Pitt Hosts Duke in Final Regular Season Home Game

PITTSBURGH -- The University of Pittsburgh men's soccer team [7-5-2, 3-2-1 ACC] is set to host the Duke Blue Devils [6-6-2, 5-3-0 ACC] in its final regular season home game Friday, Oct. 25 at 7 p.m. at Ambrose Urbanic Field in the Petersen Sports Complex.

HOW TO FOLLOW

Friday's game will be broadcast live on ACCNX and may be viewed by clicking here.
Live stats for Friday can be found here.
Fans can also follow the match with live updates on Twitter.

LAST TIME OUT

For the first time in program history, the Panthers upset the No. 1 team in the country, beating Virginia, 2-0, at Klöchner Stadium.
Pitt handed the Cavaliers their first loss of the season. Prior to that game, Virginia had only given up two goals all season.
The win was the Panther's first over a top ranked opponent. The highest ranked opponent Pitt previously defeated was No. 2 St. John's in 2000.
Pitt's first goal came in the 21^st minute of the game; the next goal came 40 minutes later in the 60^th minute.
Senior Braden Kline scored the first goal off a long pass from freshman Valentine Noel. Freshman Veljko Petkovic scored the second goal after Kline sent a pass into the box and junior Edward Kizza dished it to Petkovic.
Sophomore Johan Penaranda was strong in goal, making four saves in 90 minutes in just his third game of the year.
The win helped Pitt earn votes in the United Soccer Coaches Poll and a No. 23 ranking in the Soccer American Poll.

THE SERIES - DUKE

Duke leads the all-time series 6-0-2.
The teams' last meeting came in the ACC Tournament in 2018. The Blue Devils came away with a 4-3 victory in penalty kicks after a 0-0 tie in two overtimes.
The Panthers have never defeated Duke, despite head coach Jay Vidovich having an 8-16-7 career record versus the Blue Devils.

SCOUTING THE BLUE DEVILS

Duke heads to Pittsburgh having lost three of its past four games.
In their last time out, the Blue Devils lost 1-0 to High Point at home.
Head Coach John Kerr, who owns a 198-142-40 career record, leads Duke. Kerr has spent 12 of his 21 years as a head coach at Duke.
Senior Daniele Proch leads the Blue Devils with 23 points on 10 goals and three assists. Only three other players have more than one goal. Senior Max Moser is second in point for Duke, coming off one goal and four assists.
The Blue Devils concluded their 2018 season 11-7-2 overall and 5-3-0 in conference play, losing to UNC, 2-1 in the ACC Semifinals. Duke fell to Maryland 2-0 in the third round of the NCAA Tournament to end its season.

KIZZA COMMANDING ATTENTION

Junior Edward Kizza closed out his 2018 campaign tied for third in program history for single-season goals (15) while ranking fifth in points (30).
Kizza ranked fifth in goals nationally, ninth in shot accuracy (.622) and 11th in points per game (1.67), while ranking first in each category among ACC players.
The historic season led Kizza to First Team All-ACC honors, Second Team All-Region recognition and a spot on the All-ACC Academic Team.
Through 14 games, Kizza leads the team in points (20), goals (8) and shots (40).
The Kampala, Uganda, native picked up right where he left off to start the 2019 season, recording a brace against No. 2 Indiana in the squad's season-opener Friday, Aug. 30. In the match, Kizza recorded the fastest consecutive goals in program history after scoring at the 35:24 and 35:31 mark, with the seven-second difference besting the old record of 34 seconds set by Michael Tuohy and John Cordier in 2013. Kizza scored the game winning goal on Sept. 30 versus Denver.

PITT IN THE RPI

The NCAA released the second RPI of the 2019 season Monday, Oct. 22.
The Panthers rank 35th out of 206 in DI men's soccer. Moving up over 30 spots from last week's 68th ranking.
Pitt's highest RPI in program history came in October of 2017 at No. 14.
Four ACC schools are among the top 10 including No. 3 Virginia, No. 4 Wake Forest and No. 7 Virginia Tech and No. 8 Clemson.

THE ACC CHAMPIONSHIP

The Championship will be a 12-team single elimination tournament.
Seeding for the Championship will be determined by the regular season conference game results using a point system where a win is three points and a tie is one point.
The first round of the 2019 ACC Men's Soccer Tournament is slated for Tuesday, Nov. 5 or Wednesday, Nov. 6 at campus sites.
The Championship Final will be held Sunday, Nov. 17 in Cary, N.C.

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