Win now.
That’s the mantra the Virginia men’s soccer team is embracing as it opens its conference schedule against longtime rival Duke this Friday evening under the lights at Klöckner Stadium.
“I think we all understand that we want to win,” coach George Gelnovatch said. “We’re a young team, but we don’t want this to be a thing like next year is our year, or the year after is our year.”
Win now: It is less a sense of urgency than of untapped potential.
“Sky’s the limit,” sophomore midfielder Eric Bird said. “We’re thinking this is the year. We really feel like we can pull together this year and do big things.”
The Cavaliers (1-2-0) come off a weekend in which they hosted two nationally ranked Pac-12 teams, notching a hard-earned 2-1 win against then-No. 22 California and dropping an overtime heartbreaker 1-0 against then-No. 6 UCLA.
Given the dearth of experience on his roster — which contains 18 underclassmen, including at least nine in the starting unit each game last weekend — Gelnovatch was at first apprehensive about how his players would respond to the loss.
“I tried to be careful with my reaction to the game Sunday [against UCLA] because we have such a young group,” Gelnovatch said. “I wanted to make sure that they are not losing confidence.”
Since the defeat, however, the group of youngsters have exhibited great resolve and focus in training.
“We’re staying positive,” Bird said. “What happened [on Sunday] happened. We had a tough loss but we’re regrouping real well.”
The team’s immitigable sense of self-assurance has not been lost on Gelnovatch, who was pleasantly surprised to learn that although his players may be inexperienced they are by no means faint-hearted.
“What I found is that this is a pretty confident group,” Gelnovatch said. “Looking into everybody’s eyes, everybody was like ‘lets get on with it, we know we’re good, we know we’re young, we know we have things to learn, and we know we can be better.’”
To the budding Cavaliers, every day they play together provides another opportunity to improve and develop as a unit.
The added time and work has already proved beneficial to the freshmen in the starting lineup, including forward Darius Madison, midfielder Marcus Salandy-Defour and defender Zach Carroll.
“{The underclassman] are growing right before our eyes,” Gelnovatch said. “Sometimes you see that over the course of a year, but right before our eyes things are emerging.”
The goal for Virginia — which has proved elusive thus far — is to collect wins in the interim period. That objective will by no means get easier Friday when they square off with the always-formidable Duke (1-2-0), who came into the season ranked 21st. The Blue Devils have made an impressive 26 consecutive NCAA Tournaments and look poised to continue that streak this year.
Playing in the Atlantic Coast Conference — arguably the best soccer conference in the country — has rendered a tough matchup for the Cavaliers against a quality opponent an almost quotidian occurrence.
“The ACC is an amazing conference, and everyone in there is going to give us a really good game every time,” Bird said. “We are used to that.”
But Duke should prove an intriguing challenge for Virginia. The Blue Devils return five starters from a year ago, including two preseason All-Americans on their defensive unit.
Junior defender Sebastien Ibeagha is a rock for Duke at center back, appearing in 33 career games and solidifying the backline. Senior captain James Belshaw provides a safety valve for the already-sturdy defense with his laudable work as goalkeeper. Hailing from Nottingham, England, Belshaw boasts a career 1.14 goals against average and is one of the top keepers in the U.S.
The Cavaliers are aware of Duke’s prowess on the pitch, but they believe the difficult schedule they have already played early in the season has more than adequately prepared them for the task ahead — both this Friday and later in the conference.
“Those two guys, the All-Americans, are very, very good players,” Gelnovatch said. “But I think playing a team like UCLA on Sunday … is as good of a preparation that I can put in front of our team for this coming Friday and for the rest of the ACC.”
Virginia, who beat Duke 1-0 in Durham last season, has not won at home against the Blue Devils since 2005. Now, after experiencing two tough overtime losses this year, the Cavaliers find themselves in a position where they care only about one thing: winning, no matter the opponent.
“We’ve lost two games out of three now … getting a win would be good for us, really good for us,” Gelnovatch said.
Kickoff is slated for 7:30 p.m. Friday.
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