BGSU Men's Soccer: 2014 Season Wrapup

Max Auden (17) & Pat Flynn (right) congratulate Jacob Roth after a goal vs. West Va

Max Auden (17) & Pat Flynn (right) congratulate Jacob Roth after a goal vs. West Virginia. The 3 sophs ranked among BG's top-4 scorers in 2014

Photo by: Ernie Aranyosi

November 24, 2014 | Men's Soccer

No matter how you slice it, the 2014 campaign was a highly-successful one for Eric Nichols & the Falcons

By: BOWLING GREEN, Ohio (BGSU Athletic Communications)

The Bowling Green State University men's soccer team has seen the 2014 season, one of the most successful campaigns in the last decade-plus, come to an end. The Falcons of head coach Eric Nichols won 14 games and advanced to the championship match of the Mid-American Conference Tournament.

LINKS
BGSU Notes & Statistics - PDF | BGSU Men's Soccer Story Archives
BGSU Statistics | 2014 Media Guide | Career Stats of Current Falcons

2014 MAC TOURNAMENT
(all matches at FirstEnergy Stadium – Cub Cadet Field; Akron, Ohio)
Friday, November 14 – Semifinals
#3 Bowling Green 3, #2 West Virginia 2 (OT)
at #1 Akron 2, #4 Western Michigan 1

Sunday, November 16 - Championship
at #1 Akron 2, #3 Bowling Green 1

FASCINATING FALCON FUTBOL FACTS
No matter how you slice it, the just-completed season was a highly successful one. The 2014 Falcons achieved a great many milestones. Some of this season's accomplishments follow...

• The Falcons' total of 14 wins is the program's highest in 17 years. No BGSU team had won as many as 14 matches since the 1997 Falcons went 18-6-0 en route to a third consecutive NCAA Tournament appearance.

• BG's total of six losses is the program's lowest total since that '97 team went 18-6-0. No Falcon team has had fewer than six losses since the 1996 club went 18-4-1.

• BGSU finished with a winning record for the first time in 14 years, The Falcons last finished above .500 in 2000, when BG went 9-8-1 overall.

• The Falcons advanced to the championship match of the MAC Tournament for the first time since 2003.

• BGSU more than doubled last season's win total. The 2013 Falcons went 6-7-6.

• The Falcons scored 38 goals this season, the program's highest total since the 1997 team scored 56 times.

• No fewer than 14 of those 38 goals came in the 76th minute or later. Nine of the 14 came with the score tied and gave BGSU the lead for good.

• BGSU won five consecutive games prior to the loss to Akron in the MAC Tournament final. That five-game winning streak was the program's longest since the '97 team won 11 games in a row.

• The Falcons won four matches in the month of November for the first time since that 1997 club won six November games.

• BGSU doubled last year's totals in both home and road wins. This year's team went 6-2-1 at home, 6-4-0 on the road and 2-0-0 at neutral sites. In 2013, BG was 3-2-3 at Cochrane Field, 3-4-3 at hostile venues and 0-1-0 in neutral-site meetings.

• The Falcons were 5-1-1 in overtime matches this season. BG's total of five OT wins is a new school record. The 1984 team went 4-2-2 in overtime matches.

• Sophomore Pat Flynn had team-leading totals of 14 goals and 32 points, ranking him among the national leaders in both categories. Flynn's totals are the highest by a Falcon since BGSU Hall-of-Famer Steve Klein exploded for 18 goals and 50 points in the 1996 season.

• Flynn's total of 14 goals was tied for the third-most in a season in program history, while his point total was tied for the fifth-highest by a Falcon in a single season (lists on page 4).

• In just his second game as a Falcon, Flynn scored five goals and 11 points in BG's 8-0 win over Findlay, tying the school single-game records that had stood for nearly 33 years.

• BG's top four scorers in 2014 all were sophomores, with three hailing from Naperville, Ill. Cleveland native Jacob Roth finished second on the team with 18 points, while Joe Sullivan scored 16 points and Max Auden 15.

• Each of BGSU's final 11 goals of the season was scored by a sophomore. Players with true or redshirt sophomore status combined to score 30 of the team's 38 goals this year.

• Redshirt sophomore goalkeeper Nick Landsberger had 10 wins this season, the highest total by a Falcon 'keeper since Hall-of-Famer Scott Vallow was 10-8-1 in 1998.

