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Even though the Syracuse Orange Men's Soccer team was sent home early at the College Cup, they are still garnering plenty of national attention. We knew the Orange have had one heck of a run this year, despite losing a heck of a lot of talent. The turnaround of this relatively inexperienced group by Coach Ian McIntyre has been Coach of the Year worthy (Bobby Muuss from Wake Forest won the ACC Award). It's been a great journey and it's rewarding to see some of the accolades that the squad has been able to amass.
The Orange finished the season ranked #4 in the final NSCAA Coaches Poll. That put them behind #2 Clemson as far as ACC teams were concerned. The league in general put 7 teams in the Top 25 and five within the Top 10 as follows:
- #2 Clemson Tigers
- #4 Syracuse Orange
- #5 Wake Forest Demon Deacons
- #9 North Carolina Tar Heels
- #10 Boston College Eagles
- #11 Notre Dame Fighting Irish
- #19 Virginia Cavaliers
The finish was the highest that the Orange have ever ended the season at in squad history.
Some individual Oranges came home with awards as well. I mentioned in a previous post, but it's worth reiterating, that some of the squad had made the annual All-Region (South, don't ask me why...) and All-ACC Teams:
- Julian Buescher (1st Team All-ACC, 1st Team All-Region)
- Ben Polk (1st Team All-Region)
- Oyvind Alseth (2nd Team All-ACC)
- Miles Robinson and Kamal Miller (ACC All-Freshman)
Buescher also took home NSCAA All-American honors. He was named to the second team and joins a list of only seven other players (eight awards) in Syracuse history to be named to one of the squads. He was also named to the NCAA All-Tournament team as a first teamer. Overall a quality performance by Buescher this year, leading the team in assists (11, #7 Nationally) and second on the team in points (27) and goals scored (8). He's capped off a deserving season with some deserved accolades.