Men's soccer team opens season Saturday in Maryland

The Eastern Florida State College men's soccer team will open the regular season in Baltimore, Maryland this weekend.

The Titans come into the season No. 5 in the NJCAA Division I preseason poll and will hit the field at 3 p.m. Saturday against Harford Community College and then will play the host No. 15 CCBC Essex at 2 p.m. on Sunday.

"We are really excited about the trip, it's going to be a great opportunity for the team to play in their first competitive games of the season against two really good teams who have been in the national tournament the last few years and it will be a good chance to put what we worked on in practice and the preseason camp against junior college opposition," Eastern Florida State College men's soccer coach Oliver Twelvetrees said.

Eastern Florida State College has played against some good NCAA Division I and Division II teams in the preseason to get ready for the new season and coach Twelvetrees admits it has been a learning process for the team. 

"We have 16 new players so we have been trying to get those players on the same page, working together, collectively with cohesion and that has been the biggest focus of the preseason. It is starting to come together," Twelvetrees said.

The Titans have a solid nucleus of returning sophomores from last year's team that won 12 games and went to the Southeast District Final.

"We have a lot of strength and depth in the back line this season. Freshman Moussa Gueye and returning sophomore Rhys Myers, transfer Tajay Reid give us a lot of strength at the center back as well as local Melbourne High product Kyle Ferguson whose been fantastic as a true freshman, so we really feel like we have the depth in the back line," Twelvetrees said. "We really hope the phrase defense wins championships is going to come into play for us. We are confident with our defense play."

Sophomores Abdul Ganiyu Iddrisu and Troy LaRue Gonzalez lead the midfielders as some freshmen like Abdel Kuku and Marc Fabregas who coach says is no relation to Cesc Fabregas but does play a bit like him, have also stepped up in camp.

 "They have done well in preseason camp and we have some strikers that are starting to find their footing as well with Sebastian (Joffre), Caleb (Young) and others. We have a lot of pieces, so we are just trying to get the chemistry in the attacking part of the field, but we are confident that will come around and we are happy with the lads," Twelvetrees said.

The home opener for the Titans will be Sept. 6 against Broward College which will also be the conference opener for the Titans.