{"id":45569,"date":"2011-08-30T14:20:01","date_gmt":"2011-08-30T18:20:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=45569"},"modified":"2011-09-02T09:51:11","modified_gmt":"2011-09-02T13:51:11","slug":"mens-soccer-faces-early-season-challenges","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2011\/08\/mens-soccer-faces-early-season-challenges\/","title":{"rendered":"Men’s Soccer Faces Early Season Challenges"},"content":{"rendered":"

Update Sept. 2: The men\u2019s soccer team defeated Michigan State on Thursday after junior Max Wasserman \u201913 (CLAS) broke a tie with a free kick from 25 yards out in the 76th minute, to give UConn a 2-1 victory.<\/em><\/p>\n

Freshman keeper Andre Blake \u201915 (CLAS) made five saves to earn the victory. \u201cThese are the games we have to win, the real tough ones, \u201d said head coach Ray Reid. \u201cWe need these games. It was a resilient win.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

\"Promising<\/a>
Promising freshman goalkeeper Andre Blake '15 (CLAS) has emerged from the pack of five keepers on the roster. (Photo provided by Athletic Communications)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In 2010, the men\u2019s soccer team played six games to a tie, including its NCAA game against Brown, which was lost in a shootout. It was the second straight year the Huskies were sent home after battling to a tie.<\/p>\n

Head coach Ray Reid says that needs to change this year.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need this team to win those games,\u201d says Reid, who voiced his disappointment after the Brown loss, noting that the Huskies have not converted penalty shots during the past few seasons. \u201cIt\u2019s a mental thing as much as anything. We win games by more than a goal, but we need to win those [shootout] games. They are tight all the way.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Sophomore<\/a>
Sophomore defender Andrew Jean-Baptiste '14 (CLAS). (Photo provided by Athletic Communications)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Reid will test the mental toughness of his nationally ranked Huskies (4 Soccer America\/5 NSCAA) early in the 2011 season, beginning with Thursday\u2019s 7:30 p.m. game at Joseph J. Morrone Stadium against No. 19 Michigan State, the first of 10 NCAA tournament teams from 2010 that UConn will face this year. Those include another home game against (7\/20) California on Sept. 4, followed by a two-game road trip against Tulsa and (5\/7) SMU the following weekend. The schedule includes (25\/23) Boston College of the Atlantic Coast Conference, and Big East members (1\/1) Louisville, (12\/9) Notre Dame, West Virginia, Providence, and Georgetown.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s going to be a tough schedule, but we did that because we want to challenge this group,\u201d says Reid, who begins his 15th year leading the Huskies. \u201cThey need to be challenged.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Mamadou<\/a>
Mamadou Doudou Diouf '14 (CLAS), sophomore forward. (Photo provided by Athletic Communications)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Part of the Huskies\u2019 challenge is making up for the loss to graduation of goalkeeper Josh Ford \u201911 (CLAS), who rewrote the men\u2019s soccer record book in Storrs, and the experienced defenders Robert Brickley \u201911 (ENG), Greg King \u201911 (CLAS), Shawn Nicklaw \u201911 (CLAS), and Thomas Wharf \u201911 (CLAS). Reid is looking to sophomore Andrew Jean-Baptiste \u201914 (CLAS) to lead the corps of young defenders that will help support promising freshman goalkeeper Andre Blake \u201915 (CLAS), who emerged from the pack of five keepers on the roster.<\/p>\n

The defense will be anchored with help from redshirt junior Sean Weir \u201913 (ED) and senior Nickardo Blake \u201912 (CLAS), with contributions from newcomers Istvan Kanyo \u201915 (CLAS), Mike Mercado \u201915 (CLAS), Will Noiset \u201915 (CLAS), and Flo Liu \u201913 (CLAS), a junior transfer from University of Alabama-Birmingham.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are going to change up a lot. The group [of defenders] that came in have to not only match what [last year\u2019s seniors] did, but I feel they can do more than what they did,\u201d Jean-Baptiste says. \u201cIt is the same group on offense up front for the most part. I expect nothing different from the top players this year.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Senior<\/a>
Senior All-American midfielder Tony Cascio '12 (ED). (Photo provided by Athletic Communications)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Huskies will have plenty of firepower on offense with the return of their top four scorers, including senior All-American midfielder Tony Cascio \u201912 (ED) (26 points on 10 goals, 6 assists), junior All-American forward Carlos Alvarez \u201913 (CLAS) (22\/4\/14), junior midfielder Stephane Diop \u201913 (CLAS) (17\/8\/1), and sophomore forward Mamadou Doudou Diouf \u201914 (CLAS) (13\/6\/1).<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got all of our attack players back,\u201d says Cascio. \u201cWe\u2019ve played a year together. Now that we\u2019ve got a year under our belt, I think we\u2019re ready to go. I feel on offense if one of us is having a bad game, we have other dangerous players to pick the other guy up. We feel good about ourselves.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Junior<\/a>
Junior All-American forward Carlos Alvarez '13 (CLAS). (Photo provided by Athletic Communications)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Alvarez, who credits Huskies strength and conditioning coach Chris West with helping him to increase his power and conditioning during the past two seasons, says the team is confident in its abilities on both offense and defense.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re going to defend,\u201d Alvarez says. \u201cIf they get one, we\u2019re going to keep pushing. I trust my teammates, and this year we\u2019re stronger in our chemistry. We\u2019re going to go forward. I\u2019m trying to bring a NCAA title to Storrs.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Huskies\u2019 determination was evident last Saturday at the home opener against St. Francis, which was played in a rainstorm that was the prelude to Hurricane Irene. Despite the stormy conditions, about 2,200 fans saw the Huskies earn a 2-0 win, which Reid said was important as much for the playing conditions as for the victory.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a tournament game for us,\u201d he said after the game. \u201cThis is what it will be like in October and November around here and in the NCAA Tournament.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The men’s soccer team will face 10 NCAA tournament teams on a challenging 2011 schedule.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":45622,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[55],"class_list":["post-45569","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-30 15:08:14","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45569","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45569"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45569\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":45882,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45569\/revisions\/45882"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/45622"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45569"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45569"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45569"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=45569"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=45569"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}