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The Anteaters are riding a five-match unbeaten streak as the week begins with its final two home matches of the regular season hosting UC San Diego and then Senior Saturday vs. CSUN
Storylines
· In net, the 'Eaters have excelled as a duo with
Gordon Botterill entering the week with a shutout streak of 170 minutes coming off streaks of 189 and 276 minutes. He leads the conference with a .849 save percentage and a 0.71 goals-against-average.
Luke Pruter scored his first win at USD and saved nine shots in his first career start. He followed that up with 13 saves in a loss at Stanford for the second-highest single-game total in program history, and earned an assist and shutout vs. UCR. Together, they lead the Big West with 74 saves.
· Notables from last week in another unbeaten pair of games starting with a 1-1 draw against UC Davis after
Jake Means level things later in the first half. The 'Eaters finished the week Saturday with a 5-0 win at CSU Bakersfield thanks to a
Beto Alvarenga brace, two first-time goal scorers in
Francesco Montanile and
Rafael Espinoza, and a fifth shutout behind
Gordon Botterill's four saves to vault the 'Eaters into a tie for second place in the Big West. Alvarenga notched his first career weekly honor named Big West Offensive Player of the Week.
· From their performances, Botterill won his second Big West Defensive Player of the Week honor while Means earned his first Big West Freshman of the Week award.
· UCI's 2021 season has been a team effort with 18 different Anteaters earning points. For 11 of them, it was their first career points, and with 14 different players recording a goal, 11 have put home the first of their careers including four different players earning the four game-winners, all for their first career goals -
Ashish Chattha,
Axel Adler,
Kwabena Boateng,
Francesco Montanile, and
Christian Bond-Flasza. Overall, we've seen 11 Anteaters make their collegiate debuts in 2021 with nine producing points. The goals have ranged through the classes as well with five from first-years, six total from freshmen, and 12 from fourth or fifth-year Anteaters.
· Anteaters have made big strides in the professional ranks recently starting with Daniel Crisostomo whose made six appearances with LAFC starting the last three and putting up an 85% success rate on his passes vs. Portland.
Alvaro Quezada has also made a handful of appearances with LAFC playing alongside Crisostomo on one occasion.
Roberto Molina also made his debut with the El Salvador national team in a friendly, and started in another friendly vs. Guatemala while also continuing to compete with and captain the USL Las Vegas Lights FC.
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4 -Â 4 'Eaters have won Big West honors adding
Beto Alvarenga's offensive honor for the first of his career
1st -Â Keeper
Gordon Botterill enters Saturday's match as the Big West leader in save % (.849) and GAA (0.71)
14 & 5 -Â UCI has 23 goals from
14 different goal scorers and
5 game-winners from five different Anteaters
 #1 - Coach Raz's 2019 recruiting class was ranked #1 in the nation with two now playing pro and six on the 2021 roster
8 -Â The program will honor its
8 seniors following Saturday's match
7th -Â Anteater goalkeepers lead the Big West with 74 saves with Botterill ranking
7th nationally in save %
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This Week's Matches
· UCI enters the week tied for second on 11 points on six matches tied with Cal Poly, three points behind UC Santa Barbara, and three points ahead of Sac State who stands just outside the top six.
· UC San Diego has had an up-and-down season as their first in the Big West with a 4-9 mark with common opponents posting a win at USD and losses at Dixie State and UNLV. They are 1-5 in Big West. All nine losses for the Tritons have come by one goal as they enter Wednesday's match on a four-match losing streak. These programs meet up for the first time since 1996. The Tritons actually hold the series lead at 7-5-2 playing every year from 1984 to 1996. The last matchup was a 1-1 draw at UCI. Senior Nick Cirrito leads the offense with five goals and 25 shots. In Big West matches, the Tritons are on the bottom in scoring with just four goals in six matches along with the lowest totals of corners earned and fouls committed. Five other Tritons compliment Cirrito with four points so far in 2021.Nick Shor has stepped into goal for the past three matches stopping 12 shots.
· CSUN comes to Anteater Stadium on Saturday night as UCI honors its eight seniors on Senior Night. The Matadors have been a thorn in UCI's and coach Raz's side winning the last six meetings in this series to take a 27-21-6 lead including consecutive wins in 2019 on UCI Senior Night and ending the 'Eaters' run in the Big West Tournament at home. The Matadors have struggled in 2021 at 2-12-1 overall with losses in all eight road matches. Common opponents saw losses at UCLA and LMU. In Big West, CSUN is 1-4-1 defeating UCSD at home along with a home draw to Sac State, but at coming off road shutout losses at UC Riverside and a 5-0 loss at UC Davis. CSUN does have veteran presences steering the ship including keeper David Preys with 36 saves and two shutouts and fifth-year midfielder Giovanni Aguilar with three goals and two assists leading the Matadors in both categories.
