UC Davis secures a Big West Conference Championship, perseveres through ups and downs
By COLINA HARVEY — sports@theaggie.org
After letting the Big West Conference slip through their fingers last season, the UC Davis Aggies came into this season with a mission: securing the Men’s Big West Soccer Championship title.
The championship game against the UC Irvine Anteaters in 2023 ended in a penalty kick shootout where the Anteaters came out on top, ending the Aggies’ hopes of making it to the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) tournament.
“[Last year] definitely gave us some [motivation],” Zack Lillington, a third-year international relations major and midfielder, said. “It proved to us that we could get to that point, that it’s only a small margin between us and everyone else.”
Cason Goodman, a third-year communications major and forward, said the loss made them realize how close they were to greater success.
“We talked about [the loss] a lot when we first got back,” Goodman said. “That was our main thing. There’s one more step to climb here, and we’re more than capable.”
Coming into the season, it was clear that the Aggies had a mission. After losing to Pacific University and tying with Utah Valley University, UC Davis went on a four-game winning streak, beating Santa Clara University, Oregon State University, Saint Mary’s University and the University of San Francisco.
A 1-0 loss against Stanford University ended the Aggies’ winning streak. Despite UC Davis being competitive throughout the game, Stanford scored a winning goal in the 85th minute. This loss for the Aggies was the start of a six-game winless streak, damaging the team’s chances of making it to postseason play.
“[The loss] against Stanford kind of put us in a spiral,” Keegan Walwyn-Bent, a fourth-year animal biology major and forward, said. ”We were really trying to figure out what was going on and what we could do to kind of pull us out of the rut that we were in.”
Goodman said this loss motivated their team to improve for future competitors.
“We were looking for answers,” Goodman said. “Some people thought we were done. The ones that really didn’t want it to be over — we locked in.”
A 2-1 win against California State University, Fullerton on Oct. 12, 2024, on home turf helped the team gain confidence and momentum for the rest of the season. The Aggies finished the season strong with three wins in a row to top it off.
UC Davis secured a spot in the Big West playoffs as the fourth seed. However, all six teams in the tournament were very close in terms of points earned during the season, meaning that every competition was anyone’s game.
The Aggies first took on the California State University, Bakersfield Roadrunners, a team they had beaten just two weeks prior in the first round of the playoffs.
The Aggies dominated the first half, firing eight shots on goal while only allowing one from Bakersfield. A goal in the 69th minute from Zachary Neuls, a first-year undeclared major and midfielder, placed the Aggies in the lead after a scoreless first half. Less than two minutes later, a handball in the penalty box gave the Roadrunners a penalty kick, which they were able to score.
In the last few minutes of the game, Walwyn-Bent came off of the bench and managed to score in the 83rd minute off a cross from Goodman, sending UC Davis to the semifinals. For their semifinal matchup, the Aggies traveled to San Luis Obispo to take on California Polytechnic State University Mustangs, the first-seeded team. Although the Aggies had a loss against Cal Poly during the regular season, they outshot the Mustangs 10-5 in this game.
The Mustangs scored first with a 25th-minute goal off a corner kick. However, Neuls kept the Aggies in the game with a header off a corner kick in the 52nd minute. After scoring only two goals throughout the season, Neuls showed up in the postseason, with two crucial goals in back-to-back games.
Despite outshooting Cal Poly 15-3 in the second half, the Aggies were unable to take the lead, sending the game to overtime. After 30 minutes of overtime, the score remained at 1-1, meaning the two teams would shoot penalties. After the penalty kick shootout loss in 2024’s Big West Championship game, this gave UC Davis a shot at redemption.
Lillington said the opportunity of redemption added to the team’s nerves about the shootout.
“Obviously, everyone had high nerves, because you never really know how the outcome could be,” Lillington said. “One thing can go right for one team, and one thing can go wrong. But I think everyone came out with a calm mentality.”
UC Davis made their first penalty kick while Cal Poly was unable to get it on target. The Aggies’ second attempt was saved and the Mustangs made their kick, tying the shootout at 1-1. After each team had taken their five shots, they were tied at 4-4.
