Nov. 4, 2008

Nov. 4 Men's Soccer Notebook

IRVING, Texas - No. 7 Tulsa clinched its second Conference USA Regular Season Championship with a 0-0 double-overtime tie with South Carolina in its final regular season league game on Saturday. TU closed out league play with a 7-0-1 mark, giving the Golden Hurricane its second-straight season without a loss in league play, to become just the third team in league history to claim the regular season title with no losses. Tulsa won all seven of its contests in the month of October, and hasn’t lost in 11 games, dating back to Sept. 19. Senior GK Tyrel Lacey posted two shutouts on the week to claim this week’s C-USA Defensive Player of the Week honor.

PLAYERS OF THE WEEK
OFFENSIVE PLAYER OF THE WEEK
CHAD HAGERTY - Kentucky
Jr., F, Louisville, Ky.
Hagerty added to his team-leading assist total and netted his first goal of the year – a game-tying goal – during a pivotal 1-0-1 week for Kentucky. Hagerty notched a team-high-tying three points on the week in UK’s 1-1 tie against NCAA RPI No. 1 Indiana in Bloomington and the team’s 2-0 win over league for SMU on Sunday in Dallas. After UK allowed an NCAA-record goal in just six seconds to the Hoosiers, Hagerty found Marco dos Santos in the 22nd minute for the equalizer. The Wildcats again fell behind early against SMU, but Hagerty evened up the game with his first goal of the season in the 17th minute, also a connection with dos Santos. On the year, Hagerty leads UK with five assists, playing in 16 games with 12 starts. This is the first career weekly honor for Hagerty.

DEFENSIVE PLAYER OF THE WEEK
TYREL LACEY - Tulsa
Sr., GK, Jenks, Okla.
Lacey posted two shutouts on the week to help Tulsa claim its second-straight Conference USA regular season championship. He logged 200 minutes in goal this week and picked up 10 saves. Lacey has recorded more than 1,569 minutes in goal this season and tallied 65 saves. The senior has six shutouts in 2008. He also has a .856 save percentage and a league-leading .630 goals-against average, allowing just 11 goals on the season and just four in league play. His save percantage is good for second in the league, while he is also tied for second in the league with his six shutouts. Lacey’s efforts also helped TU finish its conference schedule unbeaten for the second year in a row, to become just the third team to claim the regular season title with no losses. The weekly honor is the second of Lacey’s career (Oct. 30, 2006) and his first of 2008.

SHOOTING STARS
- Tulsa senior F Eric DeFreitas scored the game-winning goal for No. 7 Tulsa in a 2-0 victory over FIU last week, and had a strong offensive showing in TU’s 0-0 double-overtime tie with South Carolina to help the Golden Hurricane clinch the Conference USA Regular Season Championship. He has four goals, two of which have been game-winners, for eight points. DeFreitas has attempted 33 shots on the season with 15 on goal.

- South Carolina sophomore GK Jimmy Maurer allowed just one goal in two C-USA contests last week, collecting two double-overtime ties and one shutout in the stretch. Maurer collected six saves against UAB in a 1-1 tie on Wednesday, and followed with four saves in his eighth shutout of the season in a crucial C-USA match on the road at No. 9 Tulsa on Saturday. Maurer ranks second among conference goalkeepers (overall games) with a 0.77 goals against average, while he leads the league in save percentage (.856), shutouts (eight) and shutouts per game (0.50).

- SMU freshman MF Arthur Ivo scored the Mustang’s lone goal against Kentucky, giving the Ponies a 1-0 lead just two minutes into the game. The goal was his third of the season. Fellow freshman D Adam Still has settled into a starting role since the Mustangs’ defense has lost players to injury and position changes, and was solid Sunday against Kentucky. Not only did he not allow a goal or an assist by the players he covered, he repeatedly stepped forward to intercept passes. Still locked down his side of the field all day against a very potent UK offense.

NEWEST MEN’S SOCCER RPI RELEASED
The NCAA released the latest Men’s Soccer Ratings Percentage Index (RPI) of 2008 on Tuesday, Oct. 28. Four Conference USA teams were ranked in the Top 100 out of 203 teams. Tulsa was the highest rated C-USA team appearing at No. 18, followed by SMU at No. 55. South Carolina was rated No. 86 and Kentucky comes in at No. 97. A complete list of the most recent RPI rankings is located in the PDF above and the next report will be released Tuesday, Nov. 11.

KENTUCKY SECURES SECOND SEED
Kentucky wrapped up its biggest week of the season, with a win at SMU and a come-from-behind tie at No. 14 Indiana, securing a second-place finish in Conference USA entering the regular-season finale with Memphis on Friday. UK’s win gave them a school-best 18 total league points and with six C-USA wins, UK has posted its most wins in the conference since joining as an affiliate member before the 2005 campaign.

Kentucky (10-4-3, 6-1 C-USA) is having a solid season, rolling through a six-match unbeaten streak – the second-longest streak in the 18-year history of the program. The Wildcats have not lost since an Oct. 8 setback at then-No. 14 Tulsa, with three of their four defeats coming at the hands of top-25 foes on the road (No. 7 UC Santa Barbara, No. 24 Cal Poly and No. 14 Tulsa). UK, has totaled 35 goals on the year – the seventh best all-time in Kentucky annals.

UK had a big win over SMU on Sunday, just its second in the history of the series, a series the Mustangs lead 5-2. The Wildcats have now won two straight over the tradition-rich Mustangs, after posting a 2-1 comeback win in 2007 for UK’s first-ever win over a No.1-ranked foe.

During the week, UK was led by a front-line team of Chad Hagerty and Marco dos Santos, who each tallied three points in two games, with a goal and an assist. Hagerty, a junior from Louisville, Ky., netted the game-tying goal at SMU and hooked up with dos Santos on his game-tying goal at Indiana on Wednesday. Dos Santos, a Brazil native, had the goal at IU and notched the assist with Hagerty Sunday at SMU. During UK’s six-game unbeaten streak, the Wildcats have ridden the back of Hagerty, who has notched all of his seven points during the streak, a club-high five assists and one goal. Hagerty was also named C-USA Offensive Player of the Week for his efforts.

FINAL WEEKEND TO DECIDE TOURNAMENT FIELD
The field for the 2008 C-USA Men’s Soccer championship will be set following Friday night’s action. No. 7 Tulsa has clinced the top spot and Kentucky has secured the number two seed, while South Carolina, Marshall, Memphis, UCF and SMU have all secured one of the eight spots. Below is tie-breaking criteria that will be used to detemine the seeding.

1. Two-way tie. Head to head competition between the tied teams.
2. Multiple Ties
       a. Head to head competition between the tied teams.
       b. Record versus other Conference opponents in descending rank order of conference winning percentage.
       c. The number of goals allowed by each team in Conference play. The team allowing the fewest number of goals  against, shall be the higher seed.
       d. Goals scored versus goals scored against by each team in Conference competition. The team with the higher ratio shall be the team with the higher seed.
       e. Coin toss by the Commissioner (or designee).