By R.L. Bynum

CHAPEL HILL — This is not how No. 3 UNC draws it up, but the draws just keep coming — even when the Tar Heels clearly have the better of the play.

Carolina played its third consecutive 1–1 draw, this time against No. 12 Notre Dame on Thursday night at Dorrance Field for its seventh tie and fourth in ACC play, both school records.

Ally Sentnor’s long free kick with 12 seconds left went off the crossbar, causing just one more bit of frustration on a night when UNC outshot Notre Dame 17–2 and had nine corners compared to none for the Irish.

UNC coach Anson Dorrance said that his team did a lot of things well, and he wasn’t upset with the effort, lamenting that the game has a way of frustrating you.

“Sometimes your opponent frustrates you, and sometimes the game does,” Dorrance said. “And I think today it was basically the game. It’s a very difficult game to master, very difficult to score goals, and then, ironically, very easy to score goals. And how can you outshoot a team by the margin that we outshot them with and have an equal number of goals? So that’s the dichotomy of our sport.”

UNC (9–0–7, 4–0–4 ACC) couldn’t finish several good chances in a physical and sometimes contentious match with Notre Dame (9–2–4, 4–1–2), which scored on one of only two shots and drew three of five yellow cards.

Several other Irish fouls went uncalled, including just before they scored.

“We’re speculating that on their goal [that] we were fouled,” Dorrance said. “It’s sort of the nature of the game that makes it unfair, because we were clearly the better team and just couldn’t seem to generate enough goals to allow us to win.”

In the 55th minute, Notre Dame forward Maddie Mercado hit Talia Dellaperuta hard from behind at midfield, appearing also to pull her hair, leaving the UNC midfielder understandably agitated. Carolina midfielder Sam Meza, 5–2, then shoved the 5–8 Mercado from behind in retaliation, drawing yellow cards for both of them.

Senior forward Avery Patterson, who scored her team-high sixth goal, also had some words for Mercado.

“There’s a little fire in all of us. It just takes one too many fouls to bring that out. So, I think once one person gets into it, we all have each other’s back,” said Patterson, who wasn’t surprised by Meza’s actions and thought the yellow card was worth it. “It’s what you have to do. You’re standing up for your teammates, so I don’t blame her at all.”

Redshirt senior Maycee Bell, who started in the 4–3–3 alignment at right center back after missing the Wake Forest game to rest as she works through a right knee issue, said the Tar Heels aren’t going to back down.

“We’re always gonna have our teammates back and when somebody fouls like that, obviously we’re going to be upset with it,” Bell said. “But overall, I thought we kept our cool. Obviously, we got some yellow cards, but I think that’s the nature of the game when people are fouling like that.”

Dorrance would prefer for his players not to react like that, saying it drives him nuts and quipped that his team apparently loves drama. He always went with a different tactic as a player in that situation.

“I used to really enjoy it when someone would kick the absolute s**t out of me,” Dorrance said. “And I walked up to them and I say something like, ‘is your foot okay? Then, I want you to injure yourself kicking me.’ In other words, I would never let anyone allow me to boil over. Things in this game, we seem to be too excited. And ridiculously excited, in my opinion.”

Although the Tar Heels extended their unbeaten streak against the Irish to nine, they face a battle to avoid a first-round ACC tournament game. Only the top two teams get first-round byes, and UNC’s 16 points leave it tied with Pittsburgh for fourth place with two games left (see standings below).

Patterson says that she’s confident that being held to one goal for three consecutive matches isn’t going to weigh on the team.

“I think that it’s one of those things where people go through spells in the season,” said Patterson, who was wearing a wrap around her right hand because she broke that pinkie two games ago at Duke. “My sophomore year, it was you couldn’t score. It’s not that we’re not scoring. It’s just that we’re not scoring enough. It always could be worse and I think it will work itself out.”

Carolina cashed in on the second of two corners in less than a minute to score in the 17th minute. After left back Tessa Dellarose’s strike went off right center back Maycee Bell, Patterson flipped around and made a tough angle shot from the left side to beat Irish goalkeeper Atlee Olofson for her team-leading sixth goal.

