The Carolina RailHawks hardly looked like a team that would boast the best defense in the USL-1 after allowing 13 goals in five preseason matches.

However, after nine USL-1 matches — games that actually count — the RailHawks have been second to no one defensively. Carolina (3-2-4, 13 points) currently sits third in the USL-1 table because of its defense. The RailHawks’ five shutouts and 0.56 goals against average lead the league.

“With our preseason, I had the feeling we were going to turn things around in time,” said defender David Stokes.

The RailHawks dedicated the early part of the season to developing their backline, operating under the belief, “We can’t lose if no one scores on us.”

“It was going to take a while,” said Carolina coach Scott Schweitzer of implementing the team’s 4-3-2-1 formation. “But we didn’t lose faith as coaches, and the players didn’t lose faith that it would work.”

While Carolina defends all over the field, it’s not conceding many goals because the backline of central defenders Stokes and Chad Dombrowski, and outside defenders Caleb Norkus and Frankie Sanfilippo have been rock steady.

“We’re all fourth-, fifth-year guys who had a significant role on our other teams,” Dombrowski said. “We got here, and we know how to play the game the right way. And we just work together well as a unit. Everyone works for each other. That includes the midfielders and the forwards and the goalkeeper.”

Goalkeeper Chris McClellan hasn’t had an abundance of work — he averages 3.3 saves per game — and that’s a testament to the group in front him.

“Guys are all on the same page, and defensively, if you’re organized it’s kind of hard to break down a team when you don’t have any passing lanes or if you’re not able to get a ball without pressure,” McClellan said.

Schweitzer said the biggest thing about his defense is that it’s had time to play together and time to adjust to the 4-3-2-1’s zone marking, as opposed to the man-to-man defense most of his defenders were accustomed to playing.

Schweitzer also pointed out that his four defenders’ skill sets complement each other. All four are strong in the air, strong with the ball at their feet and rarely do they make a mistake.

“The mistakes, individually, that we make, we don’t make that many,” Dombrowski said. “When we do, guys are doing the right thing all over the field to slide back and help us.”

Rochester reunion

Friday’s 7:30 p.m. match at SAS Soccer Park against Rochester is a reunion of sorts for a handful of RailHawks, from the top of the organization down to players.

Chris Economides, currently the RailHawks president and general manager, helped launch the Rochester franchise in 1996. Though his energy is focused solely on his new franchise in Cary, he still has a financial stake in the Rhinos.

“There’s some mixed emotion, but to be totally honest, that’s a game both sides have been pointing to,” Economides said. Carolina coach Schweitzer was a defender for the Rhinos from 1998 to 2003. He rejoined the club in 2005 for his final professional season. Schweitzer was a part of three USL-1 championships in Rochester, and he helped lead the Rhinos to the 1999 U.S. Open Cup. He was also named to the franchise’s 10-year anniversary team last year.

Four current Carolina players played in Rochester, too — midfielder Chris Carrieri (2004), forward Connally Edozien (2006), midfielder Jonny Steele (2005-06) and defender Frankie Sanfilippo (2005-06).

Economides, along with co-owners Steve Donner and Frank DuRoss, mapped out a blueprint in Rochester for other franchises to follow. Rochester led the league in attendance from 1996 to 2004, won three league titles in four years and won the U.S. Open Cup in 1999, the only non-Major League Soccer team to do so since MLS teams entered the tournament in 1996. In 2005, the trio was inducted into the National Soccer Hall of Fame as builders.

“Eleven years ago, Rochester started as an expansion team, came on the map, did terrible in the beginning, but went to the final of the Open Cup and the league,” Schweitzer said. “That is what we’re trying to be like, obviously. When anyone comes into the league, they want to be like Rochester. Rochester did exactly what we’re trying to do.”

Rochester (3-3-3, 12 points) enters the match trailing Carolina by a point in the USL-1 table.

U.S. Open Cup

The brackets for the 2007 Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup were released May 30. The Carolina RailHawks will play RWB Adria, an amateur club team out of Chicago, June 12 at SAS Soccer Park at 7:30 p.m.

“Anything can happen in the Open Cup,” Dombrowski said. “We’re playing an amateur team, but there are guys that used to play professionally on there. In the Open Cup, you can never underestimate anyone. Strange things can happen in the Open Cup. … You disrespect an opponent by not coming to play, you’re going to be out of it pretty quick.”

If the RailHawks win, they will face the Cincinnati Kings, a USL-2 team, or the Milwaukee Bavarians, an amateur team, on June 26. Major League Soccer teams enter the competition in the third round, which begins July 10.

The Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup, the U.S. Soccer Federation’s national championship, is an annual competition open to all amateur and professional soccer teams affiliated with U.S. Soccer. It is the oldest annual team tournament in U.S. sports history and among the oldest soccer tournaments of its type in the world.

At stake in the tournament is $180,000 in prize money broken down as follows: $100,000 to the champion, $50,000 to the runner-up and $10,000 to the team that advances deepest in the tournament from each of the Division II, Division III and amateur levels.

Steele’s out

Midfielder Jonny Steele will not be available for Friday’s match against Rochester. He will be serving a one-game suspension after earning two yellow cards in a seven-minute stretch of the first half of the RailHawks’ 0-0 tie in Portland May 27.

Doubleheader

Friday’s match between Carolina and Rochester at 7:30 p.m. will be preceded by a USL Professional Development League match between the Cary RailHawks U-23 and Atlanta Silverbacks U-23 squads at 4:30 p.m.

The RailHawks (3-1-2, 11 points) currently sit atop the PDL’s Southeast Division.