What: NCAA Tournament Second Round
Matchup: #18 FGCU (14-3-3) @ #10 North Carolina (11-3-3)
When: Sunday, Nov. 20 | 7 PM | Chapel Hill, N.C.
Links: Tickets | Video | Live Stats | Twitter
NCAA Tournament: Printable Bracket | Interactive Bracket
Coaches: Bob Butehorn (10th Season @ FGCU, 95-62-24; 14th Overall, 129-93-28) | Carlos Somoano (6th Season @ UNC, 87-22-19; Same Overall)
 
CHAPEL HILL, N.C. – The historic 2016 season continues for the #18 FGCU men's soccer team as the nation's leading offense takes on the #10 North Carolina Tar Heels in the Second Round of the NCAA Tournament. The Eagles and Tar Heels, who boast the nation's best defensive squad, are set to meet at Fetzer Field Sunday at 7 p.m.
 
The match will be streamed live on ACC Network Extra, which is available on WatchESPN.
 
HOW WE GOT HERE
Following the program's fourth ASUN Tournament title in six seasons of postseason eligibility, the Eagles traveled to Tampa to face in-state rivals USF Thursday night. FGCU and USF were deadlocked at 2-2 after 90 minutes, and despite dominating both overtime periods, the match would remain level after 110 minutes to send the match into penalties.
 
Rielee Mohsin (Stuart, Fla./Martin County/Nichols College), Miguel Jaime (Denver, Colo./Cherry Creek), and Albert Ruiz (Barcelona, Spain/ CE L'Hospitalet/UE Cornella) all converted from the spot as Jared Brown (Aurora, Ontario/St. Maximilian Kolbe CHS) made one save and two Bulls missed their target to send FGCU through to the Second Round for the first time in program history.
 
North Carolina, the No. 9 seed in the tournament, is making its 24th NCAA Tournament appearance. The Tar Heels were knocked out of the ACC Championship on the quarterfinals, a 1-0 defeat to Boston College.
 
SETTING THE STAGE
Thursday's result officially goes down as a draw, moving FGCU's all-time NCAA record to 0-2-2. FGCU's other draw was a 0-0 scoreline against USF in 2012 with the Bulls advancing 5-3 in penalties.
 
North Carolina will play an NCAA Tournament contest at home for the 16th-straight season and are 34-19-7 all-time in the tournament.
 
GLANCING AT THE BRACKET
The winner of the FGCU-UNC match will go on to face the winner of Dartmouth (8-4-6) and the other seeded team in this portion of the bracket, No. 8 Syracuse (11-3-4), on either Nov. 26 or 27.
 
The quarterfinals will be contested Dec. 2 and 3. The Men's College Cup will be held Dec. 9 and 11 at BBVA Compass Stadium in Houston, Texas.
 
SCOUTING UNC
The Tar Heels defense may be just as impressive as FGCU's offense in 2016. UNC has conceded just eight goals all season (0.47 per game) to lead the nation. VCU has been the only side all season to score more than one goal on the season, a 3-2 win for the Heels back on Sept. 5.
 
Goalkeeper James Pyle has 10 shutouts this season, helping UNC post a nation-leading 0.65 shutout percentage.
 
Offensively, the Heels are 11th in the country in scoring offense (1.9 goals per game). Nils Bruening leads the team with seven goals. Zach Wright's 16 points leads the team as well. There are four Heels with 12 points or more in 2016.
 
This will be the first time FGCU meets North Carolina.
 
FGCU entered the tournament with an RPI of 37, while North Carolina checked in at No. 10.
 
FGCU NCAA HISTORY
All four of FGCU's previous NCAA Tournament games have been closely contested as the Eagles will be looking to break through with their first official win on Sunday. Thursday featured a 2-2 meeting against USF with FGCU emerging victorious in penalties. In 2011, FGCU lost in double overtime at UCF, 1-0. Its other 1-0 NCAA Tournament loss came in 2014 when FGCU traveled to Coastal Carolina and kept what was then the nation's highest-scoring offense off the board until a highlight-reel goal in the 85th minute – a diving header which landed as SportsCenter's No. 4 Play that evening.
 
