Pair of Ranked Tests Await

No. 16 Stanford (6-2-3, 3-0-0 Pac-12)
vs. No. 25 San Diego State (6-2-3, 1-1-1 Pac-12)
Thursday, Oct. 13 • 7 p.m.
Laird Q. Cagan Stadium • Stanford, Calif.
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Complete Release (PDF)
Television • Pac-12 Bay Area
Live Statistics •Available via GoStanford.com

LOOKING AHEAD » Undefeated in its first three games to open conference play, No. 16 Stanford (6-2-3, 3-0-0 Pac-12) returns to The Farm to host No. 25 San Diego State (6-2-3, 1-1-1 Pac-12) at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Oct. 13 and No. 17 UCLA (6-3-1, 2-1-0 Pac-12) at 5 p.m. on Sunday, Oct. 16. Rich Cellini and Christopher Sullivan will call Thursday's match on Pac-12 Bay Area and Mark Rogondino and Kelly Gray will take you through Sunday's action on Pac-12 Network, Pac-12 Bay Area and Pac-12 Los Angeles.
 
HISTORY VS. SAN DIEGO STATE » Stanford is 14-11-7 all-time against the Aztecs in a series dating back to 1976, 7-0-2 in the past nine and unbeaten under Jeremy Gunn. The Cardinal hasn't dropped a result to SDSU since a 1-0 loss in San Diego on Sept. 30, 2011.
 
HISTORY VS. UCLA » Stanford is 7-39-9 in 55 all-time meetings with the Bruins dating back to 1973. Last season, the Cardinal won at UCLA, 2-1, on Oct. 16 to secure the program's first win in Westwood. Its six previous victories over UCLA had come in 2010, 2009, 2008, 2007, 2000 and 1987 and each of those matches came on The Farm. The win was also the Cardinal's first in the series since Oct. 15, 2010 (2-1). One week later, the two sides played to a 2-2 draw at Stanford.
 
LOOKING BACK TO LAST WEEK » Stanford went on the road and came home with a pair of 1-0 wins over No. 16 Washington and Oregon State. In Seattle, Bryce Marion was taken down near the right sideline, Sam Werner played his free kick into the box and Amir Bashti bagged his first goal of the season in the 78th minute to lift the Cardinal to its first road win over the Huskies since 2006. On Sunday in Corvallis, Tomas Hilliard-Arce headed home Werner's corner in the 105th minute and Stanford upped its record against the Beavers under Jeremy Gunn to 8-0-1.

17th career clean sheet for Andrew Epstein. Tied for seventh in school history.#GoStanford https://t.co/mqPfwfD60X

— Stanford M Soccer (@StanfordMSoccer) October 7, 2016

PERFECT IN PAC-12 PLAY » The Cardinal has collected nine points on a trio of 1-0 wins to begin its league slate and posted its first three-shutout streak in conference action since 2007. Stanford had never started its conference schedule 3-0 in records dating to 1973. The program wasn't affiliated with a conference in 1990 or 1991 and game-by-game results are unavailable for the 1975 season.
 
SIX POINTS ON THE ROAD » Last season, the Cardinal went to Southern California and beat UCLA and San Diego State for its first six-point conference road trip since 2006. Stanford has now swept a Pac-12 road weekend in back-to-back seasons for the first time since 2001 and 2002.
 
PAC-12 DOMINANCE » Stanford, 16-2-5 (.804) in league action since 2014, is 24-11-8 (.651) in Pac-12 play under Jeremy Gunn the past four-plus years. Stanford went 7-1-2 in conference in 2015, setting a school record for Pac-12 wins en route to its second straight league championship. The Cardinal's seven-point cushion at the top of the Pac-12 table was the third-largest margin in conference history, only surpassed by nine-point gaps for the champions in 2011 and 2003.

?? » 2014 ?? » 2015 #GoStanford

A photo posted by Stanford Men's Soccer (@stanfordmenssoccer) on Nov 12, 2015 at 8:10pm PST

IN THE POLLS » The Cardinal dropped out of the polls on Sept. 27 for the first time in two years, but worked its way back into the rankings following its sweep in the Pacific Northwest. Stanford, the nation's preseason No. 1 team, is currently 16th in the NSCAA top 25 and the top-ranked squad in the Pac-12. The Cardinal is also 21st in the official NCAA RPI released on Monday.
 
VS. RANKED » Stanford is 14-13-5 all-time against ranked opponents under Jeremy Gunn, including 7-1-3 in its last 11 and 6-5-4 at home.
 
2015 REWIND » One of the program's stated goals every year is to "play as many games as it can" and the Cardinal did that in 2015. Stanford's magical season was capped with the program's first national championship in its 100-plus year history when it routed Clemson, 4-0, at Sporting Park in Kansas City on Dec. 13. The Cardinal scored the most goals in an NCAA final since 1996 and won by the largest margin since 1975, tying for the highest margin in College Cup history. Stanford became the fifth school to capture men's and women's Division I soccer titles, following the Cardinal women in 2011. Jeremy Gunn became one of four coaches to win NCAA titles in both Division I and Division II, following his 2005 crown at Fort Lewis.

CONFINES OF CAGAN » Stanford was unbeaten at Cagan Stadium in 2015 (10-0-2), is 23-1-8 in its last 32 matches on The Farm, and has not dropped any of its last 18 at home. The program's goals-against average at home since 2014 is a miniscule 0.56.
 
