The Tar Heels (14-1, 3-0 ACC) immediately proved to be too potent offensively for the Big Green, as they scored four goals in the first half. The Big Green had not trailed in a game prior to this loss since the 60th minute of its win against Brown University on Sept. 22.
"UNC is a great team, and it was a good learning experience for us," Ali Savage '15 said. "The speed of the game alone was at a different level to other teams we have played this season. Offensively, we were very tight and proactive but had a few lulls that a team like UNC capitalizes on."
In the first half, the Tar Heels outshot the Big Green by a margin of 18-2. Dartmouth struggled to generate its offense, allowing UNC to dominate for most of the game.
The Big Green was more competitive in the second half, firing off five shots to North Carolina's 11. Goalkeeper Ellen Meyer '15 tallied six saves for the Big Green, while Jenna Stearns '13 made five saves without conceding a goal after relieving Meyer.
Prior to the weekend's game, Meyer had only allowed two goals while making 11 saves in her previous three starts, giving her a 0.67 goals against average and a .846 save percentage.
"Going into the game, we wanted to make the most out of playing such a challenging opponent," Meyer said. "We had a strong press set up, which was executed effectively against their starting players. UNC, being an annually ranked team, proved their status in their offense. They have some incredible strength and speed, which is always hard to defend."
Although Dartmouth began to settle into the game in the second half, the Tar Heels added two goals to make the score 6-0, and a comeback was simply too much to ask against a dominant UNC team.
"Their passing precision and speed was what led to their success," Savage said.
Despite the fact that both teams had the same amount of penalty corner opportunities, the Big Green had difficulty capitalizing on its chances to score. Two of Dartmouth's penalty corners resulted in great shots by Olivia Quaglia '14 and Liz Blanken '13, but the Tar Heels' defense stood strong and continued to shut out the Big Green.
"We generated a number of good scoring chances, especially in the second half, but just weren't able to put them away," Blanken said. "It's disappointing that the score wasn't closer, but we felt we were in it the whole 70 minutes and created a lot of scoring chances, especially in the last five minutes of the game."
The loss marks the third time this season that the Big Green has been shut out. Its previous shut-out losses came in early September at the Terrapin Invitational against American University and the University of Maryland.
"Although it broke our winning streak, we aren't letting it get us down," Meyer said. "On the contrary, it's given us a confidence that we can play at a very high level, and playing Yale [University on Saturday] will just be another challenging game that we are more than ready to take on."
The Tar Heels have not lost a game since falling to No. 1 Syracuse University on Sept. 1. Next up on Dartmouth's schedule will be a return to Ivy League competition as the team hosts Yale on Saturday at 12 p.m. at Chase AstroTurf Field.
"This week, we played some of our best field hockey yet, so we're looking to build off of that and go into the Yale game with the same intensity," Blanken said. "If we keep up our style of hockey and come out strong in the first half, we'll play a great game this weekend."
