Oct. 30, 2003

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The Schedule
Match No. 18
Friday, October 31, 2003 at 7:00 p.m. (Approximate after men's match.)
UC Santa Barbara Gauchos vs. University of Idaho Vandals
at UCSB's Harder Stadium

Match No. 19
Sunday, November 2, 2003 at 12:30 p.m.
UC Santa Barbara Gauchos vs. Utah State Aggies
at UCSB's Harder Stadium

The Week In Review
UC Santa Barbara posted back-to-back road victories over the weekend. The victories on Thursday at Pacific and Sunday at Cal State Northridge came by identical 2-0 scores. Junior forward Jennifer Borcich scored the game-winning goal in each match. In the win at Pacific, she scored in the first half and in the win at Northridge she broke a scoreless tie in the 84th minute. The win over Pacific snapped UCSB's season-long six-match winless streak. The Gauchos were 0-3-3 during the streak.

The Record/The Streak/The Big West Tournament
UCSB enters the week with an overall record of 8-5-4 and a Big West record of 3-2-2. The Gauchos went from having a six-match winless streak to having a three-match unbeaten string. The pair of wins last weekend were vital and have vaulted Santa Barbara back into the race for the Big West Tournament. The Gauchos enter the final weekend of the regular season in sixth-place with 11 points, one-point behind Long Beach State and UC Irvine. UC Riverside is in third-place with 13 points and Utah State, which is UCSB's opponent on Sunday, is second with 14 points. The good news for the Gauchos is that Utah State must play at league-leading Cal Poly on Friday night and that UC Riverside and Long Beach State will close the season against each other on Sunday. If UCSB sweeps its matches this weekend, they would be in the tournament. It is also possible, if Cal Poly can beat Utah State, for the Gauchos to lose on Friday and still get into the tourney with a Sunday win over Utah State. The possibilities of where the teams finish are too numerous to outline here, but UCSB could finish anywhere between first and eighth.

Big West Standings

                        Big West		                 Overall
Cal Poly		              5-0-2 (17 points)	         14-1-2
Utah State		            4-1-2 (14 points)	         10-5-2
UC Riverside	           4-2-1 (13 points)	         10-5-3
Long Beach State	       4-3-0 (12 points)	          8-8-0
UC Irvine		             3-1-3 (12 points)	          9-3-5
UCSB		                  3-2-2 (11 points)	          8-5-4
Pacific		               3-4-1 (10 points)	          4-11-2
Cal State Fullerton	    2-4-1 (7 points)	           8-7-2
Idaho		                 1-6-0 (3 points)	           3-10-4
Cal State Northridge	   1-7-0 (3 points)	           3-10-3

On The Stumpf
Paul Stumpf is in his fifth season at UC Santa Barbara. He enters this week's action with a record of 49-35-9. Last season, he guided UCSB to an 13-5-2 record, and within one game of the Big West Championship. 2002 marked the third straight season in which the Gauchos finished at or over the .500 mark, a feat last accomplished more than a decade ago. In 1999, Stumpf's first season as the head coach at UCSB, he took a team that was selected to finish last in the conference, but instead posted an 8-9-1 overall record and a 5-4 mark in the Big West. Following the season, Stumpf was chosen as the Big West's Coach of the Year. Before arriving in Santa Barbara as an assistant coach in 1998, Stumpf spent two seasons as an assistant at Humboldt State. In addition, the San Diego native spent several years coaching club teams in the Santa Rosa area.

Borcich Named Big West Co-Player Of The Week
Junior forward Jennifer Borcich took matters into her own hands, or feet, last weekend, leading UCSB to a pair of road wins. On Thursday, Borcich scored the Gauchos' first goal in a 2-0 win at Pacific. In Sunday's win at Cal State Northridge, she scored a goal to break a scoreless tie in the 84th-minute and then she assisted on an insurance goal in the 88th-minute. For her performance over the weekend, Borcich was selected Big West co-Player of the Week, the first Gaucho to earn the honor this season.

More Borcich Banter
Borcich enters the regular season's final weekend with nine goals and seven assists for 25 points. She is tied for the team-lead in goals and she is the outright leader in both assists and points. In fact, Borcich is tied for the Big West Conference lead in goals and assists, and she leads in points. In addition, the Sacramento, Calif., native also leads the league with 66 shots on the year, an average of 3.88 per match. In her career, she now has 37 goals and 21 assists for 95 points, totals that rank her fifth, eighth and fourth on UCSB's all-time lists. Finally, Borcich also enters Friday's game against Idaho having scored a goal in three straight contests, her longest streak of the 2003 season.

Con Job
While Borcich was getting things done on the offensive end of the field last weekend, sophomore goalkeeper Jamie Considine was doing her job on the defensive side. She needed just a total of five saves in posting the back-to-back shutouts. On the year, Considine has now taken part in all seven of the team's shutouts. She has played all but 18:25 of UCSB's 1620:11 total time this year and her goals against average has shrunk to 0.90. In her two seasons, Considine has now been part of 16 shutouts, fourth on the school's career list, and in her 3,225 minutes, she has a solid goals against average of 1.00.

Ruiz Is A Key
Writing about a forward, a midfielder or a goalkeeper is generally pretty easy because they have statistics to draw from. Writing about defenders is not quite as easy. UCSB's defenders have been good this year. Injuries to some key defenders have been costly. Junior Cinthia Ruiz missed three matches because of injuries and in those three, the Gauchos went 0-2-1 and allowed six of the 16 total goals they have given-up this year. With Ruiz in the starting lineup, the Gauchos have gone 8-3-3 and in her last ten starts, they have lost just one time.