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In my best Brent Musberger voice - “You are looking live at the fourth floor of the Staybridge Suites in beautiful Lexington Kentucky…”

https://www.cleveland.com/sports/college/2023/09/meet-akrons-enrique-freeman-if-you-want-to-smile-read-this-story-terry-pluto.html

Stopped at two distilleries today. At both places someone recognized my Z-logo shirt and struck up a conversation about the game tomorrow. Fun to visit areas where they follow their local team.

If your question was the last conference win in another conference other than the MAC in any sport, the answer is November 12, 2022. On that date Akron defeated Memphis 4,697 points to 4,674 points in rifle, in the Great America Rifle Conference.

I love that story. I still say if a ref did not call a questionable offensive foul for a moving screen on him with 3 minutes left against UCLA fouling him out Akron would have had their first NCAA tournament victory.

Here's what's on the Big East website for men's soccer: Following the conclusion of league play on Sunday, Oct. 29 the tournament field will be set with the squad with the highest overall conference points securing the No. 1 seed, along with the team in the opposite division with the highest conference point total locking up the No. 2 seed. The remaining six seeds, regardless of division, will be determined by conference points. Quarterfinal action will get underway on Saturday, Nov. 4, with the top four seeds hosting matches. The semifinals will return to the Maryland SoccerPlex on Thursday, Nov. 9. FOX Sports will then cover the championship game on Sunday, Nov. 12; network and start time will be announced at a later date.

Anyway.... The Zips Women won at Niagara 1-0 yesterday on a goal by Emma King

Alright...😉

Thank you for bringing this thread back to the Women's Soccer discussion! 👍

https://x.com/ZipsWSOC/status/1702482149356470741?s=20

Game preview from A Sea of Blue: https://www.aseaofblue.com/2023/9/14/23873013/kentucky-football-vs-akron-time-tv-channel-online-stream-predictions-radio Kentucky and Akron have both been slow to get the running game going and both teams have been penalized quite a bit so far this season. With that said, if Akron can get the passing game cooking early, we may be in this thing. The Wildcats have allowed 70% of passes to be completed so far, with Ball State and EKU putting up an average of 221 yards through the air. Obviously, UK has the talent advantage at most positions, but I still feel good about where Akron is as far as talent goes. That's the only thing that has helped me talk myself away from the ledge after that near disaster last week. I don't think there's anyone in the program or around the program that doesn't think/know that this team is so much better than they've shown so far. Last year, the St. Francis game was quite a bit like the Morgan State game. Then at Michigan State, the offense really started to open up before the injury and turnovers. But, I was hoping that most issues and rigidness would have been ironed out after Temple and boy was I wrong. Crazier things have happened. Go Zips!

Hallenberger scores. 2-1.

Calm down please. I wasn't accusing you of anything. I was simply stating that I didn't want to continue that debate in the Women's Soccer thread.

The last home Zips MSOC match I missed was in 2006. That streak will be broken tonight, sadly so. This FloFC had better be excellent considering it costs $30/month. Let's see if the Friars dare to high press us. I suspect they will not.

I'm sorry, I don't understand the question. Do you mean the last win in another conference that Akron was in, or a non-conference win?

My point is that is the standard that the PLAYERS hold themselves to. So getting bent out of shape whens some fans feel the same way is, well, ridiculous. And that team won an NCAA tournament game, which at the time was a bare minimum expectation.

Too soon...

The last non-MAC football win was 11/23/1991 at Temple winning 37-32. We were a Division 1-A Independent

Sorry you can't be there. (I know that feeling for the next game. Ugh) I can't answer "in any sport", but looking at the Zips Men's Soccer Media Guide, it looks like the last non-MAC conference win for Zips Men's Soccer was 10/27/1991 4-1 win at Western Illinois in the Mid-Continent Conference under Coach Steve Parker.

I agree with YipaZip and expect as always, any dissenting view to get thumbs down from the three High Priests of the "Soccer" sub-forum. Whose expectations, and who sets "The Standard" ? It might be YOUR standard and your expectations, but did you get buy-in from the Athletics Department? Yipa is right, since the return from CoVid, attendance is pathetic and there seems to be no move to increase it. I had hopes when I heard they had finally hired a full-time Marketing Asst. AD, but have seen nothing yet to ally my hopes. And it's not just Soccer, it's basketball, football, what have you. It used to be TONS of youth soccer teams at the games, TONS of advertising announcements, lots of on field and off field promotions. Meanwhile, NCAA men's soccer programs around the country have improved dramatically since 2018, just look at the teams that have made the tourney those years vs. ones from the 2010-2014 seasons. Sure there are the usuals but there are a lot of "first time" teams that surprised by getting in and surprised by winning matches. The competition has caught up to the Zips. And face it, if the Zips weren't relevant, they probably wouldn't have gotten At-large bids, and certainly not a top 16 first round bye last year after losing the last two matches to WMU.

While the offense does run a number of RPOs, not every play is an RPO. If it was, you would see some type of mesh between the QB and RB every play. To say the defense dictates the calls is somewhat true. Anytime the numbers are even, 5 vs 5 (it’s usually 5 vs 6) or 6 vs 6, a run is always an option. They just haven’t been called as much as they could (and probably should) have been. Lingard even had a 5+ yard run last game when the numbers weren’t in our favor. Coach has said himself that they need to run more, get the running backs more touches, and have the OL run block more efficiently. No one is saying run the ball against a stacked box. Although, RBs should be expected to make one person miss, especially when running inside/outside zone. Also keep in mind most of the sports media is filled with people that never played or coached football, so how they present the information is in a view with limited background.

"He’ll become a play-calling coordinator here in a very short time, and I would suspect within 10 years, he’ll be a head coach somewhere.” Joe still has the keys, but looking to turn them over soon. Thank you for sharing.

Very good read and instructive for some, I hope. Some want Akron to run more. The type of offense they play has a run in it every time they line up. The defense dictates run or pass, not the offense. Running for the sake of running will fail when the defense is lined up to stop it. I suffered through the last years of Jim Grobe at Wake Forest and saw first hand how this running for the sake of running fails. The rest of the world moved to RPO and Grobe was still blasting the fullback into the line for one yard gains. It was insanity. They brought in an RPO coach, which attracted better QBs/WRs and have now won the second most games in the ACC since 2018 after a choppy start for Clawson. The Zips have a great offensive scheme. The problem is execution. If Akron can get the passing game in a better place by completing passes short, medium and long, the running game will open. If not, well......

If these two are our best options, and they are, 5 wins is not a realistic expectation. Irons simply doesn't win games and U is a turnover machine that will cause losing when the competition level increases. QB play is more important than ever. Good QB play is central to winning in 2023. I don't care if that QB is on the team for next year or a transfer to be named later, but Akron can never win with the current quality of QB on the field.

What a huge bummer. It can be revived though. Charles needs to prioritize this. It looks great when kids show up!

Not bad for the non relevant Zips!!!

Akron men’s soccer has not won an NCAA tournament game since 2018 (someone can correct me if I am wrong). That is not acceptable. The standard is NCAA National Championships not losing in the first round or not making the tournament. YipaZip - the standard is the standard and we have fallen below expectations. So it is a fair statement that we have lost relevance. One other note why do we continue to talk about women’s soccer on the men’s soccer board? This needs moved to another section.

I'm very eager to see the Big East schedule begin. It seems weird to be ranked at the top as the new member but I guess it also justifies our invitation. Then again, they will all be gunning for us and it will be a tough competition for the BE title. Go Zips!