With the release of its 2009 schedule, the Utah women’s soccer team is looking forward to the challenge that the 2009 schedule will provide.
Head coach Rick Manning likes the Utes’ chances of making it to the postseason.
“It’s a good schedule,” Manning said. “Certainly, if we win a good number of our games, we’ll be in a great position to go to the NCAA tournament.”
Manning believes in scheduling games against teams with a high RPI because arranging such games increases a team’s chance of receiving an at-large bid to the NCAA tournament.
Utah plays PAC-10 power and 2008 NCAA tournament semifinalist UCLA on Sept. 18 in Los Angeles, Calif.
“The last few years, UCLA definitely has become a power,” Manning said. “They haven’t won a championship yet, but they’ve certainly been in the Final Four, maybe six or seven times in the last 10 years.”
Perhaps the marquee opponent for the Utes is Santa Clara University. The Broncos had a down year in 2008, missing the NCAA tournament for the first time in 19 seasons, but have a highly rated recruiting class coming in this season.
“For a home game, that’ll be fantastic,” said Manning, who was an assistant coach at SCU from 1998 to 2001. Utah has played at Santa Clara several times, though Manning says, “It took me seven years to get them to come here.” Ute senior Kelly Isleib is happy to have SCU coming to Ute Field on Aug. 28.
“It’s nice to play Santa Clara at home,” Isleib said. “That’ll be huge for us.”
Scheduling out-of-region is important because it helps the selection committee compare teams that didn’t have the opportunity to face each other. Utah’s biggest out-of-region opponents are William and Mary on Sept. 6 and Princeton on Sept. 9. Both teams consistently have a high RPI and made the NCAA tournament last year.
Utah begins the season at home on Aug. 21 vs. Utah Valley. Other nonconference home games include Cal Poly, Weber State, Loyola Marymount and Pepperdine. The nonconference road game slate includes Cal St. Fullerton, Colorado, Utah State and Oklahoma State.
The Mountain West Conference season begins with rival BYU on Oct. 3. Despite graduating many key players from last season’s conference championship team, Manning and Isleib expect BYU to be a big factor in the conference race.
“BYU is always a good team,” Isleib said.
Manning pointed out TCU and Wyoming as other tough conference games this season, but says none of the conference games are easy.
“The league’s always tight,” Manning said. “There’s some well coached teams that make it hard to beat them.”
Manning is confident in his team’s MWC chances, despite having 16 freshmen and sophomores among the 23 players on the team, as many of those young players saw significant playing time last year.
“I think we’ll have some growing pains along the way, but I’m really optimistic and confident in the group,” Manning said. “In a lot of ways, I expect us to win the conference.”
Utah begins the season with six of its first seven games at Ute Field. Schedules are made two or three years in advance, so the heavy load of early-season home games is not a result of Utah’s 1-5 start to last season. Isleib says the early home games should help the Utes.
“It will be nice to have a couple of home games under our belt before going out on the road,” she said.
