JERSEY CITY, N.J. — After seven strong seasons, culminating with 2022's stellar performance both in an out of New Jersey Athletic Conference (NJAC) play, former head coach Joe Cullen departed the New Jersey City University men's soccer sideline. Taking over the program will be former NJCU top assistant coach — previously the head man for Division II College of Staten Island women's soccer for two seasons after spending five with the Gothic Knights — Brendan Guzman. The new regime officially begins its quest to continue the program's success with the release of the 2023 schedule.

2022 Season in Review:
Last year was one to remember for Jersey City, as the squad picked up three NJAC victories and 11 total points in the standings, both the most for the program since 2008. The Green and Gold earned a pair of postseason bids, first to the NJAC Championship for the first time since 2008 — all teams that played did qualify for the tournament in the shortened 2020-21 — and for the Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC) for the first time since 2019. NJCU finished as NJAC quarterfinalists and ECAC semifinalists. Four All-NJAC players, led by First Team forward Maximo Vargas (Montevideo, Uruguay/The British Schools), helped the squad to a final record of 12-6-2, including 3-4-2 in conference play.

Looking Forward to 2023:
After kicking off the preseason with a couple inter-divisional scrimmages against Division II foes Caldwell University and the aforementioned CSI men's side at the end of August, NJCU officially begins its 2023 campaign with a trio of road matches in a six-day span — the College at Old Westbury (Sept. 3), Hunter College (Sept. 6) and Roger Williams University (Sept. 9). Then, home competition begins at the Thomas M. Gerrity Athletic Complex with four straight, ending with the NJAC opener. Sarah Lawrence College (Sept. 16) is first up to the West Side, followed by Medgar Evers College (Sept. 18) and the City College of New York (Sept. 20). Then conference play begins against Montclair State University (Sept. 23). NJAC play continues with back-to-back road matches to end the month at Rowan University (Sept. 27) and Rutgers-Camden (Sept. 30).

A home non-conference night match kicks off October against Swarthmore College (Oct. 3) before NJAC play resumes with NJCU's 2023 Homecoming game, as Ramapo College comes to the Gerrity (Oct. 7) for the first of five straight conference matches. The Gothic Knights head up to William Paterson University (Oct. 11) and then down to Stockton University (Oct. 14), before Kean University (Oct. 18) and The College of New Jersey (Oct. 21) visit the Green and Gold's friendly confines. Lehman College (Oct. 23) then visits the Gerrity before Jersey City closes out NJAC regular-season play on the road at Rutgers-Newark (Oct. 25). Then, should NJCU qualify, the three-round NJAC Tournament is scheduled for Oct. 28-Nov. 4. The Gothic Knights then have one final tune-up prior to any potential ECAC or NCAA postseason play as Yeshiva University pays a visit to the Gerrity (Nov. 11) to close out the regular-season.

Hear from Head Coach Brendan Guzman:
"The goal of the schedule was to combine games that highlight the difficulty of our conference with games that prepare us for exactly that," said Guzman. "After opening up preseason with a pair of up-and-coming Division II programs, which will give us opportunities to experiment and solve problems, we also added Swarthmore and Roger Williams, which achieves that goal of increasing the difficulty of our non-conference schedule. With a few road trips and some tough early tests, we should be well-prepared for our extremely difficult NJAC rivalry games, especially the road tests such as at Rowan, Stockton or Rutgers-Newark."

"Our job is to challenge this core group of players and if that means playing four or five regionally ranked programs during the season, then that is an amazing opportunity that they should be very excited for," continued Guzman. "I know we are excited. We have games with personal ties, some tough challenge games and a few road trips to tie it all together. On top of all that, there is nothing better than NJAC soccer."
 

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Fans can attend all NJCU men's soccer home matches at the Gerrity. All Gothic Knights home matches will also be streamed live on GothicVision, which can be found at www.NJCUGothicKnights.com/GothicVision or via the GothicVision app, available in both the iOS app store and on Android, as well as Roku.

To view the full 2023 Jersey City men's soccer schedule, along with start times, location, live stats and broadcast information, please click here (or via the link at the top).