New Mexico will be looking for two more wins at home this weekend.
The Lobos will be hosting the Grange and Ashwill Memorial Invitational this weekend, where they will once again face two teams. The club will play CSU Bakersfield on Friday and Grand Canyon on Sunday.
UNM (2-2) achieved two 2-0 shutouts last weekend against CSU Northridge on Friday and Cal Poly on Sunday. Both games were part of the TLC Plumbing and Utility Invitational.
The Lobos swept all the tournament awards that weekend. They were the tournament champs, Chris Wehan was awarded Tournament MVP, Niko Hansen was named Offensive MVP, and Jason Beaulieu Defensive MVP.
UNM head coach Jeremy Fishbein said that although he liked what he saw last weekend, he expects even better results this week.
“We are training really well, we are coming off two really good games. I’m just really excited to see the team play on Friday,” he said. “We can be a little bit better. We’ve identified a couple of areas we can improve on. We worked on those things this week.”
The CSU Bakersfield Roadrunners (1-2) are coming off a two-game losing streak. The Roadrunners lost 1-0 to Drake on Aug. 28, and 2-1 to San Francisco on Sept. 1.
CSU Bakersfield finished the 2015-2016 season with a 7-6-6 overall record. The Lobos finished that same season with an 8-6-4 record.
The last time the Lobos played this team was back in Oct. 2012, when New Mexico took down Bakersfield 2-0.
It’s been a few years since that game, and Fishbein said that this time his team won’t be taking the Roadrunners lightly.
“Bakersfield is a really good team. I think they are probably a little bit more multifaceted than last week’s opponents,” he said. “I think they are good on the ball, they have some excellent attacking players. A little more organized and cohesive than Northridge.”
The New Mexico defense, under Beaulieu, has yet to allow a goal during the run of play this season. Beaulieu has recorded a total of 10 saves and currently holds a .833 save percentage.
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In addition to these stats and the fact that the Lobos recorded two shutouts last weekend, the team will be getting defender Matthew Constant back on the pitch.
Constant made his international debut last week when he started for Canada’s U-20 team in two friendly matches against Costa Rica. He got back to New Mexico early on Sunday but he did not start during the Cal Poly game.
“I had a really good time,” Constant said. “It was my first higher level camp, I guess you could say. I really enjoyed it. It was good to play with some high level players.”
Regarding this weekend, the defender said he feels confident his team will record two more wins to add to their current two-game winning streak.
Isabel Gonzalez is a sports reporter for the Daily Lobo. She mainly covers men’s soccer and basketball. She can be reached at sports@dailylobo.com or on Twitter
@cisabelg.
