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Joe and coach Rodriguez do seem to find talent. But the unfortunate thing is It always seems to take 3 or 4 games to figure things out . We are competitive after that but having 3 or 4 losses before jelling makes a 6 or 7 win season pretty difficult

Bump for updates and a few notes. - EMU signed the largest class in the first signing period, with many of the signees being freshmen. - Toledo has lost nearly half their freshmen signees due to the coaching change. I don’t think that matters much anymore with the portal having become the more relevant recruiting source, but I thought it was worth mentioning anyway. - Supposedly, UMASS has used their NIL funds towards retention of 15 players, and 13 of them have indicated they will stay at UMASS. - I’ll continue to update this thread as I see more activity.

It's no coincidence that the two kids who play the hardest on defense started tonight. I suspect the message got through.

I look at all those Q4 wins for the Zips and it makes me scratch my head. The names of those programs are far from what I think of as programs that are typically Q4… hopefully a bunch of them build their numbers going foward.

I do not know how you found that..

The Zips get a 10 days Christmas break before Concord comes to the JAR on December 29th. Concord currently stands at 6-3, playing a bunch of teams that belong on Captain’s list of teams he’s never heard of, including Frostburg State. In the confusing geography department, they’ve also played California of Indiana and Indiana of Pennsylvania. Kraig Gilbert, a 6’8” sophomore forward leads the Grapes in scoring at 19.2 ppg. 6’8” junior forward Boubacar Djigo averages a whopping 14.2 rpg to go along with 14.2 ppg. He played for Lutheran West in high school.

Imagine showing up in a foreign country just before the beginning of training camp. You barely speak the language. All the other players have been part of the program for month or even years. Everything is different. The food, intense practices like you have never experienced with a demanding coach, classes in subjects you never imagined and not to mention American women everywhere! I would call that culture shock!

There is a silver lining: Akron has the best facilities in the MAC, a great FBS opportunity for players to showcase their talent, and a competent president/ athletic director. Under Nemer and Goodrich, those advantages will pay dividends sooner rather than later and the only direction to go is up!!

Just watched Wright State hold on at home vs EMU. I can't decide if I wish I was blind so I could never see that, or if I'm now going blind with how bad that game was.

The state of Ohio seems to be doing quite well when you consider there's over 350 D1 schools and only two from Ohio are in the bottom half. Also, love to see that one of them is OU.

Elite offensive team (look between the Yale and Baylor logos).

If Wayne Campus had a team and beat Kent we'd never let them hear the end of it

Feels that way. The difference, though, is there’s plenty of potential returning, albeit with limited production at some positions. The roster JoeMo took over was badly depleted in both talent and depth across a number of positions. On top of that, a good handful of the returning players who had upside never developed and left after JoeMo’s first year. On the bright side, other teams across the MAC are losing starters and all-conference players as well, which could lead to 2026 being wide open again.

Yet another one developed by Coach JRod who had few to no offers coming out of high school, now heading out the door to get paid. What really stings about losing Morris is his ability to adequately play anywhere on the OL when needed.

This might be BGs year

Concord's?

UMASS opens their first conference game with a 10 point loss to Kent State. OU down by 15 mid-way through the 2nd to BG. Have to think this might be Boals’ last season with the program if it keeps trending this way.

Watching Halligan last night and he reminds me a lot of Brian Walsh. Similar game and almost identical size. I like what his size brings to our rotations.

Pretty loaded at TE with Cravaack and Newell, this doesn’t hurt like many of the others. I’m thinking there will be many more coming in the next week or so.

No Nate Johnson one-handed dunk disasters last night.

Wedding anniversary. Told my wife I love her so much, I'm skipping the game vs. EMU. Shot 17% from 3P and still put up 93 points while winning by 21. Alrighty then. That has to scare the crap out of the MAC lol. What an offense.

Goes to show you what a defender Greg Tribble was!

Go fix your white board, too. 😉

Really hope that remi comes back for at least one more season. The good thing about ncaa soccer is that we will find out in the spring games instead of being in the dark all summer

all aboard the halligan train

Catdaddy's keeping on top of this but I was also pleased to see the ABJ tracking the fluid situation

I like your distinction between playoff and invitational tournament. Let me expand on that... For me to take it seriously as a playoff, it would have to be setup like other NCAA Tournaments where conference champions get an automatic berth. This would discourage all of the ridiculous conference consolidation and ensure that, from the start of the season, everyone has a legit shot of winning the title (however stretched those odds may be). The fact that the ACC Champion (Duke) was excluded while a team not even eligible to play in its conference championship game got into the "invitational tournament" is ridiculous, regardless of other logical justifications.