POW » Redshirt junior goalkeeper Andrew Epstein won his second career Pac-12 Player of the Week honor on Tuesday after pitching a pair of shutouts at UW and OSU to increase his season total to five. The electrical engineering major is working his way into the conversation with some of Stanford's all-time best keepers. His 18 career solo shutouts are tied for third in school history and tied for ninth among active NCAA players. His career goals against average (0.72) would be second only to Adam Zapala's 0.63 from 1997-2000 and his 141 career saves are tied with John Moore (2006-08) for eighth in the Cardinal record books. Since the start of league action, Epstein has lowered his goals against average from 0.93 to 0.68 and is now 32nd nationally in that category.
 
SENIOR CLASS CANDIDATE » On Friday, senior co-captain Brian Nana-Sinkam was one of 30 NCAA men's soccer student-athletes selected as a candidate for the 2016 Senior CLASS Award, which recognizes seniors that have notable achievements in four areas of excellence: community, classroom, character and competition. Stanford has done well recently as far as the Senior CLASS Award is concerned. Last season, Brandon Vincent was named a Senior CLASS Award Second Team All-American in addition to being selected as the Pac-12 Scholar-Athlete of the Year.

STRAIGHT SHUTOUTS » Stanford hasn't allowed a goal in the last 318:08 and posted shutouts in four of its last five matches, including three straight to begin its Pac-12 slate. Early last season, the Cardinal put together a shutout streak of 469:38, the program's longest since 2007 (575:51). Stanford has now had three three-shutout streaks in conference since the start of Pac-12 men's soccer 16 years ago (2001, 2007, 2016), but has never had clean sheets in four consecutive league matches.
 
AMERICAN FOR GOALS » Junior forward Foster Langsdorf has scored six times in his last seven games and his seven total goals in the first 11 matches of 2016 ties his career high set last season in 23 outings. Included in the spurt are the first two braces of his career, which came in wins over Harvard and Omaha. Langsdorf's seven goals this season lead the team, are second in the Pac-12 and 26th in the nation. He is also 42nd in the nation in points per game (1.36) and 27th in goals per game (0.64). Langsdorf's 1.73 shots on goal per game are the 23rd best mark in the country.
 
DOUBLE-DIGIT GOALS » Jordan Morris led Stanford with 13 goals a season ago. The Cardinal has not had two players post 10+ goal campaigns in back-to-back years since 2000 and 2001. Scott Leber (13) and Corey Woolfolk (12) combined for 25 of Stanford's 68 scores in 2000 and Roger Levesque followed that up with 14 goals in 2001.
 
NEW LOOK, SAME STANFORD » A process-oriented bunch, Stanford headed into 2016 with the task of replacing five starters from a year ago, including MAC Hermann Trophy winner Jordan Morris and two-time Pac-12 Defensive Player of the Year Brandon Vincent. Those two, along with Slater Meehan, Ty Thompson and Eric Verso, accounted for 53 percent of the Cardinal's goals (23-of-43), 48 percent of its assists (23-of-48) and 52 percent of its points (69-of-134) last season.
 
GREAT UNDER GUNN » One of four coaches to win NCAA titles in both Division I and Division II, Jeremy Gunn's teams are 56-22-14 (.685) in his four-plus seasons on The Farm, including 37-7-9 (.783) since 2014.  He is one of only three coaches in program history to lead Stanford to three straight seasons of 10 or more wins along with Bobby Clark (1996-2000) and Nelson Lodge (1978-83). In guiding the Cardinal to consecutive conference championships, Gunn was awarded Pac-12 Coach of the Year and NSCAA Far West Region Coach of the Year honors in both 2014 and 2015. He owns a career record of 243-83-45 (.716) in 17+ seasons, a mark which makes him the third winningest active coach at the Division I level (by percentage).

Winningest Active Coaches (Entering 2016)

SKUNDRICH SCORES » Junior co-captain Drew Skundrich has tallied the first three goals of his career this season and is second on the team in scoring. Skundrich has been able to up his offense with a move to the central midfield, the position at which he was recruited coming out of Lancaster, Pa. He was a stalwart right back during Stanford's championship run in 2015, starting all 23 games.
 
SCORE TWICE AND WIN » Stanford has scored two or more goals in 46 of Jeremy Gunn's 92 matches as Stanford's head coach and is 40-0-6 in those games. The Cardinal hasn't lost when scoring at least two goals since Nov. 11, 2010, when it fell 3-2 at Cal.

MLS » Four of Jeremy Gunn's players at Stanford are currently on MLS rosters. Jordan Morris in 2016 and Aaron Kovar in 2014 signed with the Seattle Sounders as Homegrown Players, Brandon Vincent was the fourth overall pick of the 2016 MLS SuperDraft by the Chicago Fire and Adam Jahn was recently traded to Columbus Crew SC by the San Jose Earthquakes, which drafted him with the 15th overall pick in the 2013 MLS Supplemental Draft. Off of last year's national championship team, Vincent was a 2016 MLS All-Star and Morris was just came in at No. 3 on MLSsoccer.com's list of its 24 Under 24 series, which ranks the best MLS players under the age of 24. The two-time Stanford All-American and 2015 MAC Hermann Trophy winner, Morris has exploded for 12 goals so far in his first pro season, second in MLS history for a rookie. He also has six game-winning goals, an MLS rookie record and the most in the league this season.