LANCASTER, Pa. – The Franklin & Marshall men's soccer team has made the NCAA Tournament in a Centennial Conference-record 10 consecutive seasons. With two All-Americans, four All-Region V selections, and six All-Centennial Conference honorees on the roster, expectations are once again high for a team that has not finished outside of the top three in the Centennial Conference standings since its stretch of NCAA Tournament appearances began in 2013.
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2024 Diplomats
Forward
Senior Oscar Horwitz returns for one final season after setting the school record for goals (19) and points (40) in a single season last fall on his way to third-team All-American honors. Horwitz is already seventh in school history in goals (28) and ninth in points (61) through the first 54 career matches. The 2023 Centennial Conference Offensive Player of the Year is also a two-time all-region selection who will be looked to as the leader of the offensive again this fall.
In addition Horwitz's stunning resume, five other Diplomat forwards have also started throughout their careers. Seniors Adam Green and Nic Petruso both have seven career starts to their resumes, while juniors Sean Lipschutz and Matias Arbelaez also scored during the 2023 season. Sophomore Wes Wise found the back of the net six times as he started six of his 20 matches last season, with classmate Ryan Caodano also appearing in two contests.
Newcomers: Ned Reynolds (Slingerlands, N.Y.), Kole Wintersteen (Berwyn, Pa.)
Midfield
Senior Koa Kaliebe earned second-team All-America honors during the 2023 season after starting all 20 matches and finishing the year with nine goals and nine assists. Those nine assists marked the fourth-highest single-season total in school history and give him 15 helpers through his first 60 career matches to rank seventh in program history. Kaliebe has now earned All-Centennial Conference recognition during the last two seasons after honorable mention accolades in 2022.
Three other midfielders (senior Jack Nury, junior Nathan Schlessinger, sophomore Jack Baer) have started during their F&M careers. Nury played in every match last season, starting five matches where he finished with one goal and one assist. Schlessinger started 10 of his 16 appearances last fall. He has made 23 appearances in the starting XI during his first two seasons and has five career goals and three career assists. Baer started six of his 19 contests played last fall, tallying twice in the process. Sophomore Reagan Pelletier also made four appearances during his rookie campaign. Although new to the Franklin & Marshall lineup, another collegiate starter is Lafayette and Utah Valley transfer Jack Borden who was a full-time starter for the Leopards in 2022 before playing the 2023 season at Utah Valley.
Newcomers: Andrew Antunes (East Stroudsburg, Pa.), Jack Kelly (Strasburg, Pa.), Ethan Phillips (Ladera Ranch, Calif.)
Defense
Franklin & Marshall will be very experienced in the defensive third with five players who started portions of last season. That group is currently headlined by senior Connor Anderko who has earned All-Centennial Conference recognition during each of his first three seasons in Lancaster, including back-to-back all-region accolades when he was a first-team All-CC selection during the past two seasons. Anderko has started 55 of his 56 career appearances after starting every contest during the 2023 season. Classmate Isaac Mintz has started 58 of his 60 career appearances and has earned All-CC recognition during each of the last two seasons, adding third-team all-region accolades to his resume in the fall of 2022.
Juniors Alex Fischer and Jordan Samuels started six and nine matches, respectively, last fall. Both players have played in at least 35 matches during their collegiate careers, with Samuels claiming 25 career starts on his stat sheet. Sophomore Nico Gonzalez got this Diplomats' career off to a strong start in 2023 as he earned honorable mention All-Centennial Conference recognition during his rookie campaign. Senior Jake Rosenfield is another experienced option on defense as he made 16 of his 18 career appearances at F&M last fall, with that total including two starts. Miguel Rosa, Thanos Daniildis, and Ethan Lachler also gained valuable experience last year and will look to benefit from that experience this coming fall.
Newcomers: Beckett Aufderhaar (San Francisco, Calif.), Ethan Howard (Wayne, Pa.), Thomas Kaplan (Bala Cynwyd, Pa.)
Goalie
Junior Nolan Booth emerged as the starter during the 2023 season as he played in 16 contests last fall. He has a career GAA of 0.93 through 20 total appearances, including seven shutouts. That sub-one GAA currently ranks as the ninth-best average in school history. He posted five of those shutouts during the 2023 season on his way to earning honorable mention All-Centennial Conference recognition. During the four games that Booth did not play, senior Levi Kline got the start and he did not disappoint as he finished with an unblemished 4-0 record while stopping 76.5 percent of the shots that he faced.
Newcomer: Davis Rorick (Germantown, Md.)
The Road Ahead
Franklin & Marshall went 14-3-3 last fall (6-1-2 CC) to finish second in the Centennial Conference regular seaosns standings before knocking off Geneva 1-0 in the first round of the NCAA Tournament. The Diplomats ultimately battled Connecticut College all the way to penalty kicks during their second round match at home on Tylus Field before falling by a 7-6 score in the seventh round of PKs. Franklin & Marshall has made it to at least the second round during nine of its 10 most recent NCAA Tournament appearances. That postseason success includes trips to the Elite 8 during both the 2013 and 2016 seasons, along with Sweet 16 appearances in 2014 and 2015.
The Diplomats have certainly challenged themselves once again during the regular season as they will play 2023 NCAA qualifiers Lynchburg (Sept. 1) and Kenyon (Sept. 8) during the first two weeks of the regular season. F&M was one of three teams that advanced to the national tournament out of the Centennial Conference last fall. It will make the trip to Johns Hopkins on October 19 for a showdown between two of the perennial top teams in the conference before welcoming Washington College to Tylus Field on Senior Day (Nov. 2) after the Shoremen made a run to the NCAA Final Four last year.
In the Polls
Coaches around the Centennial Conference are expecting another tough battle for the top spot in the conference standings during the 2024 season as those three NCAA qualifiers from last fall each received at least three first-place votes from the Centennial Conference's head coaches. The Diplomats were picked second and received three first-place votes for a total of 72 points. They were just edged out by 76 points award to Johns Hopkins after the Blue Jays got four first-place votes. Washington College received the final three first-place votes for a total of 69 points. Muhlenberg (55 points), Dickinson (44 points), and Swarthmore (43 points) were also predicted for a trip to conference playoffs which will once again see six teams enter postseason play. The Diplomats finished last season ranked 17th in the United Soccer Coaches Top 25 national poll and will begin their 2024 campaign from that very same position. The complete Centennial Conference preseason poll is available here, while the national preseason poll can be found here.
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Record Book Watch (active players in program's career top 20)
Connor Anderko
- Minutes played: 11th (4,627)
Nolan Booth
- Goals against avg: 9th (0.93)
- Saves per game: 18th (2.75)
- Most wins: 19th (12)
Oscar Horwitz
- Game-winning goals: t-6th (9)
- Goals: t-7th (28)
- Points: 9th (61)
- Points per game: 11th (1.13)
- Goals per game: 11th (0.52)
Koa Kaliebe
- Assists: t-7th (17)
- Assists per game: 8th (0.28)
Isaac Mintz
- Games started: t-15th (58)
- Minutes played: 16th (4,479)
