North Carolina women's lacrosse finishes 22-0 season with NCAA title

North Carolina polished off its perfect women's lacrosse season with a 12-11 victory over Boston College in the NCAA final on Sunday in Baltimore.

And much like Friday's semifinals, when the Tar Heels erased an eight-goal deficit to top Northwestern, a handful of Long Island athletes were at the center of the action.

Sam Geiersbach, a graduate student from West Babylon who had five goals Friday, including the winner with 1:03 to go, tacked on three goals in Sunday's victory and was named the tournament's most outstanding player.

She scored the first two goals of the game and had the final go-ahead score for the Heels (22-0) to make it 11-10 with 5:26 left in the match.

UNC goalie Taylor Moreno, a grad student from Huntington, made 11 saves and drew praise from Boston College coach Acacia Walker-Weinstein: "She's an amazing goalie, and I think unfortunately they have a lot of X-factors, but Taylor was one of them today and she played great,. She's a tough goalie to go against, but she's a great player and great person, and congratulations to her."

Moreno, a consensus first-team All-American, finished her career with a 70-6 record, including all 22 wins this season.

Jamie Ortega, a fifth-year senior and Tewaaraton finalist (along with teammate Ally Mastroianni), scored two goals Sunday to reach 113 points for the season, nudging past her school record of 112 set in 2019.

For Boston College, Charlotte North, last year's Tewaaraton winner, had four goals and Cassidy Weeks, a senior from Bayport-Blue Point, had three goals. Jenn Medjid, a senior from Garden City, scored two goals.

Kayla Martello, a sophomore from Rockville Centre and Sacred Heart Academy, gave the Eagles their last lead at 9-8 on a goal with 13:19 left in the match.

UNC responded with goals by Ortega and Nicole Humphrey to take a 10-9 lead with 11:04 to go.

Weeks' final goal came with 15 seconds left, gettting the Eagles (19-3) within one goal again after a BC drought of 9 minutes, 35 seconds. Belle Smith, a sophomore from Westhampton Beach, had tied the game at 10-10 with 9:50 left.

"We knew it was going to be tough and go down to the wire. It doesn't surprise me that that was a one-goal game," Tar Heels coach Jenny Levy said. "We've lost a lot of one-goal games, this crew, over the past couple years in the Final Four game, so it was nice to be on the other side of it."

It was UNC's third national title and first undefeated season. The last undefeated women's national champions were Maryland in 2017.