The Omaha men's soccer team heads to Denver to play the Pioneers on Saturday at 8 p.m. (CT). Denver, in its first year in The Summit League, was picked as the league's preseason favorite. Live stats and a live webcast (fee required) will be available at OMavs.com.
The Teams Omaha (3-7-1, 1-1-0 Summit League) is coming off a 1-0 win at Belmont last Saturday in non-conference action. The Mavericks started league play with a 2-1 win at home against Western Illinois, but then fell at IUPUI in overtime, 1-0. Omaha is in fourth place in the league standings. The Mavs are led by
Vance Rookwood and Chava Garcia's six points each. Rookwood has a team-high three goals, while Chava Garcia has a goal and four assists.
Emir Alihodzic has two goals for four points. Senior goalie
Matt Grosey has played every minute and has 33 saves, a .660 save percentage and a 1.49 goals against average. Omaha has outshot its opponents 171-122 through 11 games.
Denver is 7-3-3 overall and 2-0 in Summit League play. The Pioneers are 5-1-1 at home and topped Loyola-Chicago 2-0 on Wednesday in Denver. The Pioneers are unbeaten in their last eight games and are 6-0-2 in that stretch. Denver is tied at the top of the league standings with a 2-0 record. Its league wins have come against Fort Wayne (5-0) and IUPUI (4-0). Zach Bolden has a team-high 13 points on four goals and five assists. Cole Chapleski has four goals and two assists for 10 points. Seven different players have at least two goals. Oliver Brown has started all 13 games in net and has a 1.05 goals against average and .731 save percentage.
Series History
Omaha and Denver will be meeting for the first time.
Last Time Out NASHVILLE, Tenn. - The Omaha men's soccer team recorded a 1-0 win at Belmont last Saturday afternoon. Sophomore
Jesus Perez scored the only goal of the match in the 28th minute to lift the Mavericks to their first road win of the season. The Mavs are now 3-7-1 overall. Belmont dropped to 4-5-2. At the 27:40 mark, Perez took a pass from
Mark Moulton less than two minutes after coming on as a substitute and scored from near the top of the box for his first goal of the season. Moulton earned his first career assist. The Mavs limited Belmont to just two shots on goal the rest of the way, but goalie
Matt Grosey was up to the task. Grosey finished with four saves to earn his second shutout of the season. The Bruins finished with a narrow shot advantage, 16-15, but Omaha had a 6-4 advantage in shots on goal. Perez and Conor Corboy each had two. Corboy, a freshman, had a team-high five shots in his first start of the season.
Up Next
The Mavericks return home to host Oral Roberts on Saturday, Oct. 26.
Caniglia Field Status
The Mavericks continue to play their home matches at the UNO Soccer Field while the renovation of Caniglia Field continues. The rubber e-layer was finished on Oct. 2, making way for the installation of the actual turf. The Mavs' new home will seat 3,466 fans and will feature a state-of-the-art soccer pitch. The exact date of the first game on the new surface is not yet known, but both the men's and women's soccer programs are hopeful to be practicing on the field as early as next week.
Da Silva Collects Summit League Defensive Player of the Week Junior center back
Felipe da Silva picked up Summit League Co-Defensive Player of the Week honors on Sept. 30. The award was the first weekly honor for the Rio de Janeiro, Brazil native. Da Silva led the Maverick back line in a 2-1 win over defending Summit League champion Western Illinois and a 1-1 draw with Kansas City for an unbeaten week. Da Silva played all 200 minutes on the week and helped the Mavs limit UMKC to two shots on goal and Western Illinois to four shots on goal. He also had three shots, two on target.
Garcia Named Summit League Offensive Player of the Week Sophomore forward Chava Garcia was named Summit League Offensive Player of the Week on Sept. 16 for his performance at Drake. The award was the first weekly honor for Garcia, though he was named to the Summit League All-Newcomer Team last season. Garcia had one goal and two assists for a career-high four-points in the 4-3 loss at Drake. Garcia picked up his first assist of the game on a corner kick service to
Craig Buettner in the 14th minute to give the Mavs a 1-0 lead. With the Mavs trailing 2-1 in the second half, Garcia brought them back with a cross to Rookwood for a header goal in the 58th minute to tie the game. The Omaha South product then scored the go-ahead goal in the 73rd minute, rebounding his own shot and finishing it for his first goal of the season. Garcia had three shots on goal in the match.
Rookwood, Grosey Sweep Summit League Weekly Awards The Summit League recognized junior midfielder
Vance Rookwood and senior goalkeeper
Matt Grosey as the Summit League Offensive and Defensive Players of the Week, respectively, on Sept. 9 following the second week of the season. Rookwood's award was the first of his career, while Grosey picked up his second-career Summit League weekly award. In the Mavs' only game of the week, Rookwood scored the game-winning goal with 7:55 remaining to give Omaha a 1-0 win over Columbia. Grosey, the Mavericks' captain, posted his first shutout of the season in the victory, making him the only Summit League goalie to pitch a shutout in week two. Grosey made four saves - two of them on point-blank chances by Columbia in the final 15 minutes of the match to pick up his fourth career shutout.
Mavs Picked Fourth in Summit League Preseason Poll
The Mavericks were picked to finish fourth in the Summit League Preseason Poll voted on by the league's seven head coaches. The Mavericks received 23 points to finish just one point behind IUPUI. League newcomer Denver was selected as the favorite after finishing 11-6-3 last season and bringing six starters and 18 letterwinners back. The Pioneers received 35 points and five first-place votes. Defending Summit League Tournament champion Western Illinois finished second and collected the other two first-place votes for a total of 31 points. The Leathernecks have won three of the last four Summit League postseason titles. Following IUPUI and Omaha in the preseason poll were Fort Wayne (15), Eastern Illinois (12) and Oral Roberts (7). The Mavs finished 5-10-1 overall last season and 3-3-1 in The Summit League to finish in a tie for fourth with Fort Wayne in the standings. Omaha has 10 players back who started at least 50 percent of the games last season. However, the Mavs have a talented group of newcomers that will bolster the lineup in 2013.
Halfway Through Division I Transition
The Mavericks have now completed two full years of their four-year transition to Division I and are therefore ineligible to compete in the conference tournament and NCAA Tournament until the 2015 season. The 2013-14 season will see UNO's teams going through a full Summit League schedule for the second time.
