BALTIMORE, Maryland June 13, 2014 - Maryland has revealed its initial Big Ten Season Soccer Schedule, and the 2014 slate features home matches with Conference foes Michigan State, Wisconsin, Penn State and Ohio State, as well as a non-league home schedule that features UMBC, Georgetown, Santa Clara and Hartwick. The overall schedule is so strong that Maryland Coach Sasho Cirovski will know conclusively just how good Maryland is before post-season play begins in early November. The Terps - defending national runner-up after losing the title game to Notre Dame in a match peppered with poor calls by the game official that robbed the Terps of victory - open the regular season schedule at Louisville on August 29. The Cardinals are replacing the Terps in the ACC, and have been a strong national power in their own right in recent years, having ousted Maryland from the NCAA tournament two years ago. The Terps will also tangle with Northwestern, Michigan, Indiana and Rutgers in Big Ten action on the road. The non-league home slate includes soccer powers Coastal Carolina, UMBC, Dayton, Georgetown, Virginia Commonwealth, Lehigh, Santa Clara and Hartwick. Of that list, only Dayton has not been a school with an impressive record of accomplishment in the NCAA's Soccer Wars. Besides Louisville, Maryland will play only one other non-league opponent on the road, and that is Navy, which was 1-1 in the NCAA Tournament last season, and can be counted on to give Maryland a real battle in Annapolis when the two schools collide on Monday, September 8 at 7 pm.
The Terps will play two exhibition games that will not count in their overall record and will give Cirovski an opportunity to vet his team against real competition before the actual season starts. And Cirovski is always looking for the best teams to play. He opens the exhibition season at Akron, a team that won the national championship in 2010 after finishing as runner-up in 2009. The Terps exhibition at Akron is set for Monday, August 18, at 7 pm.
Maryland will find several big changes as it enters its first year of Big Ten play. For all of the conference's notoriety, soccer is not one of its most popular sport. In fact, before both Maryland and Rutgers joined the conference this season, the Big Ten had only six soccer-playing schools. That probably explains why there isn't a post-season tournament. While the ACC Soccer Tournament is often a barn-burner because so many of the schools are among the sport's elite, the Big Ten season ends on Wednesday, November 5 with Maryland at Rutgers. Maryland has no other games scheduled after that. In 2013 the NCAA Tournament began on Thurssday, November 21, and Maryland's first game wasn't until the second round on Sunday, November 24. If something similar happens this season, Maryland would have 19 off days in between its last regular season game and its first NCAA Tournament game. Last season, Maryland had seven days off, but only because it avoided the NCAA first round because it was one of 16 seeded teams. The NCAA has not publicly announced when the Championship Tournament will start in 2014. Another change for Maryland will be the proliferation of daytime matches. Maryland had no regular season daytime matches last season, home or away. The Terps did not play a daytime game until the NCAA quarterfinal match at Berkley, California agaisnt the University of California, and that was in December. The only other daytime match was the NCAA Championship Game against Notre Dame, a match played in Chester, Pennsylvania. The national semi-final game, a win over Virginia, was also played in Chester, Pennsylvania, but under the lights on a cold December night. In the Big Ten, conference games are often played on Sunday during the afternoon. Maryland has three such matches, and one of them is at Ludwig Field in College Park against Penn State. Here is the entire Maryland schedule:
University of Maryland Terrapins 2014 Soccer Schedule
EXHIBITIONS:
Monday, August 18, 7 pm, at Akron
Saturday, August 23, 7 pm, Delaware at Ludwig Field in College Park, Maryland
REGULAR SEASON:
Friday, August 29, 7 pm, at Louisville
Monday, September 1, 7 pm, Coastal Carolina at Ludwig Field in College Park, Maryland
Friday, September 5, 7:30 pm, UMBC at Ludwig Field in College Park, Maryland
Monday, September 8, 7 pm, at Navy in Annapolis, Maryland
Friday, September 12, 5 pm, at Michigan*
Friday, September 19, 7:30 pm, Michigan State* at Ludwig Field in College Park, Maryland
Monday, September 22, 7 pm, Dayton at Ludwig Field in College Park, Maryland
Friday, September 26, 7:30 pm, Wisconsin* at Ludwig Field in College Park, Maryland
Tuesday, September 30, 7 pm, Georgetown at Ludwig Field in College Park, Maryland
Sunday, October 5, 1 pm, at Northwestern*
Wednesday, October 8, 7 pm, Virginia Commonwealth University at Ludwig Field in College Park, Maryland
Sunday, October 12, 2 pm, Penn State* at Ludwig Field in College Park, Maryland
Wednesday, October 15, 7 pm, Lehigh at Ludwig Field in College Park, Maryland
Sunday, October 19, 2 pm, at Indiana*
Saturday, October 25, 7 pm, Santa Clara at Ludwig Field in College Park, Maryland
Tuesday, October 28, 7 pm, Hartwick at Ludwig Field in College Park, Maryland
Saturday, November 1, 7 pm, Ohio State* at Ludwig Field in College Park, Maryland
Wednesday, November 5, 7 pm, at Rutgers*
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