Troy Soccer Set for ULL, Sun Belt Championships

TROY, Alabama – The 2014 season has been a historic one for the Troy University soccer team. 18 individual and team records have fallen, but there is one more that the team is eyeing. Since joining the Sun Belt Conference in 2005, the Troy soccer program has never won a conference tournament game That is something the team is looking to change as it faces UL Lafayette in Mobile at 1 p.m. on Wednesday in the opening round of the Sun Belt Conference Championships.

"We're so pumped," junior forward Chelsey Williams said. "We're looking to win [the tournament]. I feel like if we come out and play the way we know to play, we'll have a good shot at playing for a championship."

Williams set both the career points (60) and career goals (25) record at Troy this season, but she says none of it would have been possible without her teammates.

"We've set so many individual records this year besides me, it takes a team to do anything, so I feel like I wouldn't be anywhere without them," Williams said.

Defensively the Trojans (14-5) have posted 11 shutouts in 2014, which is the most in the Sun Belt Conference. The 16 goals scored against Troy this year are tied for the fewest in the league and the Trojans 0.83 goals against average is second to only South Alabama's 0.82 mark.

"We've had a great season so far, but it all comes down to this," head coach Jason Hamilton said. "If you lose a game then you're out, if you when then you get to keep playing. We're excited to get down there and get ready."

Hamilton is the sixth head coach in the program's short 17-year history; he is the first to post an above-.500 record in his first season. Troy's 14 wins this year are a single-season program record.

With the attacking style that has allowed for so many records to fall, Hamilton feels his team has a good chance of making a run in the postseason.

"Just because we've won 14 games and set all these records, we're not going to stop. We're going to push ourselves and change the mentality to every day is a day to get better and don't settle for what we've got, let's strive to get more," he said.

Troy defeated UL Lafayette 2-0 at the Troy Soccer Complex on October 3, in the first ever night game at the facility. On Wednesday, the teams will square off under the sun at 1 p.m. at The Cage on the campus of the University of South Alabama. It will be the first time the teams have ever met in the postseason. In fact, in the Trojans' six previous trips the Sun Belt Conference Championships, only one team that they have matched up with remains a member of the league – Texas State, who eliminated Troy in 2013.

LIVE VIDEO and LIVE STATS can be found by visiting the Sun Belt Conference website at SunBeltSports.org. For continuous updates on the Troy soccer team, visit TroyTrojans.com or follow the team on Twitter at @TroyTrojansWSOC.

Next Event

Players Mentioned

Chelsey Williams