SANTA BARBARA, Calif. — The UC Santa Barbara Men's Soccer team kicks off their 2024 regular season on Thursday against Missouri State. Celebrating the 20^th anniversary of their first-ever National Championship appearance, the Gauchos will look to make another NCAA Tournament run with nearly their entire 2023 core returning.
 
After last season ended in The Big West Semifinals at UC Irvine, Santa Barbara has been picked to finish third in the conference's 2024 preseason poll, just one point behind Cal State Fullerton, though both the Gauchos and Titans received three first-place votes. Santa Barbara placed a conference-best three players on the Preseason Coaches' Team, with Alexis Ledoux, Mikkel Goeling and Nemo Philipp being recognized.
 
"Overall, we have high expectations, of course, when you have this number of players returning," Head Coach Tim Vom Steeg said. "We were a very good attacking team last year. We put up good goals and good numbers, we had games with three, four goals, but our issue was exactly that Irvine game. We just gave up two goals that we call soft, a guy picks up the ball in a wide area and next thing you know he's passing it for a tap-in."
 
NEWCOMERS
Of the Gauchos' seven newcomers for 2024, five are defensive-minded signings. Marcelo Guerra joins Santa Barbara's goalkeeping corps after back-to-back NCAA Tournament appearances at SMU, and the freshman trio of Peleg Brown, Colby Renton and Lantz Gutierrez are all fullbacks. Manu Duah is Coach Vom Steeg's most highly touted freshman signing and played all 180 minutes of preseason at the defensive midfield position.
 
In attack, the Gauchos have added freshman Zac Siebenlist and Cal Poly transfer Ocean Salari, the latter of whom joined the program in time to get minutes in spring games.
 
"Ocean was Cal Poly's best attacking player," Vom Steeg said of the redshirt sophomore. "He is instant offense and can pick up balls in different places and break teams down."
 
RETURNERS
The Gauchos return 27 players from last year's team, including five of their six All-Big West honorees. In addition, Ramses Martinez returns to the program after two years away; he was a Big West All-Freshman Team selection in 2021.
 
"Ramses three years ago, back in 2021 when we played at UCLA in the NCAA Tournament, scored the goal and was one of our most effective midfielders that season," Vom Steeg said. "Having him back in the program, his work rate, his energy, his commitment, adds."
 
GOALKEEPERS
The most obvious hole for the Gauchos to fill coming into 2024 was in goal, following the departure of Leroy Zeller, but they have three veteran options in David Mitzner, Teddy Hutman and the newcomer Guerra.
 
"It's hard to make a total evaluation until you get into some games," Vom Steeg said. "Each one of them gives us something different; Mitzner has good size and he comes well off his line, I think Teddy overall does a lot of things, and then you have (Guerra), he was in the SMU program for four years, we think he's very good with his feet and the best player of the three with his feet. Overall, each one of them has some qualities to lend themselves to being a good goalie, maybe above the others, and now it just comes down to which one is going to give us a save."
 
Mitzner drew the starting assignment and played the full 90 minutes against San Diego State, making one save to bring his preseason total up to four. Guerra made three during the Blue/Gold Scrimmage, while Hutman made two. Vom Steeg did not rule out the possibility of starting multiple different goalkeepers during the Gauchos' non-conference games.
 
DEFENDERS
Ahead of the 'keepers the Gauchos will deploy a back four, bolstered by the addition of Brown and the return of Calle Mollerberg, who missed last season due to injury.
 
"It was a priority for us to address adding a center back and adding a left back, and hoping that the players who were returning, we can get them better," Vom Steeg said. "Calle was already in the program, so that was good that he was here, he was here all spring so we got to start to work with him, but he's coming off of surgery in the fall. He's a player who we didn't have last year, and then Peleg is more of your true left back."
 
The Gauchos also return all but one of their defenders from 2023, including the center back trio of Haruki Utsumi, Timon Windisch and Johannes Vedin plus a fifth option in the much-improved Andrew Kamienski.
 
"Andrew Kamienski is our center back of the future, the only question was whether or not he would come along a little faster and help us this year, and so far, he has," Vom Steeg said. "We're expecting, between Calle, Haruki, Timon, Johannes, Andrew, if we can't sort it out with five center backs, we've got other problems."
 
Caden Vom Steeg will maintain his spot at right back, where he made the All-Big West Second Team in 2023, while Brown will play at left back. Pablo Figueroa and Keaton Fargo, plus freshmen Renton and Gutierrez add further depth in the back line.
 
MIDFIELDERS
When it comes to depth, there is no more stacked area of the pitch than the Gaucho midfield for 2024. Coach Vom Steeg has more than one player on his roster that could fill each of the three midfield roles. Duah and Nalu Mack will provide defensive cover, Mikkel Goeling and Filip Basili can play in the box-to-box role, and a handful of Gauchos could fill the creative and attacking number 10 role. Martinez got the start in that position against San Diego State, but Henrique Bueno's impressive offseason improvement makes him a candidate for the role as well.
 
"That collection of players is going to give us a lot of options," Vom Steeg said. "It will allow us to play an up-tempo, high-speed game and get a lot of players pushed forward."
 
In addition, Vom Steeg has Kaden Standish, Dom Phanco, Eddie Villeda and Ethan Senter all available to fill gaps or provide infusions of energy off the bench. Standish set up both Gaucho goals against San Diego State from free kicks, and Senter was one of just eight men to play the full 90 minutes in Santa Barbara's Blue/Gold Scrimmage.
 
FORWARDS
Last but certainly not least, the Gauchos will field a veteran attacking trio with even more firepower waiting on the bench. All-conference honorees Alexis Ledoux and Nemo Philipp return on the wings, and the Gauchos can expect a full season of Salvador Aguilar as their number nine. Depth continues to be the name of the game, as Santa Barbara can deploy a full second trio of talented forwards off their bench. Nicolas Willumsen was the Gauchos' first-choice center forward for a stretch of 2023 while Aguilar recovered from an ACL injury, and Kavi Krishnan was an All-Big West Freshman Team selection. Isaiah Barber emerged as an additional goal-scoring threat during the spring and scored the opener against San Diego State on Saturday.
 
"Isaiah is a player who keeps getting better and better and had a very good spring," Vom Steeg said. "I think he might have been our leading goal-scorer in spring."
 
Also available up front are veterans David Danquah and Rene Pacheco plus newcomers Salari and Siebenlist. Salari has a similar skillset to Ledoux, while Siebenlist brings a quickness that Vom Steeg has seen few players match.
 
FOLLOW THE GAUCHOS
Thursday's season opener against Missouri State kicks off at 7 p.m. from Harder Stadium. For fans following from afar, the game will be live on ESPN+ with live stats available through ucsbgauchos.com.