Kentucky men’s soccer (10-3-5, 7-2-1 SBC) fell to the UCF Knights (9-6-3, 5-3-2 SBC) in the conference tournament semifinals 1-0.
The Wildcats enjoyed a phenomenal regular season, only notching two losses at the hands of Indiana and Marshall, both very highly ranked teams.
Despite their regular season success, the Cats’ offense stood stagnant in the tournament and ultimately may have been the reason for their shortcomings. Through both games of the tournament, Kentucky scored a grand total of zero goals in regular time, only winning its first game through penalty kicks.
“Unfortunately, the goals have dried up,” Kentucky’s Head Coach Johan Cedergren said. “It’s just about sometimes when it rains, it pours, so I think that we just got to keep working with the guys.”
Despite the loss in the conference semifinals, Kentucky still has an opportunity to make the NCAA tournament. Only winners of conference championships receive automatic bids, so the Wildcats would need to rely on the committee to gift them an at-large bid.
“I think that we are sitting in a pretty tricky situation,” Cedergren explained. “What I would ask the committee, and the people who are looking at it, is that we won the regular season title. We only lost two games.”
Some may look at UCF’s victory as the No. 5 seed and go straight towards the idea of an upset. Those who have been keeping up with the Knights’ season, however, know that this may not be the case.
After a disappointing start to the season in which UCF had a lowly 1-5-1 record, including a loss to Kentucky in the Bluegrass, it quickly rebounded and since then have gone 7-1-2. They are not only one of the hottest teams in the Sun Belt, but possibly the country.
The idea of making the NCAA tournament was a complete longshot, but it now stares them straight in the face, as they are one win away from receiving an automatic bid.
“We have to fight every game if we want to keep going,” UCF Head Coach Scott Calabrese said. “We weren’t in the [NCAA] tournament, and I don’t know if we are now, and we don’t want it to end.”
Kentucky’s hopes of a continued season are still in the air, as they’ll look towards the selection show which will be held on Monday, Nov. 17th, and can be streamed on NCAA.com.
If this is it for the Cats, it will be a story of an amazing regular season, with questions surrounding just what went wrong in the conference tournament.
