The Lowdown: Tabor College at Friends University

 

Location: Adair-Austin Stadium      

 

Kickoff: Oct. 22 @ 7:00 PM

 

Live Stream: https://urbanedgenetwork.net/watch/2854

 

Live Stats: https://friendsathletics.com/sidearmstats/msoc/summary

 

Flying with the Men's Soccer Falcons (4-10-1, 4-5-1, KCAC)

 

Friends Men's Soccer is coming off of a tough 1-0 loss against Evangel on Wednesday night. The Falcons totaled 19 shots against the Valor as they only delivered seven. The main difference was goalkeeping and the superb defense from Evangel. 

 

Sora Shibata leads the Falcons with 11 goals on the season and he has had 6 goals in the past 5 games played. Jose Quiel leads the Falcons in assists with 5. The Falcons offense averages 2.27 goals a game against their opponent so far this year, with 16.3 shots a game.

 

Arturo Pombo-Palomero has made 32 stops with a 1.90 GAA during his 854 minutes at goalkeeper, while Juan Jose Echeverry has played 361 minutes in the net with 14 saves and a 2.24 goals-against-average for the Falcons.

 

About the Bluejays (7-7-1, 5-5 KCAC)

 

The Bluejays of Tabor recently got a win against Sterling with a 2-0 victory. Their offense averages 12.5 shots per game with 2.07 goals on average per game. Lately it has been a tough couple of weeks for the Bluejays losing six of their last eight. 

 

The Bluejays top goalscorer is Pol Fernandez with six goals on the season. The bluejays like to spread the ball all over the place having 14 different goal scorers on their roster. The defense for the bluejays is led by goalkeeper Benjamin Baeza. Baeza has played in 14 of the 15 games with a 1.89 GAA. He has logged 1235 minutes with 56 total saves and a percentage of .683.

 

The Series: Last matchup Tabor shut out Friends in a 1-0 victory. The last ten matchups between these two have been in a 7-3 favor of the Falcons. All time the Falcons record against the Bluejays is 18-5 and are looking to continue this trend on Saturday.

 

The Coaches:

 

Bryan Perez is in his fifth season as head coach of the Friends University men's soccer program.

 

Last year, Perez coached three All-KCAC players and led the Falcons to a 6-4-3 record in the KCAC. 

 

During the 2023 campaign, Perez guided the Falcons to a 9-6-5 overall record and a 7-2-4 mark in the KCAC. The Falcons advanced to the KCAC postseason tournament semifinal round and had top-seeded Oklahoma Wesleyan University on the ropes, but OKWU tied the score with 16 seconds left in regulation and pulled out a 3-2 win in double-overtime. 

 

In 2022, the Falcons finished fifth in the league after coming in as the third seed in Perez's debut season as head coach.

 

In his first season in 2021, Perez helped the Falcons to a 12-4-1 overall record, including winning 12 of their final 15 matches. 

 

In his first season with the program as an assistant coach, Perez helped the Falcons capture the KCAC tournament championship and achieve the program's first NAIA National Tournament berth since the 2007 season. 

 

Perez was recently named the head coach of FC Wichita, a local men's soccer amateur team that is a member of the National Premier Soccer League (NPSL).  He also functions as the Technical Director for the program.

 

Prior to taking his position at FC Wichita, Perez served as the Director of Coaching for Alliance FC in Kansas City, where he led the coaches and developed the soccer curriculum.

 

His professional playing career includes competing for six years for the Kansas City Comets, an indoor soccer team in the Major Arena Soccer League.  He led the Comets to a pair of championships, including an undefeated season in 2015.

 

He was also called to play for the United States Men's National Futsal team for their 2012 and 2016 World Cup Qualifying teams.

 

Perez played collegiately at the University of Missouri-Kansas City and enjoyed a standout career that resulted in him being inducted into the school's athletic Hall of Fame in 2017.

 

He wrapped up his playing career at UMKC as the team's all-time leader in goals (29), points (70) and games played (78).

 

Perez was a four-time All-Summit league performer, including earning first-team honors on three occasions.

 

He earned his Bachelor of Arts degree from UMKC in 2010 and currently resides in Wichita with his wife Jamie and two children, Mila (seven) and Enzo (four).

 

Rafael Marins is the Tabor Men's Soccer brand new head coach serving his first year at the helm. Marins was an assistant in 2024 before he became the head. Marins also coached in Washington state from 2022-24 coaching a youth soccer club in Everett. Marins also coached a women's amateur team in Washington called Fuerza FC from 2015-20. 

 

Marins went to school at Tabor college and earned his bachelors in business management in 2014. The former alumni also played soccer for the Bluejays and helped coach as a student in his years as a student. 

 

Up Next: The Falcons will travel to Ottawa next Wednesday Oct. 29 to take on the ranked (25) Braves at 7:30 PM. 

 

Men's Soccer Falcons by the Numbers:

 

Overall: 4-10-1

 

KCAC: 4-5-1

 

Home: 2-5-1

 

Away: 2-5

 

Scoring zero goals: 0-4

 

Scoring one goal: 3-6-1

 

Scoring two goals: 4-3

 

Scoring three goals: 4-0

 

Scoring 4+ goals: 4-0

 

Allowing zero goals: 3-0

 

Allowing one goal: 2-10-1

 

Allowing two goals: 0-8

 

Allowing three goals: 0-5

 

Allowing 4+ goals: 0-2

 

Leading at halftime: 4-0

 

Trailing at halftime: 0-7

 

Tied at halftime: 0-2-1

 

Leading in shots-on-goal: 4-4

 

Trailing in shots-on-goal: 0-6-1

 

Shots-on-goal are even: 0-1