Stephan Teodosescu
steodosescu@mustangdaily.net
Both the men’s and women’s soccer teams begin conference play this Friday and look forward to capitalizing on their Big West Conference schedules in 2012.
The women’s squad (3-5-1) is coming off a five-match losing streak heading into conference play after starting the 2012 campaign 3-0-1. Mustangs head coach Alex Crozier looks to a clean slate come Friday when Cal Poly hosts a struggling Pacific team.
“We’ve gone through a pretty big learning curve so far,” Crozier said. “We’ve started out the season with three wins and a tie and then lost five straight. So we’ve played some very good teams, juggled our lineup a bit and dealt with some injuries. Now that the preseason is over, conference starts 0-0. It’s a fresh start and we’re looking forward to getting to that on Friday.”
The Mustangs begin the Big West portion of their schedule with a two-match homestand hosting Pacific (3-6-0) and then welcome UC Davis (5-4-1) on Sunday at 12 noon.
After playing a primetime game at UC Irvine on Oct. 5, Cal Poly will travel to Long Beach where it faces Long Beach State, a team that’s coming off a 7-3-0 performance in nonconference play.
The Mustangs also host Hawaii as a conference opponent for the first time in Big West history when the Warriors visit Alex G. Spanos Stadium on Oct. 14.
Cal Poly will face rival UC Santa Barbara on Oct. 28 to round out the conference schedule.
According to Crozier, the Mustangs have to clean up the mistakes to compete for a conference crown in 2012.The Mustangs were outscored 15-4 in their five-game losing stretch, something that Crozier said he’d like to clean up once conference play begins.
“I’m not a big rah-rah kind of guy,” he said. “It’s just taking care of the little things and coming prepared to play. Every game is close. There are no gimmes. It’s one goal, two goals, that’s it. And you have to grind it out.”
The men, on the other hand, are coming off a five-match win streak — the longest since Cal Poly’s transition to Division I in 1994 — before falling to No. 12 UCLA in the team’s latest match on Sunday.
“Don’t hang your head for a second,” seventh-year head coach Paul Holocher said of his team’s loss to the Bruins. “It’s time to move on. We’ll see where we can improve; we’ll have a great training week ahead of us, but it’s Big West time now.”
After dropping their first two matches of the 2012 campaign against Seattle and Washington, the men’s squad has outscored opponents 11-4 in its six matches since, a welcome trend from a team that managed only 15 goals in 18 total fixtures last year.
They look to keep the offense rolling in a new conference format this season. The conference will be divided up into two divisions — North and South — and every team will play a 10-match conference schedule.
The schedule will feature a double round-robin format against every team in the North Division for the Mustangs, as they play a home-and-home with UC Davis, Sacramento State and UC Santa Barbara. They will also play each team from the South division once throughout the season.
But first, the Mustangs travel to Cal State Fullerton this Friday to face a 4-6-0 Titans team. Junior midfielder George Malki said the team’s mentality heading into its first Big West match-up is the same as it has been for the entire year.
“I think (the mentality) is the same as it’s always been,” said Malki, who leads the team in assists. “You know riding that five-game win streak. Just play as one every game. I know we were a little disappointed we couldn’t get the result (against UCLA). But it’s a zero-second memory, forget about it. We’ve put in a good week of training this week, and we’re prepared for Friday.”
The Mustangs will travel to Harder Stadium to face rival UC Santa Barbara on Oct. 19, before hosting the Gauchos in the regular season finale on Saturday Nov. 3.