Duke lax continues mastery of UVa.

The No. 7 Duke Blue Devils (11-3, 2-1 ACC) used a 6-0 run in the second half to elevate itself past the No. 1 Virginia Cavaliers (10-2, 2-1) on Friday night, 13-5, in front of 7,234 fans inside Klöckner Stadium.

With the loss, Duke claims the No. 1 seed in next weekend’s ACC Championship and plays Maryland at 5 p.m. UVa earns the No. 2 seed and will play North Carolina at 7:30 p.m., inside Klöckner Stadium.

“We just weren’t prepared to do the things that we needed to do in order to win this game,” said Virginia men’s lacrosse head coach Dom Starsia. “We weren’t prepared to match the effort of that team on the other side, and I give them credit for that. I’ve got no quarrel with my kids, and we’ve practiced hard and played hard. We’ve been through a tough part of the schedule. At the same time, this was unacceptable tonight for us across the board.”

Jordon Wolf started the scoring at the 11:16 mark to give Duke the 1-0 lead. The score stayed put for the rest of the first quarter, as UVa was held scoreless in a quarter for the first time this season. Matt White tied the game on a Colin Briggs pass with 13:04 left in the second quarter.

Duke rattled off three goals in a row in the second quarter to take a 4-1 lead. Chris Bocklet picked up a ground ball and deposited it in the goal off an errant pass to send UVa into the intermission down two goals, 4-2. UVa did not get closer the rest of the evening.

Coming out of the break, Duke scored six goals in a row to take a 10-2 lead. The Cavaliers failed to score in the third quarter and Luke Duprey capped the Duke run with a transition goal 40 seconds into the fourth period.

Briggs ended the drought with a score from Steele Stanwick with 13:42 remaining in the game. After Jake Tripucka scored unassisted at 9:49, Mark Cockerton and Stanwick finished off UVa’s scoring for the night, cutting Virginia’s defecit to six goals, 11-5.

Christian Walsh tallied back-to-back goals to finish the game’s scoring.

Duke won the shot battle (42-33) and the ground balls (39-37), while UVa and the Blue Devils tied on faceoffs (11-11). Rob Fortunato tied his career high with 16 saves, 10 of which came in the first half. Duke saved 14 of UVa’s shots.