Zac MacMath has had plenty going on in his young soccer career, including playing at the FIFA U17 World Cup for the United States and helping Maryland win an NCAA Championship last fall as a starting goalkeeper.

This summer is bringing more of the same as the talented netminder expands his soccer resume.

For starters, MacMath was with the U18 Men’s National Team at an international tournament in Portugal, helping the squad to a win and a draw against Finland and Germany respectively, before bowing out early with an elbow injury sustained in the 1st half of a 1-0 loss to the hosts.

Next up it is the Maccabi Games, an international Jewish athletic event held this July in Israel, where MacMath will be a goalkeeper with the U.S. Maccabi team.

Following that is another U18 MNT event, this time in Northern Ireland, after which MacMath will return to Maryland for the beginning of training camp with Sasho Cirovski’s defending national champions.

MacMath admits it is a busy schedule but says he prefers it that way. The U18 event in Portugal gave him a chance to get back with the national team setup. He hasn’t played as much with the U20 MNT in the runup to this fall’s FIFA World Cup, but as a 1991 birth year player, he will still be eligible for the 2011 version of the event.

MacMath said the U18 camp was an enjoyable and helpful one for him.

“It was kind of unique from any national camp I’ve been with,” MacMath said. “Coach Matko (Mike Matkovich) has a unique personality as a coach. He’s tough and what U.S. soccer needs. We’re not used to playing at a high level all the time, but he was making sure everyone was paying full attention 100 percent of the time.”

MacMath said the competition, particularly from the German and Portugese sides, was excellent, and that he was glad to get back with some of his old teammates as well.

One of those teammates, Sporting Lisbon professional Gregory Garza, enjoyed a little extra time with MacMath as they ended up going to the same hospital together, MacMath to have his elbow examined and Garza to deal with a broken nose received from a Sporting teammate in the USA-Portugal match.

“I’ve known him for a long time,” MacMath said. “We were just talking about what it’s like for him playing in Portugal and he was telling me how difficult it is to get stuff done (at the hospital) because of all the rules from the government over there.”

Given a positive report from the doctor back home in the St. Petersburg, Florida area, MacMath is looking forward to the rest of his summer, as well as his return to College Park for Terrapins’ training camp.

“We lost a lot of good players,” MacMath said of Maryland’s prospects for 2009. “It will be a challenge to rebound from that but I’m looking forward to it. I will probably get a lot more work than I was used to last year.”

But that’s ok, because keeping busy is what Zac MacMath prefers.