MORAGA, Calif. - The Saint Mary's men's soccer team will head to the east coast this week to take on Boston University and Dartmouth on Thursday and Sunday. The Gaels and the Terriers will meet for the first time in program history and after defeating Dartmouth in their first ever matchup last season, SMC will return the favor and take on the Big Green at their place on Sunday. All the necessary game information and media links can be found below or at smcgaels.com.
GAME INFORMATION AND COVERAGE
GAELS OUTLOOK
After two weeks of the 2024 season, Saint Mary's sits with a 1-2 record suffering defeats to Kansas City and 13th ranked Stanford. The Gaels got their first win of the year in a convincing 2-0 victory over Cal Poly which featured goals from forwards
Wade Muttitt and
Jude Zamora. Following their home win, they would head to the south bay to take on Stanford in a road showdown, seeking their first win over the Cardinal since 2021. Up for the test, the Gaels shocked the Cardinal early on with a goal in the fifth minute from center back
Nick Strangio, the second of his career. Strangio would get loose on an SMC corner and receive a great left footed ball from
Luke Lawrence. Strangio's initial header attempt would be saved by the Stanford keeper but he would follow up the rebound to hammer it into the back of the net for the first goal of the game.
The Cardinal would respond though and show why they are one of the premier programs in the country, equalizing off a set piece just four minutes later. They would go on to score four unanswered goals to take the game 4-1 for their third straight win in the series history. Freshman keeper
Sam Bentley got the start again in goal for the Gaels and recorded four saves while head coach
Adam Cooper went with a back three again consisting of
Nick Strangio,
Bastian Toelhoej and
Fynn Allmon. The Gaels will look to respond as they always do in another tough road matchup on Thursday against Boston. The Terriers will be another stout defensive team as they have started their season with three draws and are defending their Patriot League tournament title from 2023.
ABOUT BOSTON (Patriot League)
Boston has emerged as a top program in the Patriot League in recent years after winning their conference tournament in 2023. The Terriers won the league title with a 7-1-1 conference record and outscored their opponents 3-0 in their two tournament games to secure the title. As a result, they continued their postseason run into the NCAA Tournament but fell to 21st ranked Syracuse 3-1 in the first round. In 2022, they finished second in the league standings but saw their season come to an end in the semifinals of the conference tournament, losing to Navy in penalties.
This season, the Terriers have struggled to score as they've only net two goals in their first three matches, but have been stout defensively as they enter the match with a 0-0-3 record. Their three draws were against 9th ranked New Hampshire, Northeastern and UMass Lowell. Boston got on the scoreboard first in their last game against UMass Lowell but they gave up a goal in the final five minutes of the first half to eventually end the game in a 1-1 draw.
Both senior forward Andrew Rent and junior defender Quin DeLaMater earned All-Patriot League Preseason Honors and BU collected eight first-place votes to place second overall in the preseason poll despite the graduation of four PL major year-end award winners.
ABOUT DARTMOUTH (Ivy League)
Dartmouth came to Moraga for the first time last season and after going up 1-0 in the first half,
Tyler Hardin scored a pair of goals for the Gaels including the game winner in the 89th minute to take down the Big Green. They would finish the 2023 season with a 4-8-3 overall record and got key Ivy League victories over Princeton and Penn.
Dartmouth returns 22 players including sophomores Trenton Blake and Vasilis Moiras who earned Ivy League second-team honors and senior Kristian Feed and junior Sebastián Mañon that were named honorable mentions at the end of last season. Blake and Moiras were the team's leading scorers in 2023, combining for eight goals, six assists, and 22 points. Goalkeeper Costi Christodoulou who played in all 15 games for the Big Green returns for his senior season after posting a 1.67 goals against average, making 67 saves, and posting one shutout in 2023.
This season, the Big Green are 0-1 after dropping their season opener to Boston College 2-1. They were picked 7th out of the 8 league members in the 2024 preseason poll and will take on Fairleigh Dickinson on Thursday before meeting Saint Mary's on Sunday to conclude their second week of action.
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