2021 Atlantic Coast Conference women's soccer season

The 2021 Atlantic Coast Conference women's soccer season was the 33rd season of women's varsity soccer in the conference.

2021 Atlantic Coast Conference women's soccer season
League	NCAA Division I
Sport	Soccer
Duration	August 19, 2021 – October 28, 2021
Number of teams	14
2022 NWSL Draft
Top draft pick	Jaelin Howell
Picked by	Racing Louisville FC, 2nd overall
Regular season
Season champions	Virginia
Runners-up	Florida State
Season MVP	Offensive:Diana Ordoñez Midfielder:Jaelin Howell Defensive:Emily Madril
Top scorer	Diana Ordoñez[1]
Tournament
Champions	Florida State
Runners-up	Virginia
Finals MVP	Clara Robbins (Florida State)

2021 ACC women's soccer standings

v t e	Conf.									Overall
Team	W		L		T		PCT			W		L		T		PCT
No. 8 Virginia  ‍†‍‍y	8	–	0	–	2		.900			18	–	3	–	2		.826
No. 1 Florida State  ‍‍‡‍y	7	–	1	–	2		.800			21	–	1	–	3		.900
No. 5 Duke  ‍‍‍y	7	–	2	–	1		.750			16	–	4	–	1		.786
No. 16 Notre Dame  ‍‍‍y	7	–	3	–	0		.700			14	–	6	–	2		.682
Clemson  ‍‍‍y	6	–	3	–	1		.650			12	–	7	–	1		.625
No. 14 North Carolina  ‍‍‍y	5	–	2	–	3		.650			12	–	3	–	3		.750
No. 25 Wake Forest  ‍‍‍y	6	–	4	–	0		.600			16	–	6	–	0		.727
Virginia Tech  ‍‍‍y	5	–	3	–	2		.600			12	–	6	–	2		.650
Pittsburgh  ‍‍‍	4	–	6	–	0		.400			11	–	7	–	0		.611
NC State  ‍‍‍y	4	–	6	–	0		.400			9	–	9	–	2		.500
Louisville  ‍‍‍	3	–	6	–	1		.350			7	–	7	–	2		.500
Boston College  ‍‍‍	1	–	9	–	0		.100			7	–	10	–	1		.417
Miami (FL)  ‍‍‍	1	–	9	–	0		.100			4	–	12	–	0		.250
Syracuse  ‍‍‍	0	–	10	–	0		.000			4	–	12	–	1		.265
† – Conference champion ‡ – 2021 ACC Tournament champion y – Invited to the NCAA Tournament As of December 7, 2021 Rankings from United Soccer Coaches Poll Source: The ACC

Florida State and North Carolina are the defending regular season champions. The Seminoles are the defending ACC tournament champions.^[2]

The regular season champions were the Virginia Cavaliers. The Florida State Seminoles won the ACC tournament and the NCAA tournament.

Teams

Stadiums and locations

Team	Stadium	Capacity
Boston College Eagles	Newton Soccer Complex	2,500
Clemson Tigers	Riggs Field	6,500
Duke Blue Devils	Koskinen Stadium	7,000
Florida State Seminoles	Seminole Soccer Complex	1,600
Louisville Cardinals	Lynn Stadium	5,300
Miami Hurricanes	Cobb Stadium	500
NC State	Dail Soccer Field	3,000
North Carolina Tar Heels	Dorrance Field	5,025
Notre Dame Fighting Irish	Alumni Stadium	2,500
Pittsburgh Panthers	Ambrose Urbanic Field	735
Syracuse Orange	SU Soccer Stadium	5,000
Virginia Cavaliers	Klöckner Stadium	8,000
Virginia Tech Hokies	Thompson Field	2,500
Wake Forest Demon Deacons	Spry Stadium	3,000

