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Fall 2004 Departments
Exchange
Around the Pond
Great Sport
Arts
Books
Foundation News
Connections
Extended Family
Zip 01003
Features
The Future's So Bright
The Prince of Pages
The Changing Face of Beauty
Campaigns: Good for What Ails Us?
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Great Sport
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Soccer Preview: Pulling it together
Men's soccer rebuilds the midfield; women see three top scorers return
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–P.J. Cambo
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DESPITE GRADUATING THREE STARTING MIDFIELDERS and the team’s leading scorer (Ptah Myers, with nine goals and three assists) in May, UMass men’s soccer provides plenty of reasons for fans to be optimistic about its 2004 campaign.
Coach Sam Koch, now in his fourteenth season, will have to find the right midfield combination during a tough pre-conference schedule. In addition to an early matchup with national power Santa Clara, regional rivals Boston University and the University of Hartford travel to Amherst just before the beginning of the A-10 schedule.
The Minutemen will not concede goals easily. The team’s seasoned defense, with its enviable 1.26 goals against average, returns completely intact including senior goalie Colin Burns. That will give Koch some piece of mind while he builds a cohesive new midfield.
The experienced Oral Bullen ’05 (with eight goals and four assists) will be the key target up front. He should see plenty of time on the ball in the wake of Myers’s graduation. Ernie Billittier ’06 will also start up front. He has two goals and three assists to his credit after coming off the bench last season.
If the new midfield gels early with the experienced frontrunners, fans can expect this team to make a run at the A-10 Championship and return to the NCAA tournament after a one-year absence.
THE UMASS WOMEN WILL LOOK to improve on last year’s 4-12-1 campaign. Coach Jim Rudy returns his three top scorers and defender Tiffany Hamil, who started every game for the Minutewomen in 2003. Many underclassmen saw meaningful minutes off the bench last season, making Rudy’s job of filling the five starting spots vacated by seniors a manageable task. A young squad—with just three seniors—begins its A-10 slate on Sept. 17 at Rhode Island. They’ll cap Homecoming Weekend with a matchup with Duquesne that could have an A-10 playoff birth on the line. |
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What Curse?
What Curse? larger image
Soccer Preview: Pulling it together
Women's Crew
Women's Crew: larger image
Sports Scoreboard
Sports Scoreboard: more images
Seeing Brown
Seeing Brown: larger image
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