NATION-LEADING ATTACK
FGCU leads the country in nearly every offensive category by a wide margin: goals (60, next closest: 49), points (173, next closest: 152), goals per game (3.00, next closest: 2.45) and points per game (8.65, next closest: 7.60). The goal and point totals are single-season program records, far surpassing the previous marks of 35 and 108, respectively.
 
Individually, ASUN Player of the Year Ruiz – who scored three times in two ASUN Championship matches – leads the nation with 21 goals (three more than anyone else), while ASUN First Team member Arion Sobers-Assue (Miami, Fla./DeMatha Catholic HS) is tied for 16th with 11 goals. Ruiz also paces all of D-I with 47 points – eight more than any other player in the nation – and Sobers-Assue is tied for 7th with 32 points.
 
The Eagles have scored at least two goals in every match this year with the exception of three – and two of those came in the first three outings of the year. FGCU has not been shut out all year, something that has never happened in the 10-year history of the program. Over the final 17 games of the year, FGCU has gone an emphatic 14-1-2, with the loss coming to RPI No. 40 North Florida and the ties coming against RPI No. 47 Lipscomb and RPI No. 28 USF in the First Round of the NCAA Tournament.
 
HISTORICAL SEASON
FGCU has established the program's single-season record for wins, breaking the mark of 13 by the 2010 team. That squad finished 13-3-2 in the final year in which FGCU was ineligible for the postseason as it went through its D-I transition. FGCU's 14 wins are tied for the 5th-most in the nation this season, trailing only Wake Forest (15), Utah Valley (15), Denver (17) and Maryland (18).
 
ASUN MEN'S SOCCER AWARDS
Ruiz highlighted nine ASUN individual postseason awards for the Eagles this season by being named the ASUN Player of the Year.
 
Ruiz is the second-consecutive FGCU product to garner ASUN Player of the Year honors as current Columbus Crew SC midfielder Rodrigo Saravia claimed the award last year, the first such recognition in the program's young, but extremely successful, history.
 
Ruiz was joined on the ASUN First Team by fellow striker Sobers-Assue, central midfielder Kamar Marriott (Tampa, Fla./Heritage HS) and defensive stalwart Nicolas Samayoa (Guatemala City, Guatemala/Colegio Valle Verde) as the Green and Blue placed a league-high four members on the First Team for the third-straight year.
 
Midfielder Dylan Sacramento (Winnipeg, Manitoba/York University/Bill Crothers S.S.) and central defender Eli Roubos (Toronto, Ontario/Oregon State/Northview Heights Secondary) both earned a spot on the ASUN Second Team. The Eagles had three players receive ASUN All-Freshman Team honors in unanimous selection Miguel Perez (Weston, Fla./Cypress Bay HS), forward Shak Adams (Antioch, Tenn./Cane Ridge HS) and goalkeeper Jared Brown (Aurora, Ontario/St. Maximilian Kolbe CHS), continuing an unbelievable run of program-founding head coach Bob Butehorn and his staff producing at least two all-freshman performers in all 10 years of the program's existence.
 
The nine all-conference performers – eight of whom are underclassmen – are tied with last year for the most in FGCU program history, and were matched this season by only North Florida. In a further testament to Butehorn and his staff recruiting and developing young talent, no other team in the ASUN has even produced two or more All-Freshman Team members each of the last two seasons, but the Eagles have done it for the last decade.
 
REGULAR-SEASON RUN
Despite its unprecedented run of six-straight ASUN regular-season championships coming to an end this year, the Eagles accomplished something from 2010-15 that no other program in the history of the ASUN had done. The Eagles joined the league and became a D-I member in 2007, but FGCU was the first program in the history of the ASUN to claim at least a share of five-straight regular-season titles, let alone six in a row.
 
ASUN DOMINANCE
FGCU owns a dominant 40-5-5 record in all ASUN regular-season games since the start of the 2010 season. Out of a possible 150 points that could have been earned in that time, the Green and Blue have claimed an impressive 125 of them (83.3 percent).
 
INSIDE THE STREAK
FGCU's 10-game winning streak from Sept. 4-Oct. 14 was two better than the previous program record of eight set in 2010 and 2012. During the run – which was the longest active streak in the nation – the Eagles out-scored their opponents, 40-15, and scored at least three goals in each of the last eight victories.
 
