By Bob Sutton

CHAPEL HILL — Many of the positives were outlined for the North Carolina women’s soccer team Sunday afternoon.

Quite a bit was accomplished when the top-ranked Tar Heels tangled with third-ranked Florida State.

So the outcome just didn’t seem right.

The Seminoles scored with two seconds remaining, with the teams ending in a 3–3 Atlantic Coast Conference tie at Dorrance Field.

“A tie is a loss for us,” North Carolina forward Ally Sentnor said. “That can’t happen.”

North Carolina posted two goals in the final 14 minutes, but Amelia Van Zanten’s goal with two seconds remaining for Florida State altered the mood in a hurry among the Tar Heels.

“If we could eliminate the last couple of seconds, I’d be on Cloud 9,” North Carolina coach Anson Dorrance said.

Sentnor had a first-half goal, and Maddie Dahlien and Kate Faasse scored less than 10½ minutes apart late in the second half for the Tar Heels in what was announced as a sell-out crowd of 4,079. Those were the first goals of the season for Dahlien and Faasse.

“They’re always a hard opponent for us,” Dahlien said. “We can learn things (from this) and take it with us the rest of the season.”

Dorrance appreciated how the Tar Heels (7–0–4, 2–0-1 ACC) were determined throughout the game. He marveled at how his team ended up with a 58-percent mark in possession time, something unusual for North Carolina when taking on Florida State.

On the downside, the Seminoles (7–0–1, 2–0–1) converted off two of their three corner-kick opportunities.

“Their ruthlessness in finishing corner kicks is at a different level,” Dorrance said.

Florida State’s final goal came following a hurried corner kick that was taken with less than 10 seconds to play. Dorrance was irritated that it got to that stage because he said twice in the final minute the Tar Heels had chances to play the ball toward the corners to allow more time to tick off the clock.

“Certainly disappointed in our end game,” Dorrance said. “We had opportunities to salt the game. … If even one of those times, we had knocked it toward the corner, the game would have been over.”

Van Zanten’s goal was her first tally of the season, assisted by Taylor Huff.

Giving up three goals, even against a team of Florida State’s power, was what Dorrance called “unforgiveable.”

“I was excited about the fact that we went down, came back. Went down again, came back and then went ahead,” Dorrance said.

Faasse scored on a one-timer down the right side off Sentnor’s pass with 4:51 remaining. All looked good for the Tar Heels.

This marked the fourth meeting in barely more than 11 months. Those included Florida State’s victory in the ACC Tournament final and North Carolina’s triumph in the College Cup semifinals.

“It definitely lived up to the expectations, but lots to work on,” Sentnor said. “These games are special. I really hope we get matched up again with them. They’re a great team.”

Florida State’s first two goals came from Jordynn Dudley, whose header off Huff’s delivery put the Seminoles up 2-1 about 17 minutes into the second half.

The Tar Heels were even again with 13:21 left on Dahlien’s goal, with the ball bouncing in off the left post. Evelyn Shores assisted.

Dahlien, a substitute, was pleased with the contributions.

“Coming off the bench, you want to add energy,” she said.

Earlier, Dudley made a move in the box and delivered the goal 16:52 into the game. It came in transition as Leilanni Nesbeth controlled the ball down the field.

At the time of Florida State’s goal, the Tar Heels already had taken seven corner kicks.

North Carolina had a chance to tie with 4:54 remaining in the first half go awry when Maycee Bell shot high on a penalty kick after a Florida State foul in the box.

Unwavered, the Tar Heels were back on the attack a minute later on Sentnor’s goal. It came as Dahlien took the ball deep into the box and Sentnor finished the play.

Sentnor had Carolina’s only goal in Thursday night’s victory at Virginia. She has five goals this season.

Dudley, a freshman from Alpharetta, Ga., posted her fourth and fifth goals of the season.

Dudley had another chance in the second half, but that was thwarted with the ball ricocheting in front of the net and finally booted out of harm’s way by Tessa Dellarose.

Tar Heels goalkeeper Emmie Allen, who made four saves in the game, was called upon to smother a loose ball in the box in the opening two minutes.

The Tar Heels threatened less than three minutes later on Bell’s header that was right at Seminoles goalkeeper Cristina Roque.

Bob Sutton is a veteran ACC sports writer who was the sports editor of the Burlington Times-News for 25 years.

No. 1 UNC 3, No. 3 FSU 3

Date	Month/day	Time/score	Event/opponent (current rank)	Location	TV/ record
	August
7	Monday	W, 8–1	College of Charleston	Home	Exhibition
12	Saturday	W, 2–0	East Carolina	Home	Exhibition
17	Thursday	T, 0–0	No. 5 Penn State	University Park, Pa.	0–0–1
20	Sunday	W, 3–1	Cal	Home	1–0–1
24	Thursday	T, 0–0	No. 12 Wisconsin	Home	1–0–2
27	Sunday	W, 4–0	No. 22 USC	Home	2–0–2
31	Thursday	W, 5–0	Gardner-Webb	Home	3–0–2
	September
3	Sunday	W, 3–1	No. 10 Arkansas	Home	4–0–2
7	Thursday	W, 2–1	No. 16 South Carolina	Columbia, S.C.	5–0–2
10	Sunday	T, 1–1	No. 24 Alabama	Tuscaloosa, Ala.	5–0–3
15	Friday	W, 1–0	Virginia Tech	Home	6–0–3, 1–0 ACC
21	Thursday	W, 1–0	Virginia	Charlottesville, Va.	7–0–3, 2–0 ACC
24	Sunday	T, 3–3	No. 1 Florida State	Home	7–0–4, 2–0–1 ACC
30	Saturday	W, 4–0	N.C. State	Raleigh	8–0–4, 3–0–1 ACC
	October
5	Thursday	W, 1–0	Miami	Home	9–0–4, 4–0–1 ACC
8	Sunday	T, 1–1	No. 25 Duke	Durham	9–0–5, 4–0–2 ACC
13	Friday	T, 1–1	No. 25 Wake Forest	Winston-Salem	9–0–6, 4–0–3 ACC
19	Thursday	T, 1–1	No. 9 Notre Dame	Home	9–0–7, 4–0–4 ACC
22	Sunday	W, 6–1	Syracuse	Home	10–0–7, 5–0–4 ACC
26	Thursday	T, 1–1	Boston College	Newton, Mass.	10–0–8, 5–0–5 ACC
			ACC tournament
29	Sunday	L, 2–1 (2 OTs)	No. 11 Pittsburgh	Chapel Hill	10–1–8
	November		NCAA tournament Link to bracket
10	Friday	W, 3–1	First round: Towson	Chapel Hill	11–1–8
17	Friday	W, 1–0	Second round: No. 24 Alabama	Lubbock, Texas	12–1–8
19	Sunday	W, 1–0	Third round: No. 4 Texas Tech	Lubbock, Texas	13–1–8
24	Friday	L, 4–3	Quarterfinals: No. 6 Brigham Young	Provo, Utah	13–2–8