LEWISTON, Maine -- The Bates men's soccer program continues to grow entering the second year of the Ben Brewster era, as the Bobcats look to improve on a promising 2024 campaign. The new season begins Wednesday night when they host Saint Joseph's College of Maine at 6 p.m. on Russell Street Field. 

"We have a strong identity in terms of how we want to play and how we want to act on and off the field," Brewster said. "We want to be a team that out-works our opponents, out-thinks our opponents, and is able to just impose ourselves through our energy and our togetherness."

Bates will have to find a way to replace the scoring of the graduated three-time All-NESCAC selection Tife Agunloye '25, who paced the team with six goals and four assists a year ago. Their leading returning scorer is senior captain Sebastian Iacovitti (Florence, Italy), who tallied a pair of game-winning goals last season and also dished out one assist. Other returning offensive threats include senior forwards Tomas Alberola (Denver, Colo.), Cesar Hoover (San Diego, Calif.), and Wilson Smith (Seattle, Wash.). 

"I think what will be different about this year's team is it's a good mixture of some of the upperclassmen who have played big roles for us through the years and some incoming first-years and sophomores who have looked good so far during the first couple of weeks of practice," says Brewster. 

Senior midfielder Lane Foushée (Brunswick, Maine), junior defender Noah Greiff (Washington, D.C.) and junior defender Andrew Goddard (Enfield, Conn.) join Iacovitti as team captains.  

"Having two junior captains and two senior captains is a good mix," Brewster says. 'They have different personalities, which balance each other well, and all have done a nice job of welcoming the first-years into the team and focusing on the short-term goals in front of us each day." 

The last line of defense for the Bobcats is sophomore goalkeeper George Nassar (Newtonville, Mass.), who started 14 games as a rookie for Bates. He recorded six shutouts on the year and tallied 46 saves for a save percentage of .767. Nassar also made ESPN SportsCenter's top 10 plays of the night for his game-saving penalty kick save against the University of New England.

"George worked hard to continue improving over the offseason," Brewster says. "He's had a strong preseason and we're excited to see what he does this year."

The Bobcats played a lot of close matches last year, dropping five games by just one goal. Brewster sees the challenges the Bobcats faced last season propelling them to a break-through year in the always tough NESCAC.

"A lot of guys on the team have experienced being competitive in these NESCAC games" Brewster says. "So hopefully that experience will help us going into this season. It's also important to stay healthy and just stay connected and together throughout the whole season through the ups and downs."