1. ^ Georgia Tech does not sponsor women's soccer

Coaches

Head Coaching Records

Team	Head coach	Years at school	Overall record	Record at school	ACC record
Boston College	Jason Lowe	3	11–18–3	11–18–3	2–15–1
Clemson	Eddie Radwanski	11	244–130–37	105–65–24	44–49–8
Duke	Robbie Church	21	344–180–70	256–131–59	97–61–33
Florida State	Mark Krikorian	17	364–96–36	289–66–33	111–32–25
Louisville	Karen Ferguson-Dayes	21	187–168–37	187–168–37	27–32–10
Miami	Sarah Barnes	4	72–70–20	12–29–6	5–21–2
North Carolina	Anson Dorrance	43	851–70–38	851–70–38	208–26–10
NC State	Tim Santoro	9	67–73–15	67–73–15	19–46–8
Notre Dame	Nate Norman	4	83–60–16	25–25–2	12–14–2
Pittsburgh	Randy Waldrum	4	419–135–33	20–27–4	12–26–2
Syracuse	Nicky Adams	3	91–73–25	4–18–2	2–14–1
Virginia	Steve Swanson	21	433–161–62	329–98–51	130–46–21
Virginia Tech	Charles Adair	11	126–62–20	126–62–20	46–43–13
Wake Forest	Tony da Luz	24	313–221–52	268-180-50	90–106–23

Notes

• Records shown are prior to the 2021 season
• Years at school includes the 2021 season

Pre-season

Hermann Trophy Watchlist

The Hermann Trophy Watchlist was released on August 19, 2021^[3][4]

Player	Class	Position	School
Megan Bornkamp	Sophomore	DF	Clemson
Sophie Jones	Junior	MF	Duke
Jaelin Howell	Senior	MF	Florida State
Emily Madril	Senior	DF	Florida State
Yujie Zhao	Senior	MF	Florida State
Claudia Dickey	Senior	GK	North Carolina
Rachel Jones	Senior	FW	North Carolina
Lia Godfrey	Sophomore	MF	Virginia
Haley Hopkins	Graduate Student	MF	Virginia
Alexa Spaanstra	Senior	FW	Virginia

Pre-season poll

The 2020 ACC Preseason Poll was announced on September 8, 2021. The defending regular season champions, Florida State and North Carolina were voted in first and second place, respectively. The leagues 14 head coaches also voted on a preseason All-ACC team. Full results for the coaches poll and preseason team are shown below.

Pre-season Coaches Poll

Predicted finish	Team	Points (1st place)
1	Florida State	167 (11)
2	North Carolina	155 (2)
3	Virginia	148 (1)
4	Duke	129
5	Clemson	124
6	Notre Dame	104
7	Virginia Tech	85
8	Louisville	77
9	Wake Forest	72
10	NC State	71
11	Pittsburgh	57
12	Boston College	45
13	Syracuse	24
14	Miami	16

Source:^[5]

Pre-season All-ACC Team

Position	Player	Class	School
Goalkeeper	Hensley Hancuff	Senior	Clemson
Defender	Maycee Bell	Junior	North Carolina
	Delaney Graham	Senior	Duke
Midfielder	Megan Bornkamp	Sophomore	Clemson
	Sophie Jones	Junior	Duke
	Jaelin Howell	Senior	Florida State
	Yujie Zhao	Senior	Florida State
	Lia Godfrey	Sophomore	Virginia
Forward	Rachel Jones	Senior	North Carolina
	Amanda West	Sophomore	Pittsburgh
	Alexa Spaanstra	Senior	Virginia

Source:^[5]

Regular season

Conference Matrix

The table below shows head-to-head results between teams in conference play. Each team plays ten matches. Each team does not play every other team.