Thanks for passing this along TennZip. Rarely do you read an article where the interviewed athlete has such mature and articulate comments. Jason is another example of the exceptional quality of young men who come thru the Akron soccer program.

Best facilities in the MAC? You need to visit Miami's football building. And before you point to InfoCision, remember that an empty stadium isn't much of a recruiting asset.

Lunardi has us as a 12-seed: https://www.espn.com/espn/feature/story/_/page/bracketology/ncaa-bracketology-2026-march-madness-men-field-predictions?appsrc=sc&RuleNumber=Not Applicable&consent_mode=ccpa

Excellent article on Jason Shokalook. article has many quotes from Jason. https://rg.org/news/soccer/mls-next-pro-mvp-jason-shokalook-road-top-american-soccer

So in every tournament where a team wins five or six games, there is also a team that theoretically loses five or six. That team this year is Michigan. Washington beat NC State who beat St. Louis who beat Akron who beat Notre Dame who beat Michigan. Congrats Wolverines!

The last memorable EMU game for me was a couple of years ago when Emoni Bates was 1-12 from the field and I think we were beating them by 50 points at some point in the 2nd half.

yes

While I’m concerned about potentially losing good players, I’ll be happy for any of our players who are drafted. Many Zips have had successful pro careers. Always happy to see more.

I have as many questions as you do..... Malik and Dyson were both drafted and came back below is what MLS published https://www.mlssoccer.com/news/2026-mls-superdraft-rules-and-regulations when I type in MLS draft eligibility rules into google, Artificial Intelligence gives me this info? who knows if AI is correct...about a formal player declaration? MLS Draft eligibility primarily includes college seniors who've exhausted NCAA eligibility, but it's expanded to cover sophomores, juniors, certain Generation adidas players, and some non-collegiate internationals, with the league compiling a list based on club/coach input rather than a formal player declaration. How Players Get on the List Unlike the NFL/NBA, there's no formal "declaration" process for players. MLS consults with clubs, scouts, and college coaches to create the official list of draft-eligible players each year.

The Hockey explains a lot. I distinctly remember Shooky, after earning a red card, cheering on his teammates from the stairwell to the locker room. I kept whispering, “keep quiet so the AR does not realize you are still watching.” He just could not stop exhorting his team. Loudly. The AR eventually caught on, prompting the HR to stop the game clock so that Shooky could be escorted to the locker room. Kind of funny. Kind of moving.

I'm not bored by college football. I just don't take it as seriously as the people who run it want me to. For example, Friday Im going to see a band call Parks Brothers play. The playoff will be on. Every once in a while I'll look at the screen to see what's going on. The point I'm making is this. As much as they want us to believe it's a playoff, it simply isn't. It's an invitational tournament and the winner is called the National Champion after. To me, they are at the same level of champion as they were when they used to vote for the national championship. They just go about it a different way.

One of my top 5 favorite games at the JAR

Thankfully, college basketball and NHL. The NBA is unwatchable, and beyond the Zips, college football bores me to death anymore.

Maybe the rest of the MAC should go for the easiest schedules possible (provided they win them). Gives us a shot at a real Q1 win.

We rag on Miami for their weak schedule, but their road win @ Wright State is better than any win we have during OOC play.

And as a reward for Miami playing that extraordinarily difficult out of conference schedule, they start with cream puff Ball State.

Hopefully our coaching staff can stay in place for the foreseeable future and actually build something at UA. That is the one thing that has held us back. Hiring two of the worst head coaches in FBS history has dug us in a hole that is hard to come out of. Also doesn't help that people in NE Ohio only care about one college football team and it's not us. So there will always be this reputation that the Zips aren't a "real" school and our games don't matter.

Student for a day tickets are available in the Student Section. Got my tickets transferred to there.

Reminds me of the old Jerry Tarkanian line: "The NCAA is so mad at Kentucky they'll probably put Cleveland State on probation for an additional two years."

Josh Hardin was a starter in 2024 and he transferred out. I highly suspcet that was due to Pittsburgh poaching him with huge NIL dollars.

Scratched out serial number on a gun.

Well, the Akron coaches aren’t providing all the same services to JoeMo that she was providing to Sherrone!