Anteaters earn bye in NCAAs

IRVINE — UC Irvine senior Kevin Santora couldn’t stop smiling Monday after the NCAA men’s soccer tournament pairings revealed that the Anteaters had gained the No. 16 seed, a first-round bye and a second-round home match Sunday at 6 p.m.

That’s because Santora, being the lone senior starter in his fourth season in the program, had something none of his teammates on this year’s Big West Conference Tournament champion possessed: Perspective.

As a freshman in 2006, a smile was impossible to muster for Santora and the rest of the Anteaters, after they were surprisingly denied an at-large berth into the 48-team NCAA postseason event.

By virtue of Saturday’s 4-1 win at UC Santa Barbara in the conference tournament title game, UCI, for the second straight season, did not have to worry about an invitation. And, for the second straight year, it received one of the top 16 seedings, creating a first-round bye.

UCI (15-6) will meet either Stanford (10-5-2) or Saint Mary’s College (10-4-5) in the second round Sunday. The Cardinal and the Gaels will meet Thursday at Stanford in a first-round clash at 7 p.m.

“It’s an overwhelming, great feeling,” said Santora, who helped his No. 3-seeded team win the four-team conference tournament, repeating the feat achieved in the event’s inaugural year in 2008.

“To be seeded No. 16 in the NCAA, you have to give it up to the team, the school, our coaching staff, and the Big West in general for having such a competitive atmosphere.”

The Anteaters are hoping to duplicate last season’s second-round home sellout of 2,500, which saw a 2-1 triumph over Cal Poly San Luis Obispo in the program’s first NCAA Tournament contest.

“Our record so far this year away is better (9-1) than it is at home (5-4),” Santora said. “But I believe the atmosphere that we’re going to bring [Sunday], with people cheering for us, will be better for us. I believe we feed off the energy the crowd brings, whether we’re home or away. It’s like a crowd lights a fire under us and makes us play as well as we did Saturday.”

UCI played before 3,815 Saturday at UCSB after winning, 2-1, in double overtime in front of 1,598 at Cal Poly in the semifinals.

Saturday’s triumph allowed this year’s team, which finished third in the Big West regular-season standings, to match the victory total posted last year, before UCI lost at St. John’s in the round of 16.

UCI Coach George Kuntz said the Anteaters are as healthy as they have been all season. Sophomore goalkeeper Andrew Fontein, the MVP of the Big West Tournament as a freshman, returned to the starting lineup for this year’s tournament, after a prolonged absence due to an ailing knee.

“That makes a huge difference,” Kuntz said of Fontein, who has four shutouts in nine starts this season after recording five in 19 starts in 2008. “[Backup Victor Chinchilla] was fantastic [filling in], but our back line knows Andrew better and they can play a little differently when he’s in there. Our spacing is tighter because they know Andrew is going to get to balls off the goal line. And when you’re defending in tighter spacing, it’s easier to mark.”

Marking the ’Eaters has been challenging, because they have four proven offensive weapons.

Senior Irving Garcia (eight goals and nine assists), juniors Amani Walker (nine goals, three assists) and Spencer Thompson (seven goals, four assists), as well as senior Carlos Aguilar (six goals, seven assists), comprise one of the most potent attacking lines in the country. Aguilar earned Big West Tournament MVP honors with three goals and an assist in two games.

By contrast, junior Dylan Leslie (three goals, nine assists) and junior Bobby Warshaw (six goals, one assist) lead Saint Mary’s and Stanford, respectively, in scoring.

Only one other player for the Gaels and the Cardinal has double-figure points.

Saint Mary’s defeated UCI, 2-1, in double overtime on Sept. 18 at UCI. The Gaels, who finished second in a West Coast Conference field that produced four tournament teams, is making its first NCAA Tournament appearance.

Stanford, which played Saint Mary’s to a 0-0 tie in an Aug. 25 exhibition match, owns a 20-5-1 all-time mark against the Gaels. Stanford is making its first NCAA appearance since 2002, when the Cardinal capped a string of six straight tournament appearances by reaching the title match.

Should UCI win Sunday, its likely quarterfinal opponent would be top-seeded Akron. The Zips are 20-0 this season, becoming the first team to win 20 straight matches in a season since Evansville did it in 1990.