2024 Cal State LA Men's Soccer – Season Summary

LOS ANGELES -- Cal State LA's men's soccer team was the last team standing from the West once again after another outstanding season in 2024.

The Golden Eagles hosted a Super Region 4 second-round match for a fifth consecutive season and put together their best performance of the season in a 4-1 win over Cal State Dominguez Hills. That earned the Golden Eagles a trip to Colorado to face top-seed Colorado State Pueblo in the Super Region 4 semifinals, their fourth trip to that round in the past five seasons.

Cal State LA was the lone team from the West - from the California Collegiate Athletic Association, Great Northwest Athletic Conference and PacWest Conference - to advance that far and the Golden Eagles have been the best team in the West for four of the past five seasons. That includes, of course, the national championship season in 2021, the Super Region 4 title and national runner-up season in 2019 and the Super Region 4 title match appearance in 2023.

Cal State LA was ranked as high as No. 2 in the nation during the season and finished the season ranked No. 11 in the country in the final United Soccer Coaches poll released after the season. The Golden Eagles spent three weeks at No. 2, eight weeks in the top-three, nine weeks in the top-5 and 10 weeks inside the top-10.

This is the fourth time in the past five seasons Cal State LA has finished in the top-11 nationally and three of those seasons were top-five finishes. The Golden Eagles were No. 2 at the end of 2019, No. 1 in 2021 when they won the national championship and No. 5 in 2023. Cal State LA finished 13th in 2022.

Cal State LA has earned a Top-5 spot in the national poll in five consecutive seasons and a Top-10 spot in six straight seasons..

Cal State LA made an appearance in the national poll for the 19th consecutive season, a streak that started in 2005.

The Golden Eagles finished the 2024 season with a 12-3-6 overall record and are now 45-6-12 in three seasons since Michael Erush became head coach. Combined with the excellence of former head coach Chris Chamides, the Golden Eagles are now 63-8-15 over the past four seasons, 82-9-18 over the past five seasons and 97-11-18 over the past six seasons. During that stretch, Cal State LA has won one national championship, two Super Region four titles, three CCAA regular-season and four CCAA Tournament titles.

The Golden Eagles have enjoyed 13 consecutive seasons with 10 or more victories and have now posted 18 straight winning seasons.

Clearly, that's a lot of winning.

Cal State LA started the season with three straight road shutouts, a 2-0 win at Fresno Pacific, a 1-0 win at Western Washington and a 0-0 tie at Seattle Pacific. Home victories over Colorado School of Mines, MSU Denver and Cal State Dominguez Hills followed and the Golden Eagles stretched their unbeaten streak to a program-record 30 games in a row before a loss to Cal State Dominguez on the final day of the regular season snapped the streak and dropped the Golden Eagles out of a share of first place in the CCAA.

The Golden Eagles, as the No. 4 seed, beat Cal State Monterey Bay, 3-1, in a first-round conference tournament game at University Stadium before seeing their three-year conference tournament title reign end in a 1-0 loss to Cal State Dominguez Hills in the semifinals at Cal State East Bay.

The Golden Eagles turned the tables - and then some - in a resounding 4-1 win over the Toros in a second-round NCAA playoff game in University Stadium. One week later, the Golden Eagles fell to Colorado State Pueblo, 3-0, to end the season.

Andrew Portis earned first-team All-America honors for a second straight season and was joined on the All-West Region team by newcomer Emil Kischka. Portis also earned first-team All-West Region honors and was named the CCAA Defender of the Year.

Cal State LA Men's Soccer
2024 Overall Record: 12-3-6. CCAA Record: 5-1-5, 20 points
Final Regional Ranking: 5
Final National Ranking: 11
United Soccer Coaches All-America:Andrew Portis (D), 1st team
D2CCA All-America: Andrew Portis, 1st team
United Soccer Coaches All-West Region: Andrew Portis, 1st team, Emil Kischka, 2nd team
D2CCA All-West Region: Andrew Portis, 1st team
CCAA Defender of the Year: Andrew Portis
All-CCAA: Andrew Portis, 1st team; Oscar Warne, 2nd team, Tommaso Belli, honorable mention, Emil Kischka, honorable mention
CCAA Championships All-Tournament Team: Tommaso Belli
CCAA Player of the Week: Rene Cortez (Sept. 5-8), Tommaso Belli (Sept. 16-22), Andrew Portis (Sept. 23-29), (Oct. 7-13)
2024 CCAA Fall Academic Honor Roll: Rene Cortez, Matteo Costa, Ivan Farias-Martinez, Joel Green, Julian Martinez, Roei Mordechay, Wilhelm Olsen, Braeden Pryor, Liam Saban, Sergio Vega
2024-25 CCAA All-Academic: Felix Alverdale, Ignacio Moreno, Liam Saban, Kento Tani, Oscar Warne
2024-25 D2 ADA Academic Achievement Award: Ivan Farias-Martinez, Roei Mordechay, Liam Saban, Sergio Vega