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With five minutes remaining in the fourth quarter against Louisville, and Syracuse down by one, head coach Ange Bradley pulled out goalie Brooke Borzymowski for a final offensive push. The freshman raised her face mask on the sidelines to scan the field as the minutes evaporated off the clock at Louisville’s Trager Stadium. Florine van Boetzelaer subbed into Syracuse’s midline, and for the remaining minutes, failed to produce any more offense than before.

In No. 9 Syracuse’s (11-4, 4-2 Atlantic Coast) fourth loss of the regular season, this 2-1 one against No. 5 Louisville (16-2, 6-0) mattered the most. Within the ACC, seven teams are currently ranked. A win on Friday would’ve meant the first seed, a bye in the ACC conference and the chance for a higher seed when it comes to the NCAA tournament. Now, Syracuse has suffered back-to-back losses, both against ACC opponents Louisville and Virginia, while heading to its final game against unranked Cornell on Sunday. Even if the Orange win, they will still have to play in the first round, although they’re currently ranked top 10 in the country.

With the absence of Pleun Lammers, Syracuse’s leading goal scorer, SU’s ceiling on offensive production dropped and was limited to just five shots on goal. While the Orange did manage to gain five corners throughout the game, they went 0-5 in scoring opportunities.

Last weekend, Syracuse had the same exact corner count against then-No. 16 Virginia and failed to capitalize there as well. And even when the Orange had four corner chances to score with three minutes into the first quarter this Friday against Louisville, SU only got one shot off — a Carolin Hoffmann hit that was saved by Louisville’s Mila de Kuijer.

Tight passing allowed the Cardinals to maintain possession, and nine minutes into the first quarter, Louisville’s Filippa Niebuhr found herself near the baseline of Syracuse’s center circle. After the forward corralled in a pass from Aimee Plumb, she swirled her stick around a Syracuse defender and ripped a shot into the right side of the cage. Green cards to both Syracuse’s Claire Cooke and Louisville’s Erica Cooper limited scoring chances in the second quarter.

In the third, while Syracuse couldn’t score on a single corner, Plumb lined up next to Syracuse’s cage for an insert pass and sent it in. Julie Kouijzer collected the ball on the top of the circle and fired. Stationed in front of Syracuse’s cage, Cooper lifted up her stick sideways and deflected the ball up and into the goal. The Orange answered back eight minutes later when SJ Quigley sent a shot inside, which bounced off a Louisville defender stick. Hailey Bitters then rebounded it and sliced Louisville’s lead to one.

Yellow cards to Cooke with less than a minute remaining in the third and in the fourth quarter with Charlotte de Vries, a key piece in Syracuse’s offense, disallowed Syracuse to maintain its momentum. Bradley decided to have an empty net and failed to generate a shot.

Shortly after the buzzer sounded, Sam Minrath lifted up India Reed among a mob of Louisville players. With the bye, the Cardinals won’t play on Thursday at J.S. Coyne Stadium — Syracuse’s home turf.

Published on October 29, 2021 at 7:01 pm

Contact Christopher: [email protected] | @chrisscargs