Lillington netted the sixth shot, forcing Cal Poly to make the next one in order to continue. Cal Poly’s shot was on target in the lower right corner but was saved by Mekhai Wilson, a second-year undeclared major and goalkeeper, sending UC Davis to the Big West Championships.
Although the Aggies celebrated the win, a difficult task lay ahead: beating UC Santa Barbara Gauchos. Goodman said he was nervous about the final matchup.
“Cal Poly is a team that we normally feel like we play pretty well against, and Santa Barbara is kind of the opposite,” Goodman said. “It’s not a team that we normally do very well against.”
Walywn-Bent further described the energy of both teams going into the championship game.
“Santa Barbara [was] doing interviews, and they thought they were gonna steamroll us,” Walwyn-Bent said. “They thought they were gonna get into the NCAA [tournament] for free, like easy money.”
UC Davis’ underdog mentality is part of what motivated them throughout the season and postseason, according to Lillington.
“The league kind of doubted us in the beginning of the year,” Lillington said. “[In the Big West Preseason Coaches’] poll that [came] out, […] I think we were ranked fourth, even [though we] finished in second place last year.”
Walwyn-Bent described the misconception surrounding the odds of winning against UC Davis’ soccer team.
“I feel like people just think that once they’re playing Davis in the final they’re gonna catch a dub,” Walwyn-Bent said. “We gotta show them, we gotta let them know.”
Lillington commented on the lack of recognition the team receives.
“I think coaches and staff from the Big West may have overlooked the personnel we had and kind of overlooked our capabilities,” Lillington said.
The UC Davis Aggies went into the final determined to prove their worth.
“When it comes to Santa Barbara, I honestly have never seen a team more charged and ready for a game,” Walwyn-Bent said. “We went into that game so ready to win.”
In the first half, the Aggies got off to a quick lead with goals in the 19th and 43rd minutes. Both goals scored on the Gauchos’ home turf came from Goodman, a Santa Barbara native. These were his 10th and 11th goals this season, more than doubling the amount of goals scored by any other Aggie this season.
In the second half, UC Santa Barbara attacked viciously, getting 14 shots off. However, they were unable to connect with the net at any point.
“Towards the end of the game, we’re winning 2-0 in the second half, and Zack Lillington clears the ball off the line and he runs into the goal and he punches the net, because he’s so fired up,” Goodman said. “That’s when I knew we had them.”
When the final whistle blew, the Aggies led 2-0 — making them Big West Champions for the first time since 2019.
“It was a great, great feeling,” Walwyn-Bent said. “It was euphoric. Everybody was just on cloud nine. Playoff soccer comes with a lot more weight and so going into it, you have to be so extremely hungry. You have to be so extremely motivated and driven to want to win the game, and I felt it from the whole team. The confidence in the locker room was just through the roof.”
Goodman described the team’s mentality going into the final matchup.
“Once we were back in that final game, I don’t think any of us were gonna let [us lose] two years in a row,” Goodman said.
With the win, the Aggies automatically qualified for the NCAA tournament where they faced the University of San Diego in a first-round away game.
In the 35th minute of the match against San Diego, the Davis defense failed to control a long ball into their half from the San Diego backline. This gave San Diego’s Cesar Bahena enough space to get a strong shot from 40 feet out. It sailed above Noah Schwengeler, a third-year undeclared major and goalkeeper, and met the back of the net.
Despite the loss, the Aggies had slightly more shots on goal than San Diego, proving their ability to compete at a high level. After a very successful season for the Aggies, the team will aim to hone in on skills during their winter quarter offseason training before returning in the spring for more matches. Losing in the first round of the NCAA tournament only left the Aggies wanting to come back for more.
“We lost 1-0 in San Diego kind of on a fluke goal,” Goodman said. “And it showed everyone that we’re more than capable of competing against anybody, and so now we should set our sights higher than the Big West. Let’s put UC Davis on the map a little bit here.”
Written by: Colina Harvey — sports@theaggie.org
