University of North Carolina Athletics
From Fetzer To Finley: Resiliency Has Its Rewards
December 15, 2001 | Men's Soccer
Dec. 15, 2001
By Dave Lohse
Associate Director of Athletic Communications
It would be hard for any Hollywood screenplay artist to spin a tale as amazing as the one that has been written in 2001 by the University of North Carolina men's soccer team.
There is now only one task remaining for the burgeoning authors wearing the Carolina Blue and White. They need to script the final chapter.
That will come Sunday when the seventh-seeded Tar Heels meet the fourth-seeded Indiana Hoosiers in the championship game of the 2001 NCAA Men's Soccer Tournament at Crew Stadium in Columbus, Ohio at 1 p.m. The game will be nationally televised by ESPN.
If you are a Tar Heel fan worth your salt and you don't plan to be in the Smith Center watching Carolina play Binghamton Sunday at the same time then you should be planted in front of your TV sets and they should be turned to ESPN. You see the guys who will be wearing those fabulous looking sky blues jerseys in Ohio tomorrow afternoon deserve your support.
That North Carolina is playing in this year's national championship game is somewhat amazing. You see, it was supposed to be last year in Charlotte when this scenario worked itself out. In 2000, Carolina won the ACC regular season championship (its first since 1966), the ACC Tournament championship (its first since 1987) and it was seeded #1 in the NCAA Tournament.
That magnificent season came to a premature end when two-time defending NCAA champion Indiana, seeded #8 in the 2000 tourney, came to Fetzer Field in Chapel Hill and beat the Tar Heels 1-0 in the NCAA quarterfinals. It was a supremely disappointing end to an otherwise enigmatic run by the Tar Heels.
The Tar Heels lost four starters off that team-seniors Michael Bucy, Eddie Robinson and Caleb Norkus-as well as junior Chris Carrieri who led the nation in scoring and left a year early to be the #1 pick in the Major League Soccer draft. That group also took with it 74 percent of the team's scoring punch from 2000.
While it was expected the Tar Heels would be good in 2001 I don't think anyone envisioned what has happened. Head Coach Elmar Bolowich, one of the nicest people you'll ever have a chance to meet, and his incredibly able assistant Oliver Weiss have crafted this team into a cohesive unit. The team has been led all year by its incredible defense, which features seniors Chris Leitch and Danny Jackson and goalkeeper Michael Ueltschey. Senior midfielder Noz Yamauchi has been a playmaker of outstanding skills all season. And underclassmen like Ryan Kneipper, David Testo, Mike Gell, David Stokes and Matt Crawford have all risen to the occasion when needed.
Carolina has lost only four games all season. All four losses were on the road and all to teams ranked in the Top 10 in the nation. All four teams were top 10 seeds in the NCAA Tournament as well. UNC finished the season undefeated at home and in the NCAA Tournament it won three straight home games to reach the Final Four.
What has been most amazing is the way the Tar Heels have won in the NCAA College Cup. After receiving a bye in the first round, Carolina played brilliantly in the second round and defeated a very good Towson team by a score of 3-0. The next two games at Fetzer Field were contests for the ages. In the tournament's third round the Tar Heels needed overtime to dispatch pesky American University 1-0. Junior striker Mike Gell scored the golden goal, just about 25 minutes after Gell had failed to score on a penalty kick in regulation that might have given the Tar Heels the win.
In the quarterfinals of the tournament North Carolina outshot Fairleigh Dickinson 43-6 but needed three overtime periods to finally beat the Knights 3-2, a fact that is fairly ridiculous in its own right. The game went into overtime when with 31 seconds left the Tar Heels were called for an accidental hand ball in the penalty box which gave FDU a penalty kick that tied the game. Then in the third OT the Knights handed the Tar Heels the victory with an own goal. Bizarre!
Friday night in the College Cup semifinals at Crew Stadium the Heels pulled off their latest Houdini act. And it was a sweet one indeed. Carolina trailed third-seeded Stanford, the tourney favorite after SMU and Virginia were beaten, by 2-0 with less than 10 minutes to play. But goals by Testo and Crawford forced overtime and then in the fourth sudden overtime period it was Gell who scored his second golden goal in three games to lift the Tar Heels into the championship game.
2001 will go down in NCAA soccer history as the first year in which a school's men's and women's teams both reached the NCAA championship game. Last Sunday the Tar Heel women reached the title game but were denied their 18th title in 21 seasons by Santa Clara 1-0. This Sunday the Carolina men are in the championship game for the first time in history. I know that the entire Carolina women's soccer family led by Head Coach Anson Dorrance will be rooting hard for their friends who share the offices in the new McCaskill Soccer Center at Carolina.
Me, I'm rooting hard for another national championship sign to be hung in the southwest corner of Fetzer Field. One that says UNC Men's Soccer-2001 NCAA Champions.
Pardon me if I slip out of journalistic mode for one second and simply say, "GO TAR HEELS!"
