Four ACC teams made it to the NCAA Field Hockey Tournament in 2021 with just one advancing to the second round. Unseeded Syracuse upset No. 4 seed Penn State, 4-1 and eventually fell to Maryland (also unseeded), 2-1. The conference usually is dominant in the sport but if the NFHCA Preseason Poll is a solid indicator there’s some work that needs to be done. Only one team is ranked among the top 5 of the latest polling and it’s the same team that conference coaches selected to take the ACC title.
All seven teams from the ACC made their way into the Top 25. That grouping of coaches clearly know that in addition to returning talent there’s a plethora of incoming players rich in the type of skills that take teams into post-season play. Does that mean there will be an ACC team competing for the NCAA championship? Right off the bat there are three teams, possibly four that have rosters that any smart coach would give their eyeteeth to have on their squad. But as previous years are any indicator we’ll just have to let it play out before we have an answer.
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Field Hockey
| ACC COACHES | TEAM |
| #1 | NORTH CAROLINA |
| #2 | SYRACUSE |
| #3 | BOSTON COLLEGE |
| #4 | VIRGINIA |
| #5 | LOUISVILLE |
| #T6 | DUKE |
| #T6 | WAKE FOREST |
The national coaches’ poll doesn’t see eye-to-eye with the ACC coaches’ poll on the four field hockey teams that follow North Carolina.
| NFHCA POLL | TEAM |
| #1 | NORTHWESTERN |
| #2 | NORTH CAROLINA |
| #3 | MICHIGAN |
| #4 | MARYLAND |
| #5 | IOWA |
| #9 | LOUISVILLE |
| #10 | SYRACUSE |
| #12 | VIRGINIA |
| #14 | BOSTON COLLEGE |
| #18 | DUKE |
| #20 | WAKE FOREST |
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You’ll get to see lots of ACC field hockey this fall on the ACC Network as ten games are scheduled.
| Date | Time (ET) | Matchup | Network |
| Sun, Aug. 28 | 1:30 p.m. | Michigan at Wake Forest | ACCN |
| 4 p.m. | North Carolina vs Iowa | ACCN | |
| Sun, Sep. 4 | 4 p.m. | Northwestern at Boston College | ACCN |
| Sun, Sep. 11 | Noon | Michigan at Louisville | ACCN |
| Sun, Sep. 18 | 2 p.m. | St. Joe’s at Virginia | ACCN |
| Fri, Sep. 23 | 6 p.m. | Boston College at Duke | ACCN |
| Wed, Oct. 5 | 6 p.m. | Stanford at Syracuse | ACCN |
| Fri, Oct. 7 | 6 p.m. | Louisville at Wake Forest | ACCN |
| Sun, Oct. 23 | Noon | Rutgers at Syracuse | ACCN |
| 2 p.m. | St. Joe’s at North Carolina | ACCN |
The ACC field hockey season begins on Friday, August 26 with a number of blockbuster matchups on the schedule.
