Virginia Travels to Berkeley for Clash with California

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. — The Virginia’ mens soccer team (2-2-2, 0-1-1 ACC) is set to travel to Berkeley for a Saturday match (Sept. 21) with California (3-4-0, 0-2-0 ACC) at Edwards Stadium. Kickoff is set for 7 p.m. ET.

How to Follow
Saturday’s match against California will be streamed on ACCNX which is available on WatchESPN.com and the ESPN app for customers who have the ACC Network as part of their TV subscription. Links to both the broadcast and live stats are available at VirginiaSports.com. Fans can also get updates by following the program’s official Twitter account (@UVAMenSoccer).

The Series with California

• In California’s first season of ACC membership, this meeting will mark just the fourth all-time between the two programs, Virginia owns a 2-1 edge in the all-time series. This will Virginia’s first-ever true road game against California.
• The first meeting between the two schools was in 1983, head coach George Gelnovatch’s freshman season. Cal took a 3-0 win in a neutral site meeting at the USF tournament in San Francisco.
• After losses to Cal and San Francisco at the USF Tournament in 1983, Virginia would go on to win 15 of its last 16 on its way to an ACC Championship and its first-ever College Cup appearance.
• Virginia took a 2-1 victory in the only NCAA Tournament meeting between the two schools on its way to a College Cup appearance in 2006.
• The last meeting between the two teams featured a 2-1 Virginia win at Klöckner Stadium (8/31/2012)

Early Autumn Streaks…

• Both of the previous two seasons featured lengthy unbeaten runs that were kickstarted in late September and early October.
• In 2022, Virginia started the season with a 4-3-0 record through its first seven games.
• The Cavalier season would later feature an eight-game unbeaten run (3-0-5) that started on Oct. 7—Virginia played six top-25 teams over that stretch.
• Virginia went on to earn the No. 4 overall seed in the 2022 NCAA Men’s Soccer Championship.
• In 2023, the Cavaliers started 4-3-1 in their first eight games.
• Virginia tore off a 10-game unbeaten run (7-0-3) that started on Sept. 26.
• The Cavaliers would earn the No. 7 overall seed in the NCAA Men’s Soccer Championship.

The Virginia Standard

• Virginia recorded back-to-back five-win seasons (2022-2023) for the first time since 2005-2006
• The Cavaliers are the only team in the conference coming off back-to-back five-win seasons in ACC play
• In 2022, Virginia went unbeaten on the road in ACC play with a 3-0-1 record
• This season, the ACC features 15 teams with the addition of California, SMU and Stanford. 10 of those 15 have been ranked in the preseason top-25
• Virginia is the only team in NCAA DI coming off back-to-back top-eight seeds in the NCAA tournament
• UVA was the No. 4 seed in 2022, and the No. 7 seed in 2023
• The Cavaliers earned back-to-back top-eight seeds for the first time in the program’s history since a six-year run from 1997-2002—a run that started in George Gelnovatch’s second season as head coach