COURTNEY STEWART/Daily Bruin Sophomore midfielder
Dru Hoshimiya traps the ball in a game against LMU
last month. The Bruins play Cal today and Stanford Sunday.
By Brian Thompson
Daily Bruin Reporter
The time has come, and the men’s soccer team knows it.
As its record would indicate, UCLA (4-4-2) has had a see-saw
start to its season. But unless your school’s name is
Virginia, it’s highly unlikely a school would earn a NCAA
tournament bid with a .500 record.
If the Bruins plan on extending their amazing run of consecutive
appearances in the tournament to 19 years, they will need to put
together an impressive Pac-10 season. The Bruins need to rack up a
string of wins, and they need to start that string now.
They will look to do just that this weekend at Drake Stadium,
first with this afternoon’s game against surging California
(6-3-1), and then again on Sunday against No. 2 Stanford
(8-0-0).
“Playing in the Pac-10 is going to be our biggest
challenge,” Bruin defender Alex Yi said. “We know we
have to do well in our conference now to get a berth in the
playoffs.”
W. Volleyball PREVIEW vs. Friday 3 p.m. Drake
Stadium vs. Sunday 3 p.m. Drake Stadium
The Bruins’ goal of starting off the Pac-10 season with
victories won’t be easy. Cal and Stanford have been two of
the hottest teams in the nation. The Golden Bears are unbeaten in
their last six contests.
The Cardinal, meanwhile, are undefeated overall and are
averaging some staggering team statistics. Stanford is averaging
over three goals a game on offense, while only allowing a goals
against average of 0.38 goals per game.
The matches will be tough, but UCLA midfielder Ryan Futagaki
believes the Bruins will be up to the task.
“We’re going to have to expose their negative
points,” he said. “What’s going to make our team
successful is our hard work. Stanford and Cal are tough teams, but
I don’t think they’ve gone against a team that can
battle as hard as we can.”
While it hasn’t been the best of starts for UCLA, the team
may be ready to turn the corner. Offensive chances finally started
to come last weekend against the University of San Diego and San
Diego State. If the chances keep coming, the Bruins are confident
that they’ll be able to put them home. But for that to
happen, the forwards will have to step up their play.
“We played a lot of potentially great offensive soccer
(last weekend),” UCLA head coach Todd Saldaña said.
“Our biggest issue is still finding one or two guys to be
goal scorers for us consistently. The chances are being
created.
“We haven’t seen the best of [forwards] Cliff
McKinley and Matt Taylor. I think this weekend is going to be a big
chance for them. They are looking forward to that opportunity,
too.”
In fact, all of the Bruins are looking forward to the
opportunity to send the team onto a winning streak. It won’t
be easy against the likes of Cal and Stanford, but the signs are
starting to point to it happening very soon for the Bruins.