	Boston College	Clemson	Duke	Florida State	Louisville	Miami	NC State	North Carolina	Notre Dame	Pittsburgh	Syracuse	Virginia	Virginia Tech	Wake Forest
vs. Boston College	–	4–1	–	4–1	1–2	1–0	–	2–1 (OT)	4–1	3–0	–	3–0	1–0	1–0
vs. Clemson	1–4	–	–	4–1	1–1 (2OT)	0–1	1–2	3–0	2–1 (2OT)	0–2	0–8	–	0–1	–
vs. Duke	–	–	–	0–1	0–1	–	2–1 (2OT)	0–1	1–0 (OT)	0–5	0–2	1–0	1–1 (2OT)	0–2
vs. Florida State	1–4	1–4	1–0	–	0–3	1–4	–	2–2 (2OT)	–	0–5	0–5	1–1 (2OT)	0–2	–
vs. Louisville	2–1	1–1 (2OT)	1–0	3–0	–	2–3 (2OT)	2–1	–	3–0	–	1–2	4–1	–	1–2 (OT)
vs. Miami	0–1	1–0	–	4–1	3–2 (2OT)	–	–	4–0	5–0	2–0	–	6–1	5–0	2–1 (2OT)
vs. NC State	–	1–2	1–2 (2OT)	–	1–2	–	–	0–1	2–1	2–0	0–3	2–1	1–0	1–0
vs. North Carolina	1–2 (OT)	0–3	1–0	2–2 (2OT)	–	0–4	1–0	–	1–2 (2OT)	0–1	–	0–0 (2OT)	2–2 (2OT)	–
vs. Notre Dame	1–4	1–2 (2OT)	0–1 (OT)	–	0–3	0–5	1–2	2–1 (2OT)	–	–	0–4	2–1	–	0–2
vs. Pittsburgh	0–3	2–0	5–0	5–0	–	0–2	0–2	1–0	–	–	2–4	–	2–1	2–1
vs. Syracuse	–	8–0	2–0	5–0	2–1	–	3–0	–	4–0	4–2	–	5–0	2–1	2–0
vs. Virginia	0–3	–	0–1	1–1 (2OT)	1–4	1–6	1–2	0–0 (2OT)	1–2	–	0–5	–	–	0–1
vs. Virginia Tech	0–1	1–0	1–1 (2OT)	2–0	–	0–5	0–1	2–2 (2OT)	–	1–2	1–2	–	–	4–3
vs. Wake Forest	0–1	–	2–0	–	2–1 (OT)	1–2 (2OT)	0–1	–	2–0	1–2	0–2	1–0	3–4	–
Total	1–9–0	6–3–1	7–2–1	7–1–2	3–6–1	1–9–0	4–6–0	5–2–3	7–3–0	4–6–0	0–10–0	8–0–2	5–3–2	6–4–0

Rankings

Main article: 2021 NCAA Division I women's soccer rankings

United Soccer

Legend

		Increase in ranking
		Decrease in ranking
		Not ranked previous week

	Pre	Wk 1	Wk 2	Wk 3	Wk 4	Wk 5	Wk 6	Wk 7	Wk 8	Wk 9	Wk 10	Wk 11	Wk 12	Final
Boston College			RV
Clemson	7	9	15	RV	RV	22	RV	RV	RV	RV	RV	24	RV	RV
Duke	6	5	5	5	4	2	4	4 (1)	8	6	2 (2)	6	4	5
Florida State	1 (11)	1 (26)	1 (32)	1 (29)	1 (32)	1 (33)	1 (33)	1 (29)	1 (31)	1 (31)	3 (5)	2 (2)	1 (29)	1 (25)
Louisville
Miami
North Carolina	3 (3)	2 (4)	2 (1)	2 (2)	2 (1)	4	5	5	3	7	7	7	10	14
NC State										RV
Notre Dame			RV	RV	RV	RV	RV	24	17	15	22	RV	RV	16
Pittsburgh		RV	20	20	19	RV
Syracuse
Virginia	4 (1)	3 (1)	3	3 (1)	7	7	2 (1)	2 (1)	2 (1)	2 (2)	1 (26)	1 (28)	2 (3)	8
Virginia Tech		RV			RV	RV	19	17	RV	RV	RV	RV	RV	RV
Wake Forest							RV			RV	RV	25	RV	25

