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Courtesy Photo | Oakland University
Oakland's Francesco Mazzei and the rest of the Golden Grizzlies have had plenty to cheer about in recent weeks, as the Horizon League regular season champions will take the No. 1 seed into Thursday's Horizon League Champion Tournament semifinals on a five-game win streak.
BY DAN STICKRADT
WEB AND CONTENT EDITOR | DIRECTOR OF NEWS
MICHIGAN SOCCER NETWORK | NATIONAL SOCCER NETWORK | PREMIER MEDIA GROUP
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AUBURN HILLS, Mich. – Sometimes, things just take time.
After a slow start with a team with numerous sophomores and freshmen on its roster, Oakland University men’s soccer team is playing perhaps its best soccer of the season when it matters most.
Oakland has won five straight games to move to 8-6-2 on the 2024 season, and head into the Horizon League Championship Tournament riding the waves of a team playing with confidence. The Golden Grizzlies have won five straight games with a combined 10-4 scoring edge.
The Golden Grizzlies, who have won more than 20 overall regular season conference championships between NCAA Division I and Division II, put the finishing touches on a second straight Horizon League regular season outright title last week following wins over Green Bay (1-0) and University of Detroit-Mercy (3-1). Oakland finished 6-1-2 in conference play this season.
“The guys remained focused all season, even when we had that slow start,” admitted first-year Oakland head coach Paul Doroh, a standout player at OU in his own right back in the 1990s when the school was still known as the Pioneers and were at their tail-end as a NCAA Division II school. “It took us some time to really get going. We had to get used to playing with one another and we started to try a lot of different lineups and (different alignments). But the guys all bought in and trusted the process. Our goal was to win the (regular season title in the Horizon League and be able to host. And then the next goal was to win the Horizon tournament.”
All of this comes behind a tough 0-4-0 start to the season where OU was outscored 7-3 and suffered four one-goal losses.
Following a 3-0 shutout of Big Ten Conference member and in-state rival Michigan State on Sept. 9 – OU’s first win of the season – the Golden Grizzles have gone 7-2-2 in their last 11 games. Although the team only holds a 23-21 scoring edge overall, seven of those goals conceded came back in August in the four-game losing streak at the beginning of the season, including setbacks to University of Nebraska-Omaha (2-1), University of Michigan (2-1), Butler University (2-1) and University of Illinois-Chicago (1-0).
“It wasn’t like we played bad or anything. That was a tough stretch against some really good opponents and we were tested early,” admitted Doroh. “We gave up a couple of soft goals in those games and we had chances in each of those contests. We just didn’t finish very many (scoring) opportunities.”
But Oakland learned from those early season mishaps and have become a quality team with an RPI ranking of 101 out of 212 Division I programs this year.
Last year Oakland also reached the final of the Horizon League Tournament before succumbing to Milwaukee 1-0 in the Horizon League Championship Tournament finals, thus ending the Golden Grizzlies chances of a postseason berth. Milwaukee advance while OU remaining home.
That task is at hand – and the HL tournament is a must-win situation for all participants.
“There’s only (48) schools who can go to the (NCCA Division I Tournament), so unfortunately it’s a one-bid league again this season and only the winner of our conference tournament will advance,” offered Doroh. “Last year we were disappointed, of course, because we had a lot of chances in that game and gave up an early goal. We just couldn’t score.”
Oakland only finished 8-9-2 and still managed to go 5-4-0-0 and win the regular season title of the Horizon League. The Golden Grizzlies were outscored 33-27 last season with six shutouts but were blanked seven times a year ago.
Oakland has improved in almost every facet. Besides the narrow 23-21 scoring edge this season, OU’s offense has picked up the pace in the last month. The Golden Grizzlies have increased their output to 1.44 goals-per-game and have lowered the team goals-against-average down to 1.31. The team also owns four clean sheets this season and have only been shut out twice – only to UIC-(1-0) and to IU-Indy (0-0).
OU was rewarded with numerous players voted to the All-Horizon League postseason lists. Alex Flowers (goalkeeper), Carson Ballagh (midfielder), Jace Foster (defender) and Zach Townsend (defender) all earned first-team honors, while Abdul Al-Rashed (midfielder) garnered a spot on the second-team.
Foster is a finalist for the Horizon League Sportsmanship Award. Flowers was tabbed as the Horizon League Goalkeeper of the Year as he lowered his goals-against-average down to a league low 1.21 while his save percentage increased up to .761 over 1,260 minutes and 14.00 games.
Doroh was also named Horizon League Coach of the Year in his first year as head coach.
Several other players have increased their levels of play over the course of the season and more importantly the Golden Grizzlies have gelled into a unit and a deep unit as well.
To-seeded Oakland will host No. 4 Green Bay at 1 p.m. on Nov. 14 in the first semifinals match of the Horizon League, while second-seeded Robert Morris University will take on the University of Milwaukee at 4 p.m. in the second semifinals game at OU.
“That’s the one thing the coaching staff talked about during the preseason and we talked about it several times this season that we are a deep team,” said Doroh. “Just last week we played 21-22 players against Detroit (Mercy). There’s been a lot of games where we played 20 or more guys. There are some players that we are protecting (with redshirts) but we don’t really have anyone on this team that we feel we can’t put into a certain game because they are not ready. Even (the walk-ons). We have 34 quality players in this program this year. And by playing over 20 guys in certain games kind of backs that up. Now we’ll tighten that up a little bit in the (conference tournament). But these guys understand that if their number is called that we have trust in them of going out there and doing a great job.”
(Have a story suggestion for the Premier Media Group and the Michigan Soccer Network regarding club soccer, high school varsity, amateur soccer, collegiate soccer or professional soccer involving teams, players or coaches with Michigan ties, contact Communications Specialist/Web and Content Editor/Director of News Dan Stickradt via email at stickradt@michigansoccernetwork.com or dstickradt@thepremiermediagrp.com, or call 248-884-1051 or 248-525-2349. Dan Stickradt is a 31-year veteran of the Michigan Media circles and recently joined the staff full time in March of 2024. Want to schedule a broadcast game or live show, contact PMG/MSN Director of Broadcasting Jonathan Turner for availability and pricing at jonathan@michigansoccernetwork.com and jonathan@thepremiermediagrp.com.)
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