 | Men's Soccer |
SIUE Athletics SIUE Men's Soccer | |
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 Coach Ed Huneke |
November 5, 2007 Cougars Make Fifth Consecutive NCAA Tournament Appearance EDWARDSVILLE, Ill. -- Southern Illinois University Edwardsville men's soccer earned a fifth consecutive bid to the NCAA Tournament Monday and will play Great Lakes Valley Conference champion Lewis in the opening round. The 32-team bracket for the NCAA Tournament was released Monday. SIUE, part of the Great Lakes Region, garnered the No. 3 seed for the tournament and enters the game with a 10-3-3 record along with a No. 20 national ranking. Coach Ed Huneke, in his final season as SIUE's head coach, will have his team face off against Lewis at 5 p.m. ET (4 p.m. CT) Friday at Wilder, Ky. No. 1-ranked and top-seeded NKU, which took its first loss of the season in the GLVC Tournament title game 1-0 to Lewis, will play Gannon in a 7:30 p.m. ET (6:30 p.m. CT) contest. Huneke said he has to get his team focused for the NCAA postseason. "This team is as good as any of our recent teams, but I know we have to have good luck and good health going forward," said Huneke. No. 15-ranked Lewis enters the game as perhaps one of the hottest teams in the nation, having won its last 10 consecutive games. The last loss for the Flyers was at Saint Joseph's on Sept. 28 and at SIUE on Sept. 23. "Momentum is certainly on their side," said Huneke. The Cougars enter the NCAA Tournament having outscored their opponents 32-9 this season. Dustin Attarian leads the Cougars with 10 goals and one assist for 21 points. Kevin Bielicki and Bob Ridder are tied for second with 13 points. Huneke said it may well come down to goalkeeping. "I was just telling Greg Crook that soccer is a lot like hockey in that a hot goalkeeper takes you far into the postseason," noted Huneke. Crook, a senior, holds a 0.49 goals against average and has posted six shutouts this season. "We need him to be excellent." NCAA Division II Men's Soccer Tournament Great Lakes Regional at Wilder, Ky. Friday, November 9 #3 SIU Edwardsville (10-3-3) vs. #2 Lewis (17-4), 5 pm ET #1 Northern Kentucky (20-1) vs. #4 Gannon (16-2-1), 7:30 pm ET Sunday, November 11 Great Lakes Regional Title Game, 1 pm ET -siue cougars- |