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April 28, 2005

Baltimore, Md. –

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Game 12
ACC Tournament Semifinals – Game 2
#3 Virginia vs. #10 Maryland
April 29, 2005 ** 8:30 pm
M&T Bank Stadium ** Baltimore, Md.

The Series vs. the Terrapins
Maryland leads the all-time series with Virginia by a 42-32 margin. The rivalry between the two schools goes all the way back to 1926, the second year of the Virginia program. The teams have met at least once every season since 1950, making this the second-longest current series of any Virginia opponent (behind Johns Hopkins, 1948).

This is the third year in a row the teams have met twice.

Maryland has had the upper hand in the ACC Tournament, winning five of eight meetings, including three of five semifinal matchups.

This is the second year in a row the teams have met in the ACC Tournament; last season Maryland won the league title with a 12-11 win in the finals.

Virginia ended Maryland’s two-game series winning streak with a 10-2 win earlier this month in Charlottesville. Strangely, the Cavaliers haven’t won back-to-back games over the Terrapins since a six-game winning streak from 1998-2001. The Cavaliers haven’t beaten Maryland twice in a season since 2000. Since 2002 the teams have split the six meetings.

Maryland’s 42 wins over Virginia are the second-most wins by any school over the Cavaliers. Johns Hopkins has defeated UVa 53 times.

Meanwhile, Virginia’s 32 wins in the series make the Terps fourth on UVa’s list of most beaten opponents (UVa has defeated Duke 48 times, and North Carolina and Washington & Lee 42 times each).

Virginia as the Tourney’s Second Seed
Virginia has a little bit of history on its side in its bid to win the ACC Tournament. The Cavaliers come in as the second seed, only the fifth time they’ve been second, but the second time in the last three tournaments.The #2 seed has won more championships than any other seed (8). For the curious, the No. 1 seed has won seven titles.

Being the second seed has been good to the Cavaliers recently. They won their most recent league championship two years ago as the second seed. They also won the league crown in 1999 as the second seed. Interestingly, both years they went on to win the national championship.

Three Cavaliers Named All-ACC
Three Cavaliers–Rob Bateman, Michael Culver and Matt Ward–have been named to this season’s 11-man All-ACC squad. Ward is one of only four players to repeat from last season.

Ward, a junior attackman from Oakton, Va., is Virginia’s leading scorer for the season year in a row with 39 points (30g, 9a). He has scored at least one goal in the last 16 games dating back to last season and has tallied five goals twice this spring (Drexel, Towson). He leads the team with nine multi-goal games and is the top 20 in school history in goals and total points.

Bateman, a senior from Sparks, Md., transferred from Penn State and is playing at UVa as a graduate student in 2005. He is considered of the top long stick midfielders in the nation and will rate serious consideration for first-team All-America honors. He has snared 36 ground balls, second among conference long stick middies, and added a goal and seven assists on offense. He was a second-team All-ECAC selection in 2002 and 2003.

Culver is a junior defenseman from Ridgewood, N.J. He spearheads a defense that is ranked fourth in the nation, allowing an average of 7.00 goals per game. He held Maryland’s Joe Walters, North Carolina’s Jed Prossner and Johns Hopkins’ Peter LeSueur to just one goal each this season. Culver ranks second among ACC close defensemen with a career-high 31 ground balls.

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