On a freezing-cold night at Cagan Stadium, Stanford beat Saint Mary’s in the opening round of the NCAA Tournament in its first appearance since 2002.
Both teams came into this match looking strikingly similar in their statistics. They had each notched 10 wins over the regular season, had scored some important wins over highly ranked opposition, and their head coaches, Bret Simon for the Cardinal and Adam Cooper for the Gaels, had won Coach of the Year in their respective conferences, the Pac-10 and the West Coast Conference.
But perhaps most importantly, both Stanford (11-5-2, 4-4-2 Pac-10, 1-0 NCAA) and Saint Mary’s (10-4-5, 6-3-3 WCC) were playing their first-ever games in the NCAAs.
Yes, Stanford has been here before, and yes, Simon even took the Cardinal to the College Cup six years ago, but not one single player on either squad has made it this far before. The Gaels were obviously pleased, and perhaps a little nervous, to make it to the first NCAA game in their history, but even the experienced coaching staff of the Cardinal approached this as a new proposition.
“We weren’t sure how we would react as a group,” Simon said. “We were trying to look for things in the last training sessions and the warm-up and the pre-game meal to gauge whether the team was nervous or was approaching it in a different way.”
Perhaps this explains the first few minutes of the game. Neither team took any hold on the match, with scrappy passes that hung in the air, allowing possession to change constantly.
High, long balls do not suit the style of Stanford’s players, and once the nerves had begun to settle, they started passing quickly and accurately along the ground, keeping possession and eventually out-shooting the Gaels 12-3 in the first half.
Recently nominated to national first team all-rookie by TopDrawerSoccer.com, freshman Adam Jahn was the first on the score sheet with a stunning left-footed volley, and further made his mark on the match by setting up junior Dominique Yahyavi for the second. True to the team ethic, though, he refused to take the credit.
“We just work for each other,” Jahn said. “No one’s more important than the other, and we will not succeed if we don’t stay as a team.”
The final score line, which included sophomore Adoni Levine’s first goal this year in the 81st minute, shows how far the Cardinal has come this year. In fact, the game itself offers a snapshot of the season so far: a slightly shaky start gave way to a steady progress and now a prospect for future success.
“We had a little rocky start, pre-season,” Jahn said. “I think we all just bounced back and we just realized we had the potential to be a great team, and once we started getting wins the confidence kept going up.
“We’re peaking right at the right time now,” he added.
Saint Mary’s battled hard, especially after the first goal, but could not wrestle itself back into the game. Although the Card deserves credit for keeping the Gaels out of contention for much of the match, playing without the experience and leadership of possibly their best player, junior Jordan Rider, WCC Defensive Player of the Year, certainly had an impact on Saint Mary’s.
“Technically, we weren’t as sharp on the ball as we have been,” Cooper said. “Part of that was some nerves, part of that was Stanford doing a good job disrupting our rhythm.”
After a strong year, the Gaels can return home with their heads held high.
“Even though we didn’t win today, it gave all of our guys a taste of the tournament and a hunger for them to get back next year.”
Meanwhile, the Cardinal now must look forward to Sunday’s game against No. 16 seed UC-Irvine in Irvine. A win there would put them through to face undefeated, No. 1 seed Akron in the third round. But Irvine will not be a pushover.
In their last regular season game, the Anteaters defeated UC-Santa Barbara, ranked No. 10 by the NSCAA, 4-1 on the road to take the Big West Tournament title.
Sunday’s game will kick off at 6 p.m.