“It’s kind of one of those things where you know where the goal is in the back of your head and you know that Maycee is always going to win those headers,” Patterson said.

UNC kept applying pressure as forward Maddie Dahlien had two near misses within a minute during the first half. The Tar Heels dominated the first half with 72% of the possession time and advantages of 10–1 on shots and 6–0 on corners, but Notre Dame took advantage of its only first-half shot.

After an apparent Irish foul, forward Charlie Codd pounced on a deflection in front of the net after a wild sequence and rocketed it by UNC goalkeeper Emmie Allen to tie it at 1 in the 42nd minute.

NOTES — Carolina faces Syracuse (2–12–2, 0–7–1) at 1 p.m. Sunday (ESPN3) in its final regular-season home game. The Orange last won a game with a 2–1 win over Binghamton on Aug. 27 and is on a 12-game winless streak after Thursday’s 2–0 loss at N.C. State. … UNC freshman midfielder Evelyn Shores, who earned four team player-of-the-match awards and started six games, is out for the season after tearing her right ACL in Friday’s 1–1 draw at Wake Forest. … Redshirt sophomore Emerson Elgin came off the bench because she was on a 30-minute playing time restriction as she recovers from a knee issue. That allowed sisters Tori and Talia Dellaperuta to start together for the first time this season. They were in the middle of the 4–3–3 alignment with Talia at midfield and Tori at forward. … Bell (No. 5), Sentnor (No. 25), Meza (No. 28) and Patterson (No. 40) made TopDrawerSoccer’s Midseason Top 100 Players list. Savy King (No. 2), Shores (No. 31), Olivia Thomas (No. 50) and Melina Rebimbas (No. 55) made its Top 100 Freshmen list. … A well-done “Athletes are Artists/Artists are Athletes” video featuring Meza and tap dancer Michelle Dorrance, daughter of the coach, was played on the video board at halftime. … UNC leads the all-time series with the Irish 23–7–4, including 7–5–2 at home. … Carolina’s defense has held 15 of its 16 opponents to 10 shots or fewer, seven of those to five or fewer and three to only one.

No. 3 UNC 1, No. 12 Notre Dame 1

ACC standings

Team	Points	ACC	All
No. 1 Florida State	28	9–0–1	14–0–1
No. 11 Notre Dame	23	7–1–2	11–2–4
No. 8 Clemson	22	7–2–1	13–2–3
No. 3 North Carolina	20	5–0–5	10–0–8
Pittsburgh	19	6–3–1	13–4–1
Wake Forest	16	4–2–4	10–2–5
Virginia	13	3–3–4	8–3–6
Virginia Tech	12	4–6–0	7–8–3
Louisville	11	3–5–2	4–9–5
Duke	9	2–5–3	6–7–3
N.C. State	9	2–5–3	3–9–6
Miami	7	2–7–1	3–10–4
Boston College	4	0–6–4	3–9–6
Syracuse	1	0–9–1	2–14–2

Thursday’s games
No. 3 North Carolina 1, Boston College 1
Wake Forest 2, Miami 0
Louisville 1, Duke 0
No. 1 Florida State 5, N.C. State 0
Pittsburgh 2, Virginia Tech 1
Virginia 4, Syracuse 0
No. 11 Notre Dame 2, No. 8 Clemson 0
ACC tournament
Sunday’s first-round games
(6 seed) Wake Forest at (3 seed) No. 8 Clemson, 6 p.m., ACCN
(5 seed) Pittsburgh at (4 seed) No. 3 North Carolina, 8 p.m., ACCN
Semifinals in Cary, Thursday, Nov. 2
Clemson-Wake Forest winner vs. (2 seed) No. 11 Notre Dame, 5:30 p.m., ACCN
UNC-Pittsburgh winner vs. (1 seed) No. 1 Florida State, 8 p.m., ACCN
Championship in Cary, Sunday, Nov. 5
Noon, ESPNU

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