North Carolina
Louisville
Cardinals Top UNC In ACC Quarterfinals
November 9, 2014 | Men's Soccer
CHAPEL HILL - No. 2 and third-seed North Carolina fell 1-0 to 19th-ranked and sixth-seeded Louisville Sunday afternoon in the ACC Men's Soccer Championship quarterfinals.
Louisville (9-6-3) got the only goal of the match in the 76th minute by Ivan Gutierrez off a feed from Ricardo Velazco.
The first half mirrored a chess match as both teams played a fairly conservative brand of soccer. Each team had only three shots in the opening 45 minutes.
Out of the locker room at halftime, the Tar Heels made a point to be the aggressor in the second half. Leading that charge early on was sophomore midfielder Omar Holness.
In the 49th minute, a free kick from the Jamaican International was on frame, but Cards keeper Joachm Ball was in position for the save.
The Tar Heels continued to mount pressure on the Louisville back line. Nick Williams delivered a ball through the goal area that rolled untouched for what seemed like an eternity, but a fellow teammate could not connect on the service in the 54th minute.
In the 68th minute, Rob Lovejoy raced to gather a long ball sent into the corner, but Louisville's Michael DeGraffenreidt made a clean play on the ball from his center back position to keep the match scoreless.
After falling behind 1-0, Carolina again mounted pressure to get the equalizer. The first and only corner kick of the match was awarded to UNC in the 85th minute. Holness sent a near perfect ball into the box looking for Andy Craven, but his header went wide of goal.
UNC held a 9-6 shot advantage over the Cardinals.
Carolina will now wait on an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament that will be announced on Nov. 17.
