CHAMPIONSHIP CENTRAL
 
ORLANDO  –  The top two seeds in the tournament bracket, No. 1 UCF and No. 2 SMU, will battle for the 2018 American Athletic Conference Men’s Soccer Championship on Saturday, with the tournament title match set for 7 p.m. ET at the UCF Soccer & Track Complex. The game will be available for viewing live on ESPN3.
 
Saturday’s winner will earn The American’s automatic bid to the 2018 NCAA Division I Men’s Soccer Championship. At equal 5-1-1 conference slates, the squads shared the 2018 American regular season title.
 
SMU is seeking back-to-back conference championships, while UCF is in pursuit of its first since joining The American. The contest will be a rematch of last year’s title game, which SMU claimed by a 2-1 score in double overtime at Westcott Field in Dallas.
 
Saturday’s meeting will be the second of the season for the Knights and Mustangs, as UCF prevailed 2-0 on Sept. 28. The game went down to the wire, as UCF’s Hattabiou Barry scored the game-winner in the 90^th minute. SMU goalkeeper Grant Makela made seven saves in the full 90 minutes.
 
Both teams reach the Championship by virtue of double-overtime victories in Thursday’s semifinals. UCF (13-2-2) earned a 3-2 win in the 110^th minute over No. 4 seed UConn, with Max Steigwardt’s free kick sailing into the net for the game-winner.
 
SMU (10-4-2) received a chip-in goal by Philip Ponder in the 103^rd minute in Thursday’s earlier game to escape No. 6 seed Memphis by a 2-1 final.
 
Saturday will feature the conference’s top offensive squad in the Knights challenging the stoutest defensive unit in the Mustangs. Led by the conference’s Offensive Player of the Year Cal Jennings, No. 7-ranked UCF is averaging a league-best 2.53 goals per game, good for fourth in the nation. Individually, Jennings has been a force to reckon with as he ranks second in the country with 20 goals.
 
Additionally, the Knights are a Division I top-10 team in assists per game (2.31), points per game (7.31) and total goals (43), and lead the country with 8.38 shots on goal per game.
 
SMU has permitted just 14 goals (0.88 per game) on the season, the best mark in The American. Second Team All-Conference goalkeeper Makela has earned the win in all six of the Mustangs’ league-best six shutouts, and boasts the conference’s best goals against average at 0.77.
 
Makela is bolstered by SMU’s backline, which features First Team defender Talen Maples and Ponder, who has registered four goals in the past three games. Individually, the Mustangs placed a league-best seven on the All-Conference teams.
 
Full coverage of Saturday’s Championship can be found at TheAmerican.org/msoccer and on Twitter at @American_MSoc.