The Siena Heights men's soccer team was chosen to finish eighth in the 2019 Wolverine-Hoosier Athletic Conference (WHAC) Preseason Coaches Poll that was released by the league office on Tuesday afternoon. The Saints finished seventh in the WHAC standings a season ago with a 3-7-1 record in conference play.
The preseason poll is voted on by the coaches in the league who rank the teams in the league from 1-12. 12 points are given to the team at the top of the list, 11 points to the second-ranked team, and so on to determine the order of the poll.
2018 regular season co-champion Madonna topped the rankings, receiving 10 of the 12 first-place votes on the way to 142 points. 2018 WHAC tournament champions Lawrence Tech earned the last two first-place votes to total 130 points and take the second spot in the poll. Co-champs in the regular season, UNOH, finished with 119 points for third. Indiana Tech had 113 points for fourth. Cornerstone (82 pts.) was fifth while Concordia (Mich.) fell in sixth with 78 points. Aquinas (61 pts.) edged Siena Heights (60 pts.) by one point for the seventh-place ranking. Cleary was ninth with 50 points followed by Lourdes (42 pts.) and UM-Dearborn (37 pts.). Rochester University rounded out the poll with 22 points.
The Saints kick off the 2019 campaign on August 20 with a home game against Huntington (Ind.) at 7:00 p.m.
