| FAU vs. UCF Sat., Oct. 1, 6:00 p.m. ET No TV | LIVE STATS | Free Admission |
ORLANDO – The UCF men's soccer team is back in action tomorrow as they host FAU for the first time as a fellow American Athletic Conference member. After initially being scheduled for Friday, the match will kickoff at 6 p.m. on Saturday at the UCF Soccer Complex, the Knights' first home match since Sep. 5. Saturday night's match will be free admission for all.
The Black and Gold are coming off a 3-2 loss at Memphis, who was ranked No. 24 in TopDrawer Soccer's poll at the time. The defeat snapped UCF's four-match winning streak. The Knights opened conference play with a 4-0 defeat of Temple in Philadelphia but fell a goal short of earning a result on the road against the Tigers back on Sep. 24. UCF outshot Memphis 20-6 in the contest, including a 13-2 edge in corners.
The Knights enter the match with the fewest fouls in the nation, averaging exactly seven fouls committed each match. UCF is second in the country in corner kicks per game, averaging exactly eight corners a contest. UCF is ranked 26th in the country in goals per game, averaging 2.33 a match, having scored two goals or more in five straight matches and three goals or more in three of its last four.
Lucca Dourado has been a big contributor on the scoresheet for the Black and Gold, currently averaging a goal per game and scoring all six of his goals over a four-match period. Gino Vivi and Mauricio Villalobos Vega have been important contributors as well, with each just recently seeing their scoring streak of four straight matches come to an end on the road against Memphis. Dourado and Vivi are responsible for 35 of the team's last 65 goals scored, dating back to a point during the 2020-21 season.
FAU comes into the match with a record of 2-4-2 and a mark of 1-0-1 in conference play, recording a 1-1 draw against South Florida and a 1-0 victory over UAB. The win over the Bulls came in the Owls' first match as part of The American. FAU is one of four new teams to the league this year, joined by Charlotte, UAB and FIU. Saturday's match will be the first time since 2004 that the Knights play the Owls as leaugemates, a year in which both were part of the Atlantic Sun Conference. UCF went 7-2 that year and were crowned A-SUN champs in their farewell tour of the conference before joining Conference USA in 2005. The two teams were nearly in the same conference again as FAU joined Conference USA in 2013, the same year that the Knights jumped from Conference USA to The American.
Victor Claudel is FAU's leading scorer, tallying three goals and six points so far. As a team, the Owls average 0.75 goals per match, placing them 185th in the nation in that category. They are tied for the national lead in red cards with four through eight matches and are 96th in the country in fouls, committing an average of 11.5 per game.
FAU reached the championship match of Conference-USA's postseason tournament in 2021 but ultimately fell to Kentucky in overtime, ending the Owls' season with an overall record of 9-7-3.
The Knights own a 23-8-3 all-time series lead against the Owls, going 7-1-2 over that time, outscoring FAU 20-4 in the process. The two sides have only met twice under head coach Scott Calabrese, resulting in a 3-0 victory on Oct. 24, 2017 and a 3-2 overtime win on Oct. 1, 2019.
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