For the Cal men’s soccer team, the schedule is hardly challenging. Excluding the perennial Pac-12 powerhouse UCLA, the vast majority of the Bears’ opponents — mostly located on or around the West Coast — range somewhere between beatable and laughable.
In search of a worthy foe, the Bears (1-0) are flying across to Virginia and Maryland this weekend. Cal will first face the Cavaliers on Friday at 4 p.m. before turning to No. 6 Maryland on Sunday at 4 p.m.
While the money and time paid for a cross-country trip is steep, Bears coach Kevin Grimes felt it was a necessary cost for the team’s long-term growth.
“If we stayed close to home all year, it probably would be less stress for the body and the team,” Grimes said. “When you can get these types of experiences under your belt, you can manage the changes better individually and as a team.”
Cal will be flying directly into the heartland of American collegiate soccer, one of the few places in the nation where the soccer culture has successfully integrated into mainstream athletics. Almost every other Division I university from the states of Maryland, Virginia and the Carolinas are vying for a top-25 ranking — eight of the current top 25 hail from those four states.
The rabid support for soccer in those Atlantic states is no more visible than at Ludwig Field in Charlottesville, Md., home of the Terrapins. Maryland fans generally sell out most home games and create one of the loudest and most intimidating home environments in collegiate soccer.
“Their stadiums are something else,” midfielder Tony Salciccia said. “Fans pack it in. They have 5,000 usually every game. That’s definitely something you don’t see a lot in the West Coast.”
Unlike the competition-craving Bears, the Terrapins faces top-25 opponents on a weekly basis. Aside from regularly playing in the ACC, a conference which Grimes said is “probably the strongest conference in the country,” Maryland has four top-25 teams slated in its non-conference schedule.
The Terrapins turned some heads last Sunday when they thrashed then-No. 7 Louisville, 3-0. Although Maryland has an arsenal of veteran upperclassmen under 20th-year head coach Sasho Cirovski, it was newcomers like Zimbabwe native and freshman Schillo Tshuma who sparked the seismic victory.
Still, the offensive heart of the Terrapins is senior midfielder John Stertzer, who is arguably the best midfielder in collegiate soccer. Despite being a midfielder, Stertzer banged in 14 goals in 31 shots last season. This season so far, Stertzer has scored a goal in all three games, on pace to break his goal tally from last year.
It will be up to the Salciccia-led Cal midfield to control the ball and keep possession away from Stertzer and company for the Bears to have a chance of victory. Communication amongst the Bears will be key, but it won’t be an easy task.
With thousands of Terrapins making noise all around Ludwig Field, they will let the Bears know that this is Maryland, not some half-empty stadium in California.
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