Senior midfielder Luis Silva and junior goalkeeper André Grandt have been named the Big West Offensive Player of the Week and Defensive Player of the Week, respectively, for their parts in leading UCSB to a pair of home wins last weekend.
Silva also garnered national honors as he was named to the College Soccer News and Top Drawer Soccer National Teams of the Week. The senior scored his first collegiate hat trick on Friday night as UCSB defeated visiting San Diego, 3-0, at Meredith Field at Harder Stadium.
A crowd of 13,772, the second biggest in campus history, witnessed the feat. The hat trick was the 25th in program history. Silva scored in the 11th, 29th and 60th minutes to propel the Gauchos to the victory.
Grandt, meanwhile, posted two shutouts as the Gauchos blanked San Diego and then Sacramento State on Sunday, 2-0. He tallied a total of seven saves between the two games on his way to his fourth and fifth shutouts of the season. The junior has posted four consecutive home shutouts and has recorded 399:02 consecutive shutout minutes on Meredith Field.
This marks the first Big West weekly honor for both players this season.
UCSB will begin Big West Conference play on Wednesday, Sept. 28 when it travels to UC Riverside for a 7 p.m. match up. The Gauchos will return to Meredith Field at Harder Stadium on Saturday, Oct. 1 to take-on defending Big West regular season champion UC Irvine at 7 p.m.
