In the College Cup for the second consecutive season and fifth time overall, Pac-12 champion Stanford (14-3-4) heads to Houston for a national semifinal against North Carolina (14-3-3) at BBVA Compass Stadium on Friday, Dec. 9 at 5:45 p.m. on ESPNU.
he Cardinal and Tar Heels have met once before in a NCAA semifinal in 2001. North Carolina took that one 3-2 in quadruple overtime and beat Indiana 2-0 two days later to claim its first of two national championships in men’s soccer.
The defending NCAA champions are 22-12-4 all-time in the NCAA tournament – 13-2-3 at home, 6-7-0 on the road and 3-3-1 at the College Cup. Its stretch of four consecutive postseason berths is the second longest in program history behind a six-year run from 1997 to 2002.
Stanford, which won the program’s first national title last year over Clemson, will attempt to become the first back-to-back NCAA champion since Indiana in 2003 and 2004.
Men’s soccer also has a chance to keep an incredible departmental streak intact. Stanford teams have won 109 NCAA titles and the school owns an active 40-year stretch with at least one NCAA team championship dating to 1976-77.
Stanford has posted shutouts in five straight postseason matches and hasn’t allowed a postseason goal in the last 512:17, since Ian Harkes’ 70th-minute penalty at Wake Forest in last year’s quarterfinals. It hasn’t given up a goal in the run play in the postseason in the last 610:34, since Abdi Mohamed (62′) headed one in for Ohio State in the third round last season at Stanford.
Stanford tied a program record set last season and placed five on the NSCAA NCAA Division I Men’s All-Far West Region Teams. Goalkeeper Andrew Epstein, defender Tomas Hilliard-Arce and forward Foster Langsdorf were first team selections and co-captains Brian Nana-Sinkam and Drew Skundrich earned spots on the second team.