July 26, 2006

DALLAS - The SMU men's soccer team is ranked second by College Soccer News.com, and South Carolina holds the No. 29 slot, in the first of many preseason polls released prior to the fall soccer season.

Entering his 23rd season as head coach at SMU, Schellas Hyndman returns eight starters from last year's squad that finished the 2005 campaign with a 14-6-3 record after earning the program's second-ever College Cup berth and the third College Cup appearance for Conference USA.

South Carolina is coming off a season that produced a Conference USA Championship and automatic berth into the NCAA Tournament in 2005. Head coach Mark Berson returns eight starters, including four all-Conference USA players, from the 12-7-2 team. The Gamecocks welcome 12 freshmen, as part of the 19th best recruiting class in the nation according to CollegeSoccerNews.com, to the 2006 roster that features a strong class of six seniors.

The Conference USA men's soccer season opens Friday, Aug. 25 with all nine teams in action. SMU opens the 2006 regular season against Wisconsin at the Golden Hurricane Classic in Tulsa, Okla. South Carolina hosts No. 15 Clemson.

2006 College Soccer News Preseason Top 30 National Poll
1. Maryland
2. SMU
3. North Carolina
4. Connecticut
5. Penn State
6. Virginia
7. Akron
8. UCLA
9. New Mexico
10. Creighton
11. South Florida
12. Duke
13. Indiana
14. California
15. Clemson
16. Notre Dame
17. St. John's
18. UNC-Greensboro
19. Wake Forest
20. Old Dominion
21. UC Santa Barbara
22. San Francisco
23. Cal State Northridge
24. San Diego State
25. Virginia Tech
26. Santa Clara
27. St. Louis
28. Wisconsin-Milwaukee
29. South Carolina
30. Ohio State