OFFENSIVE STALWART
Both Ruiz's goal (21) and point totals (47) are by far single-season program records as the previous highs were seven and 17, respectively. Additionally, Ruiz has continued to build upon his career program record for points with 65 (previous: 43, Cristian Raudales) and goals with 29 (previous: 19, Raudales). More single-season and all-time records are included at the end of this release.
 
Ruiz has ten more goals than anyone else in the ASUN this year. Additionally, he has 16 more points than any other player in the league.
 
Ruiz has scored the most goals in a single season in the conference dating back to 2006. Additionally, Sobers-Assue's 11 goals rank tied for 7th in league history in the last decade. The ASUN single-season record for goals is 27 set by Clint Adams of Stetson in 1993.
 
ASUN Single-Season Goals Record (Since 2006)
1. Albert Ruiz, FGCU (2016) – 21
2. Gordon Wild, USC Upstate (2015) – 16
    Anton Axelsson, Jacksonville (2007) – 16
4. Tommy Krizanovic, Jacksonville (2006) – 14
5. Richard Jata, Campbell (2008) – 12
    Garrett Pettis, Lipscomb (2008) – 12
7. Arion Sobers-Assue, FGCU (2016) – 11
    Four Others Tied
 
NATIONAL RANKING
FGCU is ranked #18 this week in the highly-respected College Soccer News National Poll, in addition to appearing at #20 in the NSCAA poll, which is the only poll the NCAA officially recognizes.
 
The Eagles were ranked as high as #11 in the NSCAA poll late in the regular season, which was the highest for any FGCU program in the D-I era (2007-08). FGCU has been ranked in the NSCAA top 25 each of the past eight weeks. Initially, FGCU appeared at #15 – four spots higher than the team's previous regular-season high mark of #19, set three times and most recently last September. The Green and Blue moved up to #12 and remained there for two weeks before the #11 ranking four weeks ago.
 
MORE AWARDS
For the first time in conference history, a team secured five straight ASUN Player of the Week honors in men's soccer as FGCU collected its fifth in a row in October when Sobers-Assue garnered the award for the second time.
 
It continued an award-winning season for FGCU, which has already claimed all of the below individual honors this year:
 
Sept. 19: Albert Ruiz, ASUN Player of the Week
Sept. 19: Sawyer Jackman, ASUN Defensive Player of the Week
Sept. 19: Albert Ruiz, College Soccer News National Player of the Week
Sept. 20: Albert Ruiz, TopDrawerSoccer National Team of the Week
Sept. 26: Arion Sobers-Assue, ASUN Player of the Week
Sept. 27: Arion Sobers-Assue, NSCAA National Player of the Week
Sept. 27: Arion Sobers-Assue, TopDrawerSoccer National Team of the Week
Oct. 3: Albert Ruiz, ASUN Player of the Week
Oct. 4: Albert Ruiz, TopDrawerSoccer National Player of the Week
Oct. 10: Shak Adams, ASUN Player of the Week
Oct. 17: Arion Sobers-Assue, ASUN Player of the Week
 
RECORD NIGHTS
On Sept. 27 at Rutgers, Ruiz scored all three of his goals by the 9:02 mark, and is believed to have recorded the fastest hat trick – in terms of time from the start of the game – in D-I history. The junior scored at the 5:42, 8:24 and 9:02 marks. The previous record is believed to have been held by Indiana's Steve Burks, who tallied three goals 11:41 into a contest with Indiana State on Oct. 6, 1973.
 
With 3:20 between the first and third goals, Ruiz is the 3rd-fastest player to score three-straight goals at any point of a game in D-I history. He is bettered only by Illinois-Chicago's John Stone, who did it in 2:15 (28:58-31:13) in 1985, and Saint Joseph's Kyle Patterson in 2:31 (28:02-30:33) in 2007.
 
In addition to Ruiz's three goals, Sobers-Assue also scored at the 9:21 mark, giving the Eagles three goals as a team in a span of just 57 seconds. That is the 2nd-fastest in NCAA D-I history at any point of a game, behind only Syracuse's 43-second span versus Fordham on Oct. 17, 1989.
 