• Auden scored six goals on the season. Three of the six were game-winning goals, with two coming in overtime.

• Roth, like Auden, scored two 'Golden Goals' in 2014. They are the first two BGSU players to score multiple overtime winners in a season in the 'Golden Goal' Era, which began in 1997.

• Auden scored four of his six goals against MAC teams. In fact, he scored the GWG in all three of BGSU's wins against league foes this fall. Those three winners came on three consecutive weekends, as he scored in a home win over Western Michigan (Nov. 1), a road victory vs. Northern Illinois (Nov. 8) and a neutral-site contest against West Virginia (Nov. 14). The WVU contest was a MAC Tournament semifinal.

• The 2014 campaign marked the first time five players scored at least 10 points in a season since the 1997 campaign, when a whopping nine players did so.

• Senior Danny Baraldi was part of that quintet, with 10 points in 2014. He posted double-digit point totals in each of his four years at BGSU, the first Falcon to do so since Chris Dore (1996-99).

• Baraldi finished his career with 57 points on 18 goals and 21 assists. He was just one assist and two points away from moving into the top 10 on each of those BG career charts.

• Baraldi ended 2014 tied for fourth in career assists among all active Division-I players.

BUILD FROM THE BACK
Slowly but surely, the Falcons have improved defensively during the Eric Nichols Era. BGSU's totals/averages in a multitude of categories have gotten markedly better since Nichols took over prior to the 2009 season. The 2014 Falcons lost only one game by more than one goal, and this year's team ranks 23rd in the nation on arguably the most important list: winning percentage. To follow are a few more statistics that illustrate BG's defensive improvement over the last few seasons...
DOING IT WITH DEFENSE – BGSU TOTALS/RANKINGS SINCE 2008
Category                    2008   2009   2010   2011   2012   2013   2014^
Team goals-against avg. * 173rd 192nd 134th 109th   83rd   33rd   53rd
Shutout percentage *       174th 153rd   66th   44th   57th   36th   58th
Saves percentage *         142nd 162nd 122nd 100th   29th   26th   31st
Winning percentage *       176th 179th 133rd 120th 106th 110th   23rd
Shutouts                       2      3      6      7      7      8      8
Goals allowed                 37   44   26   24   23   17   20
Matches allowing 2+ goals     14   13      8      7      9      4      5
Matches allowing 3+ goals      5      9      2      4      1      2      2
Multiple-Goal losses           9      8      6      3      5      2      1
* NCAA rankings; all other categories are BGSU's season totals
^ 2014 totals/rankings through games of Thursday, Nov. 20

CHART-TOPPERS
The Falcons were well represented in the NCAA Division I statistical rankings all season long. Through Thursday's (Nov. 20) matches, BGSU was ranked among the top 32 teams in the nation in eight of the 11 categories kept by the NCAA, while sophomore Pat Flynn was ranked 10 or better in the country on five total lists.
FALCONS AMONG THE NATIONAL LEADERS (through matches of Nov. 20, 2014)
Player/Team
Category (Total/Avg.)      Nat'l Rank   MAC Rank
BGSU
Total Goals (38)               12    1
Total Points (111)         12    2
Total Assists (35)   15    3
W-L-T Percentage (.690)    23    1
Goals/Game (1.81)              24    2
Points/Game (5.29)    24    2
Assists/Game (1.67)      27    3
Saves Pct. (.813)      31    2
Goals-Against Avg. (0.91)      53    2
Shutout Pct. (0.38)      58    1
Saves/Game (4.14)              77    1

Pat Flynn
Total Goals (14)                3    1
Game-Winning Goals (6)          3    1
Total Points (32)               4    2
Goals/Game (0.67)               8    2
Points/Game (1.52)             10    2

Jacob Roth
Total Assists (8)              13    2
Assists/Game (0.38)            38    4

Ryan James
Total Assists (6)              48    5

Joe Sullivan
Total Assists (6)      48    5

Max Auden
Game-Winning Goals (3) 50    4

BGSU IN THE RPI
The Falcons were ranked 66th of 205 schools in the latest NCAA Men's Soccer RPI, released last Monday (Nov. 17) by the NCAA office. MAC champion Akron was ranked 23rd, while the other two MAC Tournament participants, West Virginia and Western Michigan, were ranked 38th and 101st, respectively.