2021 To This Point
· With three matches remaining in the regular season, UCI's remaining opponents all fall outside the top six in the standings. UCI is 3-0-2 against the other five programs in the top six with wins over Cal Poly, CSU Bakersfield, and UC Riverside with draws at UCSB and vs. UC Davis. The only Big West loss for the Anteaters has come at Sacramento State currently in seventh in the standings.
· UCI added a fifth weekly honor as
Beto Alvarenga scored his first Big West Offensive Player of the Week award from a brace at CSU Bakersfield. He joins
Gordon Botterill with two Defensive Player of the Week honors,
Jake Means winning the program's first Freshman of the Week, and
Kelvin Neumetzler garnering Big West Offensive Player of the Week notoriety after scoring twice in a win over Dixie State as part of an unbeaten week vs. DSU and Omaha.
· The Anteaters begin Big West play with a 2-6-1 record. UCI was picked to finish third in the conference, and play squads tied for fourth that were picked preseason to finish first (UCD) and 10th (CSUB)
· The 'Eaters began the season going 0-4-1 with one goal scored. Those four losses included three on the road, three by one goal, and two against ranked squads.
· UCI's pair of five-goal matches match the most goals scored under head coach
Yossi Raz tying with the first win over coach Raz's UCI career in 2017 at Northern Kentucky, 5-2. The five goals at home and five-goal margin of victory are the first since the same match in 2010 defeating Cal State Fullerton, 7-2.
· The Big West revealed its Preseason Coaches Poll and All-Big West Preseason squad last week. The 'Eaters are projected to finish third behind UCSB and UC Davis who are tied for first. The 'Eaters received one first-place vote and were one of six programs of the 10 in The Big West that earned a vote. The 11-player All-Big West Preseason squad featured a pair of Anteaters for the third straight season. Sophomores
Eddy Berumen and
Oscar Cervantes represented after each finished 2019 as members of the Big West All-Freshman Team.
Student-Athlete Notes
·  Among the new 'Eaters is some international flavor including a pair of freshmen from Norway in
Victor Sandsmark-Evensen and
Mathias Winum, four-year transfers in
Gordon Botterill, originally from Switzerland, and
Ryan Khedoo, originally from Canada while also recently playing with the Guyana National Team.
Francesco Montanile crossed stateliness from Arizona, and
Luke Pruter grew up in Ireland. 'Eaters also have international ties to Mexico, India, Hong Kong, Japan, and Germany.
· Keeper
Gordon Botterill had some insightful words following the team's uplifting win Saturday night:
· "Playing with UCI, it's been quite special for me because I feel like I've fallen in love with the sport again. At times previously, I felt like I might have fallen out of love with it with is hard to taken having played it while growing up, but this season I've mentioned to coach Raz how grateful I am that I can love the sport again, and it's a great group of lads, especially the goalkeeper's union; the facilities are a big bonus, but this season has been slowly getting there and building to something special."
· "We can't get to ahead of ourselves, we have to take it game-by-game. The way we're coming into them and improving bit-by-bit, it's feasible to keep taking these steps. It's minute-by-minute, and at the moment we seem to be progressing, and we need to keep trusting ourselves and finding those little things like today - you can have all the ability in the world, but in the end of the day, especially in college soccer, the thing that wins games is heart and soul which can be hard to translate those things and channel emotion in the right direction, but tonight's showing I hope we can keep up to the end of the season."
· With no soccer in 2020-21, men's soccer still pushed through graduating five Anteaters, and 16 'Eaters made Dean's List between Fall, Winter, and Spring quarters.
Eddy Berumen and
Kelvin Neumetzler were Anteaters appearing on all three Dean's Lists in 2020-21. Three return of the seven that were 2019 Big West All-Academic in Berumen, Alvarenga, and Yamaguchi.
· Of the 22 'Eaters that have declared a major, 12 different majors are represented with the most common as Business Economics and Sociology / Social Ecology with six members each.
· The pair of grad transfers to the program will each be working towards their grad school degrees during the season.
Gordon Botterill begins the highly-acclaimed Master's in Innovation and Entrepreneurship.
Ryan Khedoo is pursuing DASA, or the Master's in Demographic and Social Analysis
· A pair of Anteaters are currently double majors in
Lawrence Yamaguchi for International Studies and Sociology while
Kelvin Neumetzler is in Psychology and Business Economics.
· Among the other fields Anteaters are studying toward are three Criminology, Law, & Society majors, two International Studies, two Business Administration, and solos in Education, Public Health Science, and Computer Game Science.
Stats To Watch
· Two veterans lead the way in matches played with fifth-year forward
Lawrence Yamaguchi at 63 matches starting 25 while scoring leader
Michael Orozco has started 47 times of the 54 matches he's appeared in. Others include
Beto Alvarenga - 16 starts in 45 caps,
Axel Adler -
40 caps with nine starts, and 10 starts in 36 career appearances for
Christian Bond-Flasza.
