CARY, N.C. – With the Terrapin men’s soccer team just pulling up to the parking lots here at WakeMed Soccer Park, I will unload my notebook from Wednesday’s quarterfinals game against Clemson.
If you haven’t heard, the No. 2 seed Terps (15-2-1) are facing the No. 6 seed Virginia Cavaliers, who defeated Wake Forest in the quarterfinals. Before I look into the Cavaliers here are some notes from Wednesday:
The return of defender Ethan White
White returned from an ankle injury that kept him out of the final three regular season matches to face the Tigers. While he wasn’t perfect, White showed why he is one of the top center backs in the ACC.
“It was great to have him back. He was a little rusty. He grew as the game progressed. He’s been out for about four games (sic) now, so having him back is great,” coach Sasho Cirovski said.
The status of goalkeeper Zac MacMath and defender Alex Lee
MacMath took a hard midair hit in the final few minutes of Wednesday’s game and lay on the ground for several moments. It looked so serious that backup goalkeeper Will Swaim began to warm up. MacMath, though, got up and rubbed off the hit and played the rest of the way. He made a tough save to clinch the win
“Zac is fine,” Cirovski said.
Lee, meanwhile, was beat in the penalty box for the Tigers’ only goal. Shortly following the goal, Lee came off and looked out of it on the sidelines. He wasn’t playing with the same intensity as he usually does.
“Alex is just a little under the weather and he gave it a shot. He was just a little bit quesy before the game and he’ll be ready for Friday,” Cirovski said.
The emergence of Cortes as a scoring option from RB
In the past two games the senior has tallied two goals and two assists for the Terps. He’s playing a position at right back that Cirovski expects some offense from, but not this type of production. Cortes said he’s been focusing on his crosses the past few days.
“That was just a timing for our part,” Cortes said. “The past couple days we’ve had a lot of time after practice to work on those things.”
ACC Outreach Initiative
The conference has instituted a program for ever sport that puts athletes in the classrooms of elementary and middle school students in the respective community of the ACC Tournament. Sadly, this time came hours before the Terps faced Clemson in the quarterfinals on Wednesday.
So instead, the Terps sent director of soccer operations Matt Burke (“jack of all trades”). Burke supposedly was received just like a player.
Final words on subpar Clemson performance
“That’s the thing as a coach you fear,” Cirovski said. “We’ve been in such good form the past three games with a lot of different things like big crowds, big stage, senior night… all of those things. This is obviously a huge occasion, but the first game is always a very difficult game. The key for us today was to survive and advance and we did that.”
Chris Eckard is the Diamondback’s Terrapin men’s soccer team beat reporter. Reach him at ceckard@umdbk.com and follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/ceckard.