Occidental College Tigers looking to make SCIAC playoffs
LOS ANGELES, Calif. — Occidental College soccer is gearing up to make a run to secure a place in the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SCIAC) playoffs this fall. Occidental College plays in the NCAA鈥檚 Division III in southern California. The team started the season off slow, losing seven of their first nine games. In that span, they lost their opening four in conference games, losing to division rivals Redlands, Pomona-Pitzer, Chapman and Claremont-Mudd-Scripps. After a win at Caltech in late September, the Tigers were looking at a 1-4 in conference and remained near the bottom of the conference. To qualify to the SCIAC playoffs, teams must finish within the top four in the conference.
The Occidental College soccer team first played varsity matches in 1967, and hasn鈥檛 had a winning season until 2012, under their third-year coach. The head coach, Radames 鈥淩od鈥� Lafaurie, took over the team in the 2010 season. He has turned the Tigers into a formidable force in the SCIAC conference. He has seen steady progress with the squad and has created a competitive environment but saw unique challenges this season.
“The main challenge [this season] was missing out on coaching our players for eighteen months between March of 2020 and August of 2021,鈥� Lafaurie commented. 鈥淚t took us a while聽to remember really what it takes at this level, but once we did, we began to show our talents again.聽We are a momentum-based program, and typically we can carry momentum from semester to semester, we couldn’t do that this year, so it took us longer to get the ball rolling (literally and figuratively).鈥�
The 2018-19 season was one of the most successful of his tenure, leading the team to their first SCIAC championship finals. They also donned the top player in the conference, midfielder Liam Walsh. In the 2019-20 season, the Tigers fell to Claremont-Mudd-Scripps 2-0 in the semifinals of the tournament. That season, Adrian Paredes finished second in the running for SCIAC Player of the Year and has continued his strong play this season. He plays as a center midfielder and has been a major contributor to the scoresheet, adding six goals and an assist so far this season. He leads the Tigers in goals and total points and is a key piece to the success of the Tigers team both on and off the field.
The start to the season made playoff hopes dim, but the team has since turned it around to allow for an end of season push. The Tigers went on to win against University of La Verne, Whittier College, UC Santa Cruz and Cal Lutheran University. This strong month of October has given the team hope that they can make the playoffs if they finish the season strong. After a loss to Redlands, the team has three games in conference to close out the season.
On top of the difficulties from the gap in preparation, the disjointedness in the squad posed another challenge. This season, the Tigers had an unusually young squad and, due to the COVID-19 break, there was a lack of experience within the team.
鈥淚ntegrating five fifth-year seniors with two first-year classes essentially meant that we had players on opposite sides of the spectrum with very little in between for the first time ever,鈥� Lafaurie observed. 鈥淲hen you consider that, besides our fifth years, some of our juniors were first years that maybe didn’t get a lot of playing time in their first season. We almost had three classes of first years mixed with fifth-year seniors, so this was an additional hurdle that we’ve never had to deal with either, but we’ve done it!鈥�
They face tough competition to end the season, facing Claremont-Mudd-Scripps (first in the division), Pomona-Pitzer (fourth in the division) and Caltech (last in the division), so the road to the playoffs will not be easy. If they can put another win streak together, they will be able to qualify for playoffs. Once in the playoffs, every game is single elimination, so anything is possible. Even if this season doesn鈥檛 end in the way the coaching staff had hoped, Lafaurie is still looking to build towards the future and enjoy the rest of the season.
鈥淢ost importantly, we want to feel proud of our performances in the rest of the games to close out our season,鈥� he said.聽鈥淭o enjoy the moments together, train hard, play well and feel good about our performances, regardless of how the season went for the players who maybe aren’t quite ready. We still believe in them and know that their time will come with hard work and discipline.鈥�
This is an unedited user writing submission. The views, information, or opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of Best Version Media or its employees.