Zips1991

Thanks for the update. Two injuries at once is no fun at all.

Anyone heard how long Barre will be out? I saw him with a cast on his wrist the last couple of games.

How about a push to move to 8 teams? That also gets rid of the byes. Or maybe 4.

Well, I thought the same for a minute. But then, I thought "they could just travel to local schools and get more players that way". I could see budget affecting our ability to get quality players but not so much affecting the number of players. But I'm sure our budget doesn't help matters at all either.

I've never been there but it looks like it would be tough to shoot there, based on how it looks on TV. It reminds me of the ballrooms that some of the early season tournaments are held in, just bigger.

I agree, it just stinks that it's so early in the conference schedule.

I've been worrying about Miami's 3-point shooting (and our lack of 3-point defense) for several days now. Someone please tell me why we're gonna be okay in this game. 😆

I need someone to explain to me like a 5th grader why we only signed 8 HS players while everyone else was 15-20+

I did some quick googling of each player, mainly looking at their Transfer Market pages to get a sense of the competition levels they were playing at. Giannis Gazis: https://www.transfermarkt.us/giannis-gazis/profil/spieler/1226505 Most recently played for Panathinaikos U-19s, appearing in 4 matches. His page also notes that he played for Greece U-17s Noa Testa: https://www.transfermarkt.com/noa-testa/profil/spieler/937514 Most recently played for the 2nd team at FC Lausanne-Sport. Their 2nd team is in the 3rd tier of Swiss soccer. Played in 6 matches and recorded an assist. Johan N’Ganzadi: https://www.transfermarkt.us/johan-nganzadi/profil/spieler/743397 He is already listed as an Akron player on his profile. Most recently played for a 5th tier team in Belgium. Played for several youth teams of larger clubs including Genk (2018-2020) and Standard de Liège. His page notes that he played for Belgium U-17s.

I understand that the league wants to use the early conference dates (which are not subject to wildcard selection) to get some of the lesser teams on national team, so the top teams can be televised later in the season, but it's not like they didn't know this was going to be a good matchup coming into the season. And with it being the only meeting between the two, they should've made certain it was televised.

I'm here to admit I was wrong. 😆

Miami up 36-15 already. Is it possible that BG are once again frauds? 😆

I know UMass is not that great but they're only -2.5 tonight at EMU. If I were a betting man (which I'm not at this present moment), I'd be on that for UMass. At least on the moneyline.

It's been said many times on this site but replacing all the bleachers with chair backs would be the biggest possible improvement for the JAR. It's not like the slightly reduced capacity is gonna be an issue.

Miami is now receiving one vote in the coaches poll. They had previously only received votes in the AP poll, I believe. This week's AP poll is not released yet.

I was impressed by the crowd based on all of those factors also. I don't see an official attendance listed in the box score like usual but it was better than some of the other games. The youth teams and family that were in attendance certainly helped. And I don't think they kids will care who the opponent was, they'll remember the Zips winning by 51.

Five, as me and my brother will be there. As long as we don't get blown off the freeway on our way there.

Good point! I'm ready for a nice crowd at the JAR but I don't think that's gonna happen until the Kent game on January 30th. Will they bring the north upper baseline seats back for that game? I would think so.

That's what I'm thinking but the attendance for PSU-Shenango was only 1,108 and that was with students in attendance while today's game is during winter break. So, I think it's gonna be close. 😅

Actually, no. Official attendance, maybe. Which begs the question, when was the last time the official attendance was less than 1,000 outside of covid?

I like the idea of adding players from in-conference as they have experience against the same opponents we'll be playing. Plus, in theory, it weakens your competition which is a nice bonus. Both sound like good additions but especially Benitez.

I jumped the gun, he's now listed as Out on the updated availability for tonight.

Enrique is listed as available for tonight's game after being recalled from Iowa earlier today. To my knowledge, this is the first time he's available for Minnesota this year. https://x.com/i/status/2003519298556633267

The dangers of Elon Musk's X, where anyone can get themselves verified.

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.