge for us," Hathorn said of Duke's quick strike. "We have always talked about not putting our heads down when we get a goal scored on us, but I think sometimes we have. We also talked about getting the early goal today. We thought that would be really important, and we did not get it, but we came right back and got it."
Hathorn said the immediate comeback helped Duke build momentum, which the team carried through to the second half. And at the 60-minute mark, the Blue Devils seemed to hit an offensive groove they had yet to find in conference play, scoring three more unanswered goals in 14 minutes to put them comfortably ahead 4-1.
Freshman Rebecca Allen, who did not play in the first half, came up big off the bench and scored twice to give Duke the two goal advantage. Church said Allen's absence from the lineup in the first half was an honest mistake-he simply forgot about her on the sidelines. The coach added teasingly that Allen may never play in another first half again if it means the Blue Devils could end up with the same result.
Allen was not rattled by the apparent snub, however. Instead, she just focused on doing the right things when given the opportunity.
"[Elisabeth Redmond] was making a run down the left side, and we kind of made eye contact," Allen said about her first goal. "She played me a great ball in the middle of the field, and I looked up and saw the keeper was not ready for it, so I just kind of hit it."
Allen found the back of the net again 10 minutes later on a pass from midfielder C.J. Ludemann off a free kick to give Duke an insurance goal. Five minutes later, Ludemann put one in herself from about 25 yards out for the insurmountable three-goal advantage. With the victory, the Blue Devils assured themselves a birth in the conference tournament.
"We really needed this win today," Hathorn said. "We needed it for NCAAs, and we needed it for the ACC tournament. We needed it to get our confidence back."
With confidence in hand and Mr. Tie at least on a one-game hiatus, Duke can move on to its final regular season contest against Clemson and then bigger and better things in Florida at the ACC tournament.
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