Cal Poly men’s soccer — It’s about to get physical

The game plan has been the same for a few years. For teams playing against Cal Poly’s possession-style game, there has been one consistent answer. Get physical. I’m not talking Olivia Newton-John physical.

I’m talking hard-nosed tackles, grabbing, pulling, bumping, and generally slowing the game down. See, the Mustangs want to keep the game flowing and the ball moving at all costs, but they better be prepared for what teams are about to throw at them.

Last season, Cal State Fullerton used the second conference game of the season to give blueprint of how to frustrate and beat the Mustangs. Cal Poly ended that game with ten men and ended the season only winning two of their final ten matches.

In this week’s press conference, I asked coach Phil Ruskin about the physical play of other teams against his.

In terms of technical ability, Ruskin isn’t wrong. Cal Poly does move the ball around and there aren’t a lot better passers and technical players like Cal Poly’s Chase Minter, Steve Palacios, and Matt LaGrassa. But, they’re not the biggest guys. Most of Cal Poly’s taller, more physical players like Kaba Alkebulan, Justin Dhillon, and freshman Adam Olsen are attackers.

Matt LaGrassa and the Mustangs midfielders will have to endure a lot during a tough conference schedule. By Owen Main

Just as Cal Poly has the potential to wear-down and frustrate other teams by controlling the ball, other teams also have the ability to play a physical, high-pressure style and maybe even get under Cal Poly’s skin.

UC Irvine comes into Thursday night’s Big West Conference opener with the number two RPI in the country as an unbeaten team. Ruskin feels Cal Poly can compete with them. They are certainly skilled enough, but whether they are strong enough or mentally tough enough remains to be seen.

At some point, one would think that Cal Poly soccer is due to take the next step for the program and legitimately compete for a conference title. Whether that year is this year, with less depth than they expected and an interim head coach remains to be seen. I guess I’ve seen stranger things.

But the main question for me is still about Cal Poly’s depth and ability to deal with physical play. Can a team like Cal Poly with 13-14 rotation players compete at this level? Can they handle physical conference weekends where they might get beat-up?

Thursday night, we’ll begin the journey to find out.