In his eighth season alongside head coach Scott Calabrese, associate head coach Paul Souders played a key role in further solidifying UCF's status as a top three program in one of the nation's premier men's soccer conferences throughout the 2024 campaign.
The Knights in 2024 concluded their second campaign with at least seven wins since joining the Sun Belt prior to the 2023 season, and in just two years in the conference have accumulated one MLS SuperDraft selection (Anderson Rosa), three major conference post-season award winners (Calabrese – 2023 Coach of the Year; Clarence Awoudor – 2023 Newcomer of the Year; Saku Heiskanen – 2023 Freshman of the Year), seven All-Conference selections, four United Soccer Coaches All-Region appointments, and two top-three regular-season conference finishes.
UCF has also demonstrated its ability to compete with the nation’s best in that span, going undefeated in four of its eight contests against ranked opponents with each match finishing with a score margin of two or fewer goals.
On the heels of the team’s seven-win 2024 slate, UCF boasts an aggregate .609 win percentage in its first two seasons in the Sun Belt, accompanied by a dominant 10-4-2 mark in 2023 that saw the Black and Gold, most notably, earn the first national No. 1 ranking, and later unanimous national No. 1 ranking, in a regular-season poll of any athletics program in school history.
The Knights’ depth was on display throughout the fall ‘24 campaign, as 13 different players scored at least one goal, highlighted by a pair of braces by players in their first collegiate seasons and a hat trick by one of the more prolific goal-scorers in program history, Lucca Dourado.
Dourado and fellow senior Jonas Fritschi both earned in-season league honors as well, garnering Sun Belt Offensive and Defensive Player of the Week for their efforts in UCF’s 4-0 win over South Carolina on Senior Night. The pair joined Zane Bubb, Juanvi Muñoz and Robbie Soronellas as the fourth and fifth players in the last two seasons to be recognized in the league’s weekly honors.
Souders, who played a pivotal role in bringing Dourado and Rosa to Orlando prior to their respective collegiate debuts in the 2020-21 season along with Calabrese, saw Rosa complete his college career without missing a single match. The defender finished the 2024 season as the program’s all-time leader in career games played, appearing in each of the Knights’ 76 matches over his five seasons.
The Knights kicked off their inaugural season in the Sun Belt in 2023 with an immediate statement victory, toppling the eventual 2023 National Champion and then-No. 9 Clemson Tigers on the road in their Aug. 24 season-opener by a 2-1 final score.
The winning effort, coupled with UCF’s 4-0-2 start overall, would help vault the Knights into the United Soccer Coaches national rankings from week one through the end of the season.
En route to earning the program’s first NCAA Tournament berth since the 2020-21 season, the Black and Gold also earned ranked draws with then-No. 4 West Virginia (2-2) and then-No. 11 FIU (2-2) before rattling off a season long six-game win streak Sept. 29–Oct. 27.
Rosa aided in keeping his program within national headlines even after the conclusion of the season, when he became the 13th in program history to be selected in the MLS SuperDraft with his second-round selection by the Colorado Rapids Dec. 19, 2023. He was also the sixth to be drafted in Souders' and Calabrese's UCF tenure, joining Gino Vivi (2023, LA Galaxy), Nick Taylor (2022, Orlando City), Yanis Leerman (2022, Chicago Fire), Cal Jennings (2020, FC Dallas) and Jonathan Dean (2020, Orlando City).
The early and immediate success for the Knights in the Sun Belt comes on the heels of a strong final six years as members of the American Athletic Conference from 2017-2022. UCF earned four AAC conference titles (three regular season, one tournament), while authoring two double-digit win seasons, four seasons with at least nine wins and five with at least eight wins.
The most successful era of UCF's run in The American came between the 2018 and 2019 seasons, when the Knights produced 13-3-3 and 15-3-2 records, respectively, en route to consecutive AAC regular-season championships and NCAA Tournament berths. With Souders' guidance, the Knights earned two Offensive Player of the Year awards (Jennings 2x), two Midfielder of the Year awards (Louis Perez, 2018; Yoni Sorokin, 2019), two Goalkeeper of the Year awards (Yannik Oettl 2x), one Freshman of the Year award (Gino Vivi, 2019), and two Coaching Staff of the Year awards (2018-19) in that span.