Top Drawer Soccer

Legend

		Increase in ranking
		Decrease in ranking
		Not ranked previous week

	Wk 1	Wk 2	Wk 3	Wk 4	Wk 5	Wk 6	Wk 7	Wk 8	Wk 9	Wk 10	Wk 11	Wk 12	Wk 13	Wk 14	Wk 15	Wk 16	Final
Boston College
Clemson	8	7	10	23	21	16	18
Duke	7	6	6	5	4	3	6	6	12	10	8	11	12	9	4	6	6
Florida State	2	2	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	2	2	1	1	1	1	1
Louisville
Miami
North Carolina	4	4	3	3	2	4	4	4	3	6	5	4	4	14	16	16	17
NC State
Notre Dame					24	22	20	15	13	14	17	25	23	20	22	22	15
Pittsburgh		23	21	22	20
Syracuse
Virginia	3	3	2	2	7	5	2	2	2	2	1	1	3	2	9	9	9
Virginia Tech								25
Wake Forest									23

Players of the Week

Week	Offensive Player of the week	Defensive Player of the week	Reference
Week 1 – August 24	Amanda West, Pittsburgh	Jaelin Howell, Florida State	[6]
Week 2 – August 31	Linda Boama, Boston College	Claudia Dickey, North Carolina	[7]
Week 3 – September 7	Shayla Smart, Wake Forest	Claire Constant, Virginia	[8]
Week 4 – September 14	Megan Bornkamp, Clemson	Emily Madril, Florida State	[9]
Week 5 – September 21	Tess Boade, Duke	Ruthie Jones, Duke	[10]
Week 6 – September 28	Sammi Fisher, Notre Dame	Emily Madril, Florida State (2)	[11]
	Diana Ordoñez, Virginia	Alia Skinner, Virginia Tech
Week 7 – October 5	Beata Olsson, Florida State	Melissa Dagenais, Miami (FL)	[12]
	Emily Gray, Virginia Tech	Avery Patterson, North Carolina
Week 8 – October 12	Jameese Joseph, NC State	Eva Gaetino, Notre Dame	[13]
Week 9 – October 19	Jameese Joseph, NC State	Maria Echezarreta, NC State	[14]
	Alexa Spaanstra, Virginia
Week 10 – October 26	Tess Boade, Duke (2)	Emily Royson, Duke	[15]
	Diana Ordoñez, Virginia (2)
Week 11 – November 2	Caroline Conti, Clemson	Ashley Naylor, Notre Dame	[16]

Postseason

ACC Tournament

Main article: 2021 ACC Women's Soccer Tournament

	Semifinals					Final
	1	Virginia	1
	5	Clemson	0
						1	Virginia	0
						2	Florida State	1
	2	Florida State	2OT
	6	Wake Forest	1

NCAA tournament

Main article: 2021 NCAA Division I Women's Soccer Tournament

Seed	School	Region	1st Round	2nd Round	3rd Round	Quarterfinals	Semifinals	Championship
1	Florida State	Florida State	W 3–0 vs. South Alabama – (Tallahassee, FL)	W 5–1 vs. No. 25 SMU – (Tallahassee, FL)	W 1–0 vs. No. 19 Pepperdine – (Tallahassee, FL)	W 1–0 (OT) vs. No. 9 Michigan – (Tallahassee, FL)	W 1–0 vs. No. 5 Rutgers – (Santa Clara, CA)	T 0–0 (4–3 PKs) vs. No. 13 BYU – (Santa Clara, CA)
1	Duke	Duke	W 1–0 vs. Old Dominion – (Durham, NC)	W 1–0 vs. No. 18 Memphis – (Durham, NC)	W 7–1 vs. St. John's – (Durham, NC)	L 1–2 vs. No. 12 Santa Clara – (Durham, NC)
1	Virginia	Virginia	W 6–0 vs. High Point – (Charlottesville, VA)	W 2–0 vs. Milwaukee – (Charlottesville, VA)	L 0–1 vs. No. 13 BYU – (Charlottesville, VA)
2	North Carolina	Virginia	L 0–1 vs. South Carolina – (Chapel Hill, NC)
3	Notre Dame	Rutgers	W 3–0 vs. SIU Edwardsville – (Notre Dame, IN)	T 0–0 (4–3 PKs) at No. 24 Purdue – (Fayetteville, AR)	L 2–3 at No. 7 Arkansas – (Fayetteville, AR)
	Clemson	Virginia	L 0–1 vs. Alabama – (Clemson, SC)
	NC State	Florida State	W 2–0 at South Florida – (Tampa, FL)	L 0–3 vs. No. 19 Pepperdine – (Tallahassee, FL)
	Virginia Tech	Rutgers	W 3–0 vs. Ohio State – (Blacksburg, VA)	L 0–3 at No. 7 Arkansas – (Fayetteville, AR)
	Wake Forest	Florida State	W 3–0 vs. Harvard – (Winston-Salem, NC)	L 0–2 vs. No. 9 Michigan – (Ann Arbor, MI)
W–L (%):			7–2–0 (.778)	3–3–1 (.500)	2–2–0 (.500)	1–1–0 (.500)	1–0–0 (1.000)	0–0–1 (.500) Total: 14–8–2 (.625)

