Normally when the city of Plattsburgh is brought up in conversation, people immediately think of the cold conditions.
Despite this common assumption, the Plattsburgh State men’s soccer team has managed to stay hot throughout its first few weeks of play with an overall record of 7-0.
PSUC entered the last weekend with a record of 4-0 heading into a tournament against all non-conference teams.
The fear of the unknown was of little concern to the Cards as they blew by both Colby-Sawyer College and Mount Saint Mary College. Both games were won by at least six points— something that is uncommon in the sport of soccer.
Although the team did display dominance over their opponents, head coach Chris Waterbury, like any other coach, is never satisfied.
“It wasn’t what I was expecting in terms of the score lines,” Waterbury said. “I’m happy with the result, but I honestly can’t say that we had our best performance this weekend.”
In the world of sports it is not rare to see teams go on a winning streak that is simply unbelievable. They somehow manage to slip past all of their opponents with the help of a great amount of luck. However, this is not the case for the Cards.
Throughout the course of the season, the SUNYAC conference has been displayed complete and utter dominance against their opponents. The conference has a combined record of 36-4 against non-conference teams; tantamount to all the teams PSUC has played so far. This astonishing statistic leaves most people asking; what makes the SUNYAC conference superior? Assistant Coach Geoff Spear said, the success of the conference has direct correlation to the competition within.
“The competition is strong top to bottom every year,” Spear said. “No matter what you have done as a team, everyone starts at 0-0, and no one wants to obtain that first loss.”
Both Waterbury and Spear made it a point that any “blemishes” on a conference teams record, meaning a loss or tie, came from a highly skilled team. The coaches also explained it will not be common to see a blowout game once the conference competition starts rolling in.
Oneonta is among PSUC’s top concerns at the moment due to the fact that they believe the Red Dragons will be the top team in the conference.
Spear has described them as a final four team that is not only well coached but also has a lot of depth. Geneseo, Brockport, and Cortland are also teams that the Cards will be looking out for this season. In other words, there is really no team in the conference that PSUC will look past this year.
PSUC will not see their first conference opponent until next Saturday against SUNY Potsdam, and the players are continuing to push each other. They are preparing for the Civil War that is about to be sparked within the SUNYAC conference. Especially at this point in the season, it is too early to tell who will come out on top. This week’s SUNYAC player of the week, Nicholas Laurent, doesn’t care about the projections. He’s more focused on doing whatever it takes to make sure is team is at their top performance rate.
“At the end of the day you can’t make the other team worse, you can only make your team better.” Laurent said. “So for now, we’re just going to keep trying to get better.”
Email Kevin Morley at kevin.morley@cardinalpointsonline.com
