2006 Men's Soccer
Season Outlook

After just one week of preseason practice, senior midfielder Danny Aviles already had an assessment of Chapman University’s 2006 men’s soccer team.

“Better than last year!” said an enthusiastic and optimistic Aviles.

This is good news for Chapman fans, who also saw improvements in last year’s Panthers who doubled their win total from the season before. It appears as though head coach Eddie Carrillo’s got his program on the rise once again.

“It’s a good group of guys,” said Carrillo, in his 11th season as head coach at Chapman. “They’re getting ‘it’ quicker this year. They started to get ‘it’ at the end of last year. This group wants to learn and get better.”

The most glaring need for Carrillo’s team is goal scoring. The Panthers were held to one goal eight times in 2005 and shutout another five times. A bright spot on this year’s team is that Chapman returns three of its top-four goal-scorers from a year ago – led by Aviles’ four goals in ’05 and 12 career goals.

“I anticipate we’ll be better offensively than in year’s past,” said Carrillo. “That might be our strength this year at the top.”

“With Chris (Marshall) and Paul (Hirschman) we have a lot of speed, strength and understanding of the game. They’re really playing with a lot of passion.”

In Marshall, the Panthers’ have goal-scoring capabilities. The junior, who missed all of last season studying abroad, was third on the team with 15 points (five goals, five assists) in just 800 minutes as a freshman in 2003. And at 26 years old, the Englishman Hirschman provides Chapman with maturity and inspiration.

To complement them, Aviles, junior Brandon Young and senior Patrick Gonzales combined for nine goals and 19 points in 2005.

“We’re just a little more talented this year than in the past,” said Carrillo.

In goal, the Panthers hope a healthy and improving Josh Kaplan-Lyman can stabilize a defense that allowed nearly three goals per game last season. The junior goalkeeper – who split time with two other keepers – gave Chapman the most quality minutes in goal, making 55 saves and allowing 2.48 goals-against.

“We want him to be ‘the guy’,” said Carrillo of his 6 ft., 3 in. goal-minder. “We want him to be more vocal, more intimidating. He’s been working hard and wants to get better.”

Through it all, it could be the youngsters that determine how much Carrillo’s program is improving. Nine players on the roster have one year or less of varsity experience. At any given time, as many as five or six could be on the field at the same time.

The Panthers may not turn things around in one season, but the upward climb is filled with hope and talent.