REDLANDS, Calif. - The Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SCIAC) Men's Soccer Preseason Polls were announced this week, which were voted upon by the league's member head coaches.
After collecting five first-place votes the University of Redlands Men's Soccer team finds themselves heading into 2022 as the second best program within the conference after tallying 75 points, trailing only to 2021 SCIAC Regular Season Champions Claremont-Mudd-Scripps (1st – 76 Points) who received the other four first-place votes.
The Bulldogs finished 2021 as the SCIAC Tournament Champions, which earned them a berth into the NCAA Division III National Championships, where they made it to the Round of 16. That same year they posted a 17-3-1, 9-2-1 SCIAC ledger.
This season Head Coach Ralph Perez brought in six first-years as the team heads into the 2022 slate currently ranked No. 12 in the United Soccer Coaches Division III Preseason National Rankings. In 2021 Redlands gained six All-SCIAC performers and the SCIAC Defensive Athlete of the Year (Arian Mogharei), but only two of those players return, which include Ethan Kovach (1st Team), who scored five goals and had six assists as a junior along with being named 3rd Team All-West Region and Peyton Menti (2nd Team) who added 13 shots with four of them being on goal.
Not only will the Maroon and Grey have to replace five All-SCIAC members, but they also need to replace their leading scorer in Collin ChubbFertal who had 14 goals, finishing his career with 28, which tied his brother, Casey, for the 10th most in program history. Overall, they have to replace 30-of-54 goals (55.5 percent), but they return 27-of-38 assists (71 percent) thanks to their top three-assist leaders Jaime Dulle (7), Kovach (6), and Joseph Parra (5), who all return for their senior seasons.
After Claremont-M-S and the University of Redlands the rest of the Top-5 include Chapman University (3rd – 59 Points), California Lutheran (4th – 50 Points), and Pomona-Pitzer (5th – 46 Points).
The 2022 SCIAC men's soccer season is set to begin September 1 with four non-conference matches. Conference play is set to begin September 14 with four SCIAC matchups, highlighted by the Bulldogs and Stags match-up, which will be played under the lights at Farquhar Field.
2022 SCIAC Men's Soccer Preseason Poll
1. CMS, 76 points (4)
2. Redlands, 75 points (5)
3. Chapman, 59 points
4. Cal Lutheran, 50 points
5. Pomona-Pitzer, 46 points
6. Occidental, 39 points
7. Whittier, 28 points
8. La Verne, 19 points
9. Caltech, 13 points
Note: (first-place votes)