· Entering the 2019 season, coach Raz's recruiting class was ranked No. 1 in the nation by Top Drawer Soccer. From that class, two players are currently on pro sides -
Roberto Molina at Las Vegas Lights FC and Jorge Hernandez with L.A. Galaxy II - and those remaining in
Eddy Berumen,
Kwabena Boateng,
Mario Anaya,
Rafael Espinoza,
Ricardo Ibarra, and
Oscar Cervantes.
Fans In The Stands
· UC Irvine soccer and Anteater Stadium welcomes back 100% capacity attendance for the 2021 season. In accordance with CDPH guidance regarding COVID-19, UC Irvine Athletics events will be at full-seating capacity for the upcoming 2021-22 season. The first match vs. UCLA brought in 858 fans, the fourth-largest crowd during coach Raz's tenure.
· Returning to the roster are 13 Anteaters, 10 that have played minutes for UCI. Scoring leaders return including
Michael Orozco with three goals and eight points.
Lawrence Yamaguchi and
Oscar Cervantes each bring six career points scoring twice and adding two assists. Joining the 13 returners are 14 newcomers; seven joined the squad in 2020 for the season that never happened, and seven more joined the fold for 2021 with three four-year transfers from Fairfield, Kansas City, and San Francisco. UCI lost seven from the 2020 roster including four signing pro contracts.
· Head Coach
Yossi Raz returns for his fifth year with the program and fourth Division I soccer season. Raz is 26-21-12 in his three seasons at the helm without any losing seasons including a Big West title and trip to the NCAA Tournament in 2018.
· All home soccer matches in 2021 will be broadcasted on ESPN+ following the Big West's new deal. Play-by-play broadcaster David Gascon will have all the action for fans.
· Joining coach Raz on the sideline is a reformed coaching staff led by
Cale Rodriguez as top assistant coach.
Yonha Adrabi has elevated from volunteer goalkeeper coach to assistant. Joining as the new volunteer assistant is
Kostas Kyriazis and director of operations
Gemar Lezeau, both coming from the New York Red Bulls coaching ranks.
'Eaters Playing Professionally
· UC Irvine men's soccer alums currently account for 16 'Eaters playing professionally across five countries. The United States holds the largest contingent of Anteaters still playing.
Alvaro Quezada was drafted in early 2021 by LAFC and signed with them. He is currently being loaned to Las Vegas Lights FC alongside fellow 'Eaters Daniel Crisostomo and
Roberto Molina for the USL Championship side. On Wednesday, August 6, LAFC added Crisostomo to the club signing him. Later that evening in LAFC's match vs. Sporting KC, he was on the bench alongside Quezada before Quezada heard his named called for his first MLS minutes entering in the 68th minute and finishing out the match nearly collecting an assist in his debut. Quezada becomes the seventh Anteater all-time to record minutes with and MLS club. Crisostomo later became the eighth Anteater to play in an MLS game entering for LAFC in the 81st minute August 15 at Atlanta United FC.
· Molina earned a call-up to the El Salvadorian National Team last month playing in a friendly against Costa Rica hoping for an invite to the World Cup Qualifiers in September. Other 'Eaters on national teams have been Lester Hayes III playing for the Puerto Rico national team in World Cup Qualifier wins over Bahamas and Puerto Rico. Miguel Ibarra also spent time with the U.S. national team entering in three friendlies. Brad Evans also played in 21 caps adding a goal in a WCQ vs. Jamaica.
· The USL Championship level is home to eight Anteaters including the three in Las Vegas. Cameron Iwasa continues his run with Sacramento Republic FC which will make the jump to MLS soon. Elsewhere is Thomas Janjigian with Hartford Athletic, Tarek Morad at Oakland Roots, Ford Parker at Birmingham Legion FC, and long-time MLS pro Miguel Ibarra at San Diego Loyal FC.
· Below the USL Championship is USL League One containing a pair of 'Eaters with Victor Falck in his second season with Richmond Kickers and 2020 grad
Luca Mastrantonio with FC Tucson. Within the NISA league stands two more 'Eaters with Giovanni Ramos-Godoy at Stumptown AC and Los Angeles Force's
Seamus McLaughlin.
· Four Anteaters are thriving globally starting with the most successful in Lester Hayes III. He's found himself in Denmark with new club Dalum FC. He took part in Gold Cup qualifiers with Puerto Rico scoring once in his two matches. Prior to that, he spent three years in Spain with two different ninth-tier clubs as one of their top goalscorers. Darren Hamilton continues his career back in England now with Whitley Bay FC of England's ninth tier. Making his way with Latvia's Super Nova is long-time forward Renato Torquato. Former keeper Bryan Tian Keat See, who spent one season with the 'Eaters, is on his third club in southeast Asia now with Pulum Pinang in Malaysia.
