Men's Soccer: Despite slow start, Tigers aim to repeat

Coming off a devastating end to its most successful season in recent history, the men’s soccer team is trying to shrug off last November’s disappointment and refocus its efforts forward. But fulfilling the ultimate goal of repeating as Ivy League champions will not come easily for a team that, despite its very strong showing in the conference last year, is not necessarily the favorite going in.

“We’re motivated by the challenges in front of us this year,” head coach Jim Barlow ‘91 said. “When we think back to last season, we have nothing but good memories.”

By any measure, it is hard for the Tigers to think of the 2010 season as anything but a success. The team was not the preseason favorite, but it nonetheless pulled together the longest win streak in program history, taking all seven of its Ivy League games along the way. Senior forward Antoine Hoppenot won the Ivy League Player of the Year after leading the conference with nine goals, while midfielder Josh Walburn ‘11 and junior defender Mark Linnville were given first team All-Ivy honors.

While their star players and fluid chemistry on the field allowed the Tigers to close out the regular season with a program-record 12 consecutive wins, they were stunned in the first round of the NCAA Tournament, losing 2-1 to the University of Maryland, Baltimore County in a game that seemed to be in the Tigers’ hands. Princeton had many good chances to score but struggled to get the finish.

“We’ll remember what happened, but we don’t really dwell on it,” Linnville said of the game.

Though players said the loss is not hanging over their heads, the problem that caused the loss has continued to plague them in this year’s early non-conference games. Princeton (0-2-1) has had many opportunities over the first three contests, maintaining possession of the ball for a good percentage of the time, outshooting its opponents 47-27 and receiving 27 corner kicks to its opponents’ 11. But it has all amounted to just one goal.

“There’s a crazy amount of chances that we don’t finish,” junior forward Matt Sanner said. “Soccer’s a weird game. Each of the teams we’ve played, we’ve outplayed them and outshot them and had the ball for most of the game but just couldn’t convert.”

According to Barlow, the team has been great at creating opportunities for itself over the first three games from the run of play, corner kicks and restarts. The inability to finish has been frustrating, he said, because it is difficult to pinpoint the reason.

“All the different ways we were scoring last year, we’re still creating those kinds of chances this year,” Barlow said. “It’s the last piece that’s not going well, the little bit of panic around the goal, the lack of composure.”

The Tigers have been reviewing film of their missed opportunities and creating situations near the goal in practice that are similar to the chances they have been getting in games. Barlow said he has also been working on figuring out how to get Hoppenot and freshman forward Cameron Porter — who have similar styles of play — to work off each other.

“They both like to just go,” Barlow said. “They both like to run at goal, they both like to take people on, they both like to attack one-on-one and get the finish.”

It has worked for Porter, who scored the Tigers’ only goal so far this season in the 2-1 home loss to Farleigh Dickinson last Friday on an assist from Hoppenot. He is a member of a large freshman class that Sanner said is capable of making up for some of the losses Princeton experienced due to graduation.

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“There’s a number of them starting, so that helps fill in the gaps,” Sanner said of the freshmen. “[Last year’s seniors] were definitely good players and it’s hard to replace them, but every year you have to have other guys step up, and we have the players to do that.”

In addition to the threat up top that Hoppenot and Porter pose, the Tigers are confident in their back line, anchored by Linnville and junior goalkeeper Max Gallin. The defense has performed solidly thus far, as the Tigers have limited their opponents to just three goals off plays that Linnville described as “bizarre” — a throw-in, an own goal and a penalty kick.

While the defense will do what it can, the Tigers’ offense will need to develop the capability to finish off its attack in order to compete in a very strong Ivy League. Brown and Dartmouth, which both reached the Sweet Sixteen last year, are returning a number of their strongest players. Barlow also expects strong showings from Harvard and last year’s second place team, Penn, which lost a tense de facto title game at Princeton near the end of the season.

Compounding these challenges, the Tigers will face these four opponents on the road this year, whereas last year they played their strongest rivals in front of the home crowd at Roberts Stadium.

“The Ivy League this year is going to be very competitive,” Linnville said. “I don’t know if we can focus in on one opponent. We know that every single game is going to be a battle.”

Still, the Tigers are optimistic that they can bounce back from a slow start and mirror last season’s track. They began 2010 with a 1-3-1 record, and Barlow said he feels the team is playing better now than it was at this point last season.

Princeton has a tough nonconference schedule ahead in the next two weeks, facing three Big East opponents including No. 14 St. John’s, but the Tigers welcome the challenge.

“We’ve got a good nucleus of guys coming back from last year’s team. We’ve got a lot of guys with a lot of experience,” Barlow said. “We feel pretty good about our team.”