UK had only 12 players last spring. Now the Cats are a national title contender. What gives?

The record crowd was electric.

The task was gigantic.

The statement was emphatic.

When the No. 4 Kentucky men’s soccer team defeated No. 2 Indiana 3-0 in front of a crowd of 3,503 at The Bell on Wednesday night, the Cats declared themselves legitimate contenders for the national title.

“Beating the No. 2 team in the country, especially that Indiana — they are not a team that gives you anything — they are a great opponent, and that’s a great result,” said junior forward JJ Williams, who scored two goals and contributed to the other. “I think we believe we can beat anybody now, but at the same time, no game is easy. We have to be humble.”

The Hoosiers, a program with eight national titles, returned nine starters from a squad that reached the NCAA finals last year. They were riding a nine-game win streak after an overtime loss to Wake Forest, now the No. 1 team in the country, in the season opener.

Indiana (9-2-0) ranked in the top 10 in both scoring offense with 2.5 goals per game and scoring defense with 0.49 per game. Kentucky both shut out the Hoosiers and hung three scores on them, more goals than IU has given up in a game in more than three years.

Indiana’s keeper, Trey Muse, a Louisville native whose father played for UK, led the nation with 18 shutouts last year as a freshman. When Muse committed to Indiana, his dad, Dave Muse, said it was because Indiana was a top program that gave his son the best opportunity to compete for a championship.

That might still be the case, given UK’s tournament history, but this year might mark the Cats’ best chance yet, especially when the Big Blue Nation turns out like this on a Wednesday night.

“I was talking to Mitch (Barnhart) a little bit ago,” UK men’s soccer Coach Johan Cedergren said. “This is why we all came to Kentucky.”

Cedergren has put his team in the NCAA Tournament four times in six years, the last in 2016, when the Cats earned a top-16 national seed, home field and a first-round bye. But each of those trips has ended early.

Kentucky, undefeated at 9-0-1, figures to earn its highest national ranking in program history if it takes care of business in a road game against conference opponent Florida International on Sunday.

“We have goals — talking about trying to make the Final Four — and I think the way this team played tonight, I can see a path,” Cedergren said. “But there’s lots of games between tonight and a Final Four. If we don’t do the core value stuff and we don’t play the way we should be playing … then we won’t reach our potential.”

The “core value stuff” might seem like coach-speak, but team captains Williams and senior Tanner Hummel say it’s what has made the difference for them this year.

“Throughout the years, seeing the team improve and grow, it’s crazy,” Hummel said. “It got started this past spring. As a team, we’re a lot closer. One of the big things the captains want to do is make sure the team is close and that we had a good culture.”

Last year, a mid-season loss to Indiana marked the beginning of a downward spiral that saw UK go 1-4-2 over its last seven games and miss the tournament.

“I think last year was an accumulation of we let things slide, and that we weren’t holding guys accountable both on and off the field,” Cedergren said. “That’s when we just said, ‘OK, here are the standards we are going to set, … If you want to play here at The Bell in front of 3,000 people, here are the things you have to do no matter who you are.’”

The core values? Be humble, be selfless, be disciplined and have a “UK attitude.”

“So, we worked really hard in the winter and the spring making sure that they understand that it’s OK to talk about being selfless and humble and disciplined, but what does that mean in February?” Cedergren said. “What does that mean when we’re out here pushing sleds and there’s snow and ice and its 25 degrees?”

Those hard discussions meant a team that lost eight seniors also saw seven other potential returning players leave the program. The Cats began spring training with only 12 players on what had been a 27-man roster.

Cedergren had his guys. He bolstered them with 14 freshmen this summer. His starting lineup Wednesday included four freshmen, four sophomores, a junior and two seniors.

Cedergren also changed how the Cats play. After years of playing a more defense-minded 4-2-3-1 formation with a lone striker up top, Cedergren saw the strength of his personnel and made the decision to play a 4-4-2, giving Williams a partner in the attack.

“Things have changed for sure, just because the coaching staff has believed in me a little bit more,” said Williams, who leads the team with nine goals. “Definitely they’ve pushed me. They’ve given me a little bit more freedom to do what I needed to do to be successful, but also my team puts me in great positions to be successful.”

Williams credited everyone from the back line to the midfielders to fellow forward, freshman Jason Reyes.

It was Reyes who set up Williams’ first score three minutes into the Indiana game and Reyes who launched himself Bruce Lee style into the goal Wednesday night to pound home Williams’ free kick after it caromed off the crossbar. That effort put the Cats up 2-0 with six minutes left in the game.

Then, it was Hummel’s long pass from the back that found Williams one-on-one with an Indiana defender after UK’s defense quickly turned away an Indiana attack. Williams fought shoulder-to-shoulder as he pressed into the box and then juked the Hoosier into the ground before calmly finishing his second goal of the night.

While Cedegren worried that the new offensive formation might make the Cats more vulnerable in the back, UK has eight shutouts midway through the season, surpassing its total last year. The combination of defenders Leon Jones and Aime Mabike, a Henry Clay product, along with Hummel and Cole Guindon has worked brilliantly with keeper Enrique Facusse.

“If you would have (told) me nine games into the season that we’d have only been scored on three times with two forwards, I would have said, ‘I don’t think so,’” Cedergren said before Wednesday’s game. “But I think we’re going to score even more goals and what it turns into is we’re able to press and defend even higher because we have more people up the field.”

Now, UK has to close out its conference schedule and make sure it obtains one on those top 16 national seeds. That would mean hosting one or more tournament games at The Bell.

“The sky’s the limit, but you never know. I’ve been here for seven years. There’s a red card or there’s a couple of injuries … ,” Cedergren said. “You just try to stay in the moment. … and then you see where you come out at the end.”

Next game

No. 4 Kentucky at Florida International

When: 7 p.m. Sunday

Records: UK 9-0-1, FIU 4-6

This story was originally published October 4, 2018 at 3:58 PM.