The North Carolina reserves stood on the sideline with their arms crossed — their eyes scanning the ground, watching the scoreboard, escaping the action in any way possible.

The Tar Heels were down three goals, and Carly Reed had just lost control of the ball with 2:36 left in the game. Syracuse’s Kelly Cross had picked it up. At that point, all Syracuse needed to do was run out the clock.

“They try and shift around with what they’re going to do,” SU defender Natalie Glanell said. “They’re down and they have to make some kind of adjustment. Some things might have worked for them, we had to follow and answer.”

The Syracuse defense held North Carolina, the nation’s top scoring offense at more than 17 goals per game, to just 16 shots. The No. 3 Orange (13-1, 5-1 Atlantic Coast) forced 11 turnovers, and made an elite scoring team go stagnant in a 12-9 win over No. 1 North Carolina (12-2, 5-1) in front of a school-record 2,142 fans at the Carrier Dome on Saturday afternoon.

The Tar Heels tallied just three goals in the first half, and even when they came back to tie the score at nine, the Syracuse defense kept them out of the cage the final 12:27 of game action.

“Obviously we’ve got to prepare,” UNC head coach Jenny Levy said. “And we did prepare and credit their defense, they did a great job. I thought they brought great energy, executed well.”

Levy said that it was the first half in which her team dug itself into a hole. UNC committed eight turnovers, with Levy noting that their threshold for each game is fewer than 10.

With two minutes left in the half, the defense forced Sydney Holman to throw a ball awry. It started quickly skidding to the sideline by the Syracuse bench. All the SU players started jumping and yelling as the ball went out of play, giving the Orange an opportunity to run out the clock on the half.

“If you don’t have the ball, you can’t score,” Levy said. “And if you get the ball and you turn it over, it doesn’t help. They dominated possession today.“

SU head coach Gary Gait said his team adjusted on defense in the second half after a 6-2 UNC run over the course of 13 minutes tied the game at nine.

He said the Tar Heels had to change up their offensive approach to get back in the game, and his players responded.

“Everybody attacks a little differently and they attacked it a couple different ways,” Gait said. “And we made adjustments to where good players play their positions, and they overload one side and we balance. They made adjustments and we adjusted back.”

What was expected to be a shootout between the nation’s two top offenses was anything but. The game was chippy and turnover heavy. There were three double-penalties, which resulted in toss-ins to decide possession.

It was seemingly every play that officials blew their whistles.

Levy said the officiating was “awful”, and Gait said he “unfortunately” couldn’t comment on it.

But even though neither team could find an offensive flow, it was Syracuse’s stifling defense that prevented UNC from ever having a chance.

“We prepared well, and we communicated and did the adjusting that we had to do in the second half,” Glanell said. “But again, as I always say, we stuck through and communicated.

“We stayed very composed and played our defense and came out on top.”

Published on April 12, 2014 at 8:00 pm

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