The Eagles found a way back into that incredible, historical list again on Oct. 11 when FGCU scored three goals in a 3:47 span to erase a 1-0 deficit against USF. Those goals came at the 66:03, 66:59 and 69:50 marks, ranking as the 15th-fastest in D-I history for a three-goal span by the same team.
 
HAT TRICK PARTY
Ruiz is the first player in program history with two hat tricks, and it took just 10 days between them. The first men's soccer season at FGCU was 2007, and it took until Oct. 31, 2010, for a Green and Blue member to record a hat trick when Scott Harrison finally did it versus North Florida. Nearly six years went by before another occurred, and that happened with Ruiz against UNCW on Sept. 17. It then took just three more days for the third hat trick in program history to occur as Sobers-Assue netted three opposite FAU on Sept. 20.
 
START ANOTHER STREAK
After jumping out to a 2-0 lead not even 15 minutes into its match Oct. 18, FGCU allowed North Florida to score three unanswered goals and leave the FGCU Soccer Complex with a 3-2 triumph. The loss broke a 29-game home regular-season conference unbeaten streak (26-0-3) for FGCU against ASUN members dating back to 2008.
 
ANIMO, THOMAS
FGCU lost freshman central defender Thomas Delplace (Toulouse, France/Scientific Bac) for the year with a broken leg suffered just more than three minutes into the Eagles' match at UCF on Sept. 14. Delplace cut across the box and legally challenged what would have been a quality Knights' scoring chance, but his shin collided with the attacking UCF player's leg.
 
In honor of their teammate, FGCU players have started to wear T-shirts in pre-game warmups with text that reads "Animo Thomas" – which translates to "Cheer Up, Thomas" in Spanish.
 
FGCU Career Records

	GOALS				POINTS
1	Albert Ruiz (14-16)	29		1	Albert Ruiz (14-16)	65
2	Cristian Raudales (08-11)	19		2	Cristian Raudales (08-11)	43
3	Felipe DeSousa (12-14)	18		3	Felipe DeSousa (12-14)	38
4	Henry Penagos (10-14)	13		4	Arion Sobers-Assue	35
5	Arion Sobers-Assue (14-16)	12		5	Josey Portillo (08-11)	31
	Scott Harrison (08-11)	12

FGCU Single-Season Records

	GOALS				POINTS
1	Albert Ruiz (2016)	21		1	Albert Ruiz (2016)	47
2	Arion Sobers-Assue (2016)	11		2	Arion Sobers-Assue (2016)	32
3	Albert Ruiz (2015)	7		3	Deion Jones (2010)	17
	Felipe DeSousa (2012)	7			Scott Harrison (2008)	17
	Cristian Raudales (2011)	7		5	Albert Ruiz (2015)	16
	Deion Jones (2010)	7

 
FOLLOW ALONG
For up-to-the minute information and a behind-the-scenes look at the FGCU men's soccer program, follow on Twitter @FGCU_MSoccer, Instagram @FGCU_MSoccer, Facebook /FGCUMSoccer and YouTube /FGCUAthletics.
 
COACH BUTEHORN
FGCU is led by Bob Butehorn, who has coached six professional players and 63 ASUN All-Conference selections since FGCU started its program in 2007. In just six years of postseason eligibility, Butehorn has guided FGCU to four ASUN Tournament championships and NCAA Tournament appearances – in 2011, 2012, 2014 and 2016 – and won an unprecedented six-straight ASUN regular-season championships from 2010-15. His teams have been ranked nationally on several occasions by multiple media outlets, including a program-record #11 NSCAA ranking in 2016. Now in his 14th season as a head coach, Butehorn has a 129-93-28 (.572) overall record, 95-62-24 (.592) mark in his 10th season at FGCU and 52-18-7 (.721) record in ASUN contests.
 
SUPPORT THE CAUSE
FGCU Athletics sponsors events throughout the year to benefit the FGCU Campus Food Pantry (www.fgcu.edu/foodpantry) and the Harry Chapin Food Bank (www.harrychapinfoodbank.org), FGCU Athletics' charities of choice. For more information, including how to make a contribution, please visit www.fgcu.edu/foodpantry and utilize the hashtag #FeedFGCU to help raise awareness.