Awards and honors

ACC Awards

2021 ACC Women's Soccer Individual Awards[17]
Award	Recipient(s)
Offensive Player of the Year	Diana Ordoñez – Virginia
Coach of the Year	Steve Swanson – Virginia
Defensive Player of the Year	Emily Madril – Florida State
Midfielder of the Year	Jaelin Howell – Florida State
Freshman of the Year	Michelle Cooper – Duke

2021 ACC Women's Soccer All-Conference Teams[17]
First Team	Second Team	Third Team	All-Freshman Team
Megan Bornkamp – Clemson Michelle Cooper – Duke Tess Boade – Duke Ruthie Jones – Duke Jaelin Howell – Florida State Emily Madril – Florida State Yujie Zhao – Florida State Maycee Bell – North Carolina Sammi Fisher – Notre Dame Lia Godfrey – Virginia Diana Ordoñez – Virginia	Hal Hershfelt – Clemson Sophie Jones – Duke Gabby Carle – Florida State Beata Olsson – Florida State Clara Robbins – Florida State Sam Meza – North Carolina Jameese Joseph – NC State Samar Guidry – Virginia Laurel Ivory – Virginia Alexa Spaanstra – Virginia Emily Gray – Virginia Tech	Renee Guion – Clemson Hensley Hancuff – Clemson Makenna Morris – Clemson Jody Brown – Florida State Claudia Dickey – North Carolina Lulu Guttenberger – NC State Korbin Albert – Notre Dame Olivia Wingate – Notre Dame Amanda West – Pittsburgh Haley Hopkins – Virginia Taryn Torres – Virginia Shayla Smart – Wake Forest	Renee Lyles – Clemson Michelle Cooper – Duke Maria Alagoa – Florida State Mia Justus – Florida State Nina Nicosia – Louisville Emily Colton – North Carolina Emily Murphy – North Carolina Emika Kawagishi – NC State Annika Wohner – NC State Korbin Albert – Notre Dame Nikayla Small – Wake Forest

2022 NWSL Draft

Main article: 2022 NWSL Draft

FW

Forward

MF

Midfielder

DF

Defender

GK

Goalkeeper

Player	Team	Round	Pick #	Position	School
Jaelin Howell	Racing Louisville FC	1	2	MF	Florida State
Emily Gray	North Carolina Courage	1	3	MF	Virginia Tech
Diana Ordoñez	North Carolina Courage	1	6	FW	Virginia
Caitlin Cosme	Orlando Pride	1	10	DF	Duke
Sammi Fisher	Chicago Red Stars	2	19	MF	Notre Dame
Claudia Dickey	OL Reign	2	20	GK	North Carolina
Ryanne Brown	OL Reign	2	21	DF	Wake Forest
Jenna Menta	Racing Louisville FC	3	30	FW	Wake Forest
Hensley Hancuff	NJ/NY Gotham FC	3	34	GK	Clemson
Lily Nabet	Angel City FC	3	36	MF	Duke