After a stellar start to the 2016 season, Penn men’s soccer will be looking to this weekend’s trip to Nebraska as an opportunity to assess the team’s improvement and depth. This Friday’s contest against #8 Creighton (1-1-0) followed by Sunday’s clash against University of Nebraska Omaha (2-1-0) provide two difficult matches in three days, the only time this season that the Quakers (0-0-2) will have such a short turnaround. Interestingly, the two Nebraska universities will come into the weekend having played each other in their most recent game, Monday night.

It seems the lack of success last year can be attributed to two main points: youth and injuries to the team’s few experienced leaders. In 2016, look for those issues to be almost completely resolved.

If you got to Rhodes Field 10 minutes late for Sunday’s game, then you missed a couple of things. 

You know the old saying, “new year, new me?” Well, Penn men’s soccer is taking that to heart this brand new season. Flip back the calendar a year, and the Quakers limped out of a 4-0 loss to high-power American University team.

They say the best offense is a good defense. Sometimes, you just need a good offense. For Penn women’s soccer, that is the mantra for this new season.

Five years, two surgeries, four coaches, two schools – women’s soccer’s Paige Lombard has seen it all.

It was a trial by fire for Penn women’s soccer this weekend, as they fell victim to a powerful Maryland side led by a familiar face under the sweltering heat at Rhodes Field.

A season of tempests and droughts. That was the volatile nature of Penn Women’s Soccer’s often-electrifying, often-frustrating 2015 campaign.

For those of you who were watching, and/or mesmerized by, the Copa America Centanario, you’ll have noticed a few things.

The women’s soccer program just released their schedule for the 2016 season, but you’d be forgiven if you thought they posted the wrong one. This season’s list of fixtures looks remarkably similar to last season’s, head coach Nicole Van Dyke’s first in charge of the Red and Blue.

The Copa America is now in knockout mode, with the preliminary stages of the competition now finished. But last weekend, the tournament certainly had knockout vibes running throughout Philly as three teams said goodbye to their Copa America dreams.

The stage is set in Philadelphia. The United States Men’s National Team has played in some pretty important and memorable games in recent history, notably including the last game of the group stage at the 2010 World Cup, which featured a famous last-minute winner from Landon Donovan to send the Americans through to the knockout rounds.

As spring semester ended and students prepared to embark on their various summer journeys, one women’s soccer player had reason to be especially excited. Erica Higa, a sophomore midfielder for the Red and Blue, traveled to Rwanda alongside fellow Penn Athletics representative coach Kerry Major Carr of women’s volleyball and around ten other Penn students and faculty as part of the School of Engineering and Applied Science’s Rwanda Gashora Program. The program was created to explore the possibilities of using solar energy and information communication technology in low-resource communities in developing countries.

As William Shakespeare once said, “All’s well that ends well.” Butor Penn men’s soccer, there would be no such redemption.

What went wrong?

On Saturday, mere hours after Penn football triumphed in front of a raucous home crowd, the women’s soccer team faced Princeton on Rhodes Field.

Penn women’s soccer has nothing to lose.