ITHACA, N.Y. – Coming off a 1-0 win over Dartmouth last weekend, Cornell men's soccer will take to Berman field for the final game of 2013 in a 7 p.m. matchup against Columbia on Saturday night.

GAME INFORMATION
GAME #17: Cornell vs. Columbia  
DATE & TIME:  Saturday, Nov. 16 at 7 p.m.
SITE: Berman Field (Ithaca, N.Y.)
SERIES RECORD:  Columbia leads 31-20-9
LAST MEETING: Nov. 10, 2012; Cornell won 1-0
2013 RECORDS: Cornell (7-5-4, 1-4-1 Ivy League), Columbia (8-5-3, 1-2-3 Ivy League)
LIVE STATS | AUDIO
 
ABOUT THE BIG RED
With a win against Dartmouth last weekend, Cornell improved to 7-5-4 on the season and 1-4-1 against Ivy League opponents and ensured that the team would finish above .500 for the third consecutive season. Prior to Coach Zawislan taking over in 2009, the team had gone seven years since its last .500 or better campaign in 2001. Senior defender Patrick Slogic still leads the team with eight points on three goals and two assists, but with two points last weekend junior Conor Goepel jumped into second with seven points (3g, 1a). Junior goalkeeper Zach Zagorski is enters the final weekend of the season as the Ivy League leader in goals-against average (0.65) and is second in save percentage (.816).

HEAD COACH JARO ZAWISLAN
After taking over a program that was 1-15 the season before his appointment as head coach, Jaro Zawislan has steadily improved men's soccer at Cornell; transforming an eighth-place team into Ivy League Champions and coaching the Big Red to the program's best season in nearly two decades. Zawislan, a native of Poland, now holds a 40-23-20 record after the team's 1-0 win at Dartmouth last weekend. He played soccer for four years at Clemson and then spent time professionally in the United States and Poland.
 
ABOUT COLUMBIA
Despite being held scoreless last weekend in a 2-0 loss to Harvard, the Lions are currently second in the league with 25 goals on the season and are averaging 1.6 goals per game – double the Big Red average this season.  Columbia also picked up its lone Ivy League win against Dartmouth, posting a 2-0 shutout on Oct. 26 and has earned ties against Brown (2-2), Penn (0-0) and Yale (3-3). David Najem leads the Lions with five goals and six assists for 16 points this season. Will Stamatis and Andrew Tinari have also netted five goals for Columbia in 2013.
 
THE SERIES WITH COLUMBIA
Columbia leads the series –which began in 1908 – 31-20-9, but Cornell has not lost a game to the Lions under current head coach Jaro Zawislan. In his first season, the Big Red pulled out a 1-0 win in overtime on Berman field, and followed that up with ties each of the next two seasons. In 2012, Cornell traveled to take on the Lions with its Ivy League championship fate in its own hands. An early goal by Daniel Haber in the 15^th minute helped the Big Red to a 1-0 win and its first outright Ivy League title since 1977.
 
GAME-WINNING TOUCH
Conor Goepel scored the team's only goal against Dartmouth last week with a blast from the top of the box in the 46^th minute. All three of his goals this season have been game-winners and he now has six game-winning tallies on his career and is tied for sixth all-time and fifth among program leaders for most GWG in a single season.
 
CLASS OF 2014
The following six seniors will play their final game both on Berman Field and as a member of the Big Red men's soccer team on Saturday night:

• Kurtis Teskoski made his first collegiate start in goal for the Big Red against Lafayette on Sept. 24 and earned his first career victory the following Friday in a 1-0 shutout of Buffalo on the road. In total, he made five starts in goal for the Big Red this season, posting a 1-3-1 record with two shutouts and 13 saves. He made an additional three appearances at forward during his career.
• Jake Kirsch has been an integral part of Cornell's stellar defensive corps the past two seasons. He has played in 34 games to date and has three goals and one assist to his credit. He scored his first career goal, a game-winner, in Cornell's 2-1 win at Cal State Fullerton to open the 2012 season. Both his goals this season have come when the Big Red needed them most; either helping to spark a come-from-behind win, or force overtime.
• Patrick Slogic has anchored the Big Red's back line for the past three seasons, playing 5,033 consecutive minutes for Cornell dating back to October 2010.  One of three Big Red captains this season, he enters the weekend with eight goals and six assists for 22 points and has four career game-winning goals. In addition, he has earned numerous honors while on East Hill including First Team All-Ivy and First Team All-Region honors in each of the last two seasons in addition to All-Ivy honorable mention as a freshman. He was named to the MAC Hermann Trophy watch list at the beginning of the 2012 season and again this past August and was also selected as a candidate for the Senior CLASS Award in the preseason.
• Stephen Reisert is a midfielder who has been a great asset to the Big Red in transition and served as the team's primary set-up man on corners and earned Second Team All-Ivy honors a season ago. Despite missing some time due to injury this season, he has four assists this season, including two in the last two games, and 21 career points on six goals and nine assists.
• Jake Rinow is also one of the three team captains this season  and the final piece of Cornell's senior leadership on defense. An aggressive outside back with a dangerous throw, he has stepped in on offense this season with two goals and two assists – both career highs. His first goal of the season forced overtime against Cal State Fullerton He enters his 65^th career game this evening with 10 points during his tenure with the Big Red on three goals and four assists. 
• Benjamin Williams is a defensive-minded midfielder who has often served as Cornell's last line of defense on set pieces to protect the Big Red from allowing goals in transition. The other of the three squad captains this season, he has six assists to his credit to date, including a career-high three during his junior campaign.

BACK TO BACK TO BACK
The Big Red opened the 2013 season with three straight overtime games; the last time a Cornell men's soccer team played in three straight games needing more than 90 minutes was in September 2006 against Buffalo, Boston University and Columbia.  

SENIOR LEADERSHIP
The Big Red has three captains, as Jake Rinow, Patrick Slogic and Benjamin Williams assumed the role for their senior seasons. Slogic is coming off a First Team All-Ivy season in 2012 and was named to the MAC Hermann watch list and as a contender for the Senior CLASS Award in the weeks prior to the 2013 season.
 
FRESH FACES
Cornell added 13 newcomers to the roster for the 2013 campaign. Goalkeeper Evan King, midfielder Madison Heck and midfield/forward hybrid Sebastian Scales all come to East Hill from Eastside FC in Washington State.
 
AIN'T THAT AMERICA
Nearly all of the players on this season's roster hail from one of 12 states, as California, New York and Washington each claim claiming four players. The Big Red has three players from New Jersey, two from both Colorado and Indiana and one each from Arizona, Connecticut, Illinois, Kansas, Michigan and Nebraska. Freshman JJ Black hails from Cambridge, England.