A FEW MORE THINGS YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT THE 2014 SEASON
• Head coach Eric Nichols and the Falcons lost a total of 10 seniors off of the 2013 team. Nichols and his staff began preseason camp in August with just eight returning letterwinners, including four starters, and the Falcons had 11 newcomers on the 23-man opening-day roster.

• The returning players had combined to score just seven of the team's 25 goals, and the roster featured three goalkeepers, none of whom had ever played a second in goal for the Falcons.

• BGSU was picked to finish fifth in the six-team MAC after going 6-7-6 overall and losing those 10 seniors. However, the Falcons burst out to a 9-2-0 start to the 2014 campaign. The Falcons then went 0-3-1 in mid-October, though, and three of those four matches were conference contests.

• BG was 0-2-1 in the MAC after an Oct. 25 loss at West Virginia, and the Falcons needed to get a result in each of the remaining two league matches to have a chance to make the MAC Tournament. Nichols and the Falcons proceeded to reel off four-straight wins – with three coming in overtime – to end the regular season. That streak included a come-from-behind win over Western Michigan as well as a victory at Northern Illinois on the final night of the regular season, and the Brown and Orange qualified for the league tourney.

• BG then made it five wins in a row, downing WVU in another OT thriller in the MAC Tournament semifinal. The season came to an end when host Akron got a goal with under 12 minutes left for a 2-1 win in the league tourney final.

• The Falcons were the only school without an All-MAC First-Team selection, but BG's total of five honorees on the All-MAC Team was the third highest in the conference. Senior Danny Baraldi, juniors Jake Genrich and Ryan James and sophomores Pat Flynn and Jacob Roth all were named to the all-league second team.

• College Sports Madness also announced an all-league team, and that web site named Flynn, Roth and redshirt sophomore Max Auden to its All-MAC First Team, while awarding Baraldi, Genrich, redshirt sophomore Nick Landsberger and true soph Joe Sullivan second-team honors. And, College Sports Madness named Nichols its MAC Coach of the Year.

• In the classroom, Flynn and Sullivan were named to the Capital One Academic All-District Team, and are eligible for Academic All-America honors. The Capital One Academic All-America Team will be announced tomorrow (Tuesday, Nov. 25).

50 YEARS, 400 WINS & MORE
• The 2014 season marked the 50th year of BGSU men's soccer. Legendary coach Mickey Cochrane initiated varsity programs in both soccer and lacrosse at BG in 1965, after serving as club coach of both sports at the University the previous year.

• Eric Nichols, who just completed his sixth season with the Falcons, is only the fifth coach in the illustrious history of BGSU men's soccer. Cochrane, Gary Palmisano, Mel Mahler and Fred Thompson are the only other individuals to have served as head coach of the men's soccer Falcons during the first half-century.

• The Falcons' first victory of 2014, a 2-0 win over IUPUI at Cochrane Field, was the 400th win in the history of the program. Through the conclusion of the 2014 campaign, BGSU has an overall record of 413-349-79, good for a winning percentage of .538.

THANKS, SENIORS
The Falcons will lose the services of three seniors from the 2014 team. All three – Danny Baraldi, Jon Kumher and Vlad Lekarev – were starters this fall. Baraldi started at least 16 games in each of his four seasons, and had career totals of 57 points on 18 goals and 21 assists. He was injured in the Western Michigan match on Nov. 1, and missed the final two regular-season contests before coming off the bench in each of the MAC Tournament matches. Kumher started all 21 contests at a central defender position in 2014, and was on the pitch for 1,950 of the 1,972 total minutes. He played in 54 career matches, starting 36. Lekarev saw time at a multitude of spots on the field in 2014. Like Baraldi, he was injured in the WMU game, and missed the next two matches. He returned to the starting lineup for each of the MAC Tournament matches, and made a total of 19 starts on the year. Lekarev played in 52 total games in three seasons with the Falcons.

A LOOK AHEAD TO 2015
While the on-field and off-field contributions of the 2014 seniors will be difficult to replace, head coach Eric Nichols and his staff will have a veritable plethora of seasoned returnees in 2015. The returning players combined to score 32 of the Falcons' 36 goals (not counting own goals) this season, and all three goalkeepers on the roster have at least two years of eligibility remaining.

CAPTAINS
Seniors Danny Baraldi and Jon Kumher and junior Jake Genrich were the captains of the 2014 Falcons.

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