MDZip

Probably wouldn't have been good either, he was a heavyweight.

I talked to Tom about this tonight. He said he did contact the selection committee and was told that Connecticut and Georgetown both had 3 top 30 wins where Akron only had one and both had beaten St. Johns when Akron only tied them. When he pointed out that they both also had a loss outside of the top 30 and Akron lost only the the top RPI team, he was told perhaps they should have looked a little deeper into it. He did attempt to get an explanation but that was a pretty poor one. Water under the bridge now. Go Zips!!! Beat Michigan (yet again)! Maybe we're in their heads now.

Fortunately, they did not televise my free throw shooting debacle. I volunteered to shoot free throws against an Oklahoma State fan for 30 seconds. I made all of one. He made two.

Here are the field goal numbers from four different players from today's game. 5-14 4-14 2-9 1-10 No one player lost this one. Maddeningly, tantalizingly close to a big win (sigh).

Since the game is so early tomorrow morning, guess we have to start this one tonight. I'm not at all confident of a Zips win without some of our key players but I always have hope. Besides, the Zips logo looks nice out on the hotel marquee.

Nice job George, I think that should be the Zips mantra - "Just win the whole f***ing thing"

How do we know they're weak? They had a good year last year and The Big South has sent some pretty good teams to the NCAA tournament before. Lets wait a bit before we decide how good or bad they are (and consequently how good or bad that loss was).

And that goal was on a rainy night against WVU where Meves slipped and fell, otherwise he stops it. Once again Zips, go out and show the NCAA what idiots they are.

Apparently the committee must take more than just RPI into account. And Notre Dame played nine teams that made the tournament (but played some twice because of the Big East tournament), so strength of schedule is roughly comparable. Akron played eight, but ND lost THREE times and tied once. Don't see how that is the top seed with other worthy candidates with better resumes.

I think Notre Dame is overseeded as well. Maryland and Akron should have been above them. Notre Dame is going to have a tough time with UNC, same with Georgetown and UCLA and of course UConn with Akron. Time to go bust some brackets.

Everyone but the Big East took it in the shorts. Nice of the NCAA to make sure that none of their big four coul meet until the final, yet it was perfectly OK to send #2 Maryland up against the same ACC foe in the third round, Wake, that just beat them. Rooting against every Big East team now.

Does that mean we got a 5 seed? Are you watching it?

You seem surprised, sadly most of us are not.

I think I found it - this should give the live link when it starts. http://www.ncaa.com/sports/soccer-men/d1

Anyone know what network is televising the NCAA slection show? ESPN and Fox Soccer channel don't have it - is it televised? Or on-line somewhere?

OK SeeTee, I'll bite. Akron is a relative newcomer to college football in an area that was already overloaded with D-1 teams. There are 8 FBS schools in Ohio and Ohio probably doesn't have the talent to supply all of them with high level players. However, every one of them has seen a high level of success in the last ten years (except, you could argue, Akron) so its not impossible. Look at other states like Florida, until recently they only had three FBS schools, now they are at seven and plenty of talent in Florida to supply them (and enough for other out of state schools to swoop in and grab some quality as well). Texas is similar, with 11 FBS schools but lots of talent and population in the state. California is even better off with only seven FBS and tons of talent. With Akron being a relative newcomer, with no real tradition or cachet, its tough to attract good players and the awful facilities didn't help (but even then there was some measure of success). A lot of it comes down to the coach, his system and philosophy that matters that much in college sports, why do you think the good ones get paid so much? I don't think we've ever really had a good one. What happened to all our former coaches? Not one was offered another FBS head coaching job. I'm willing to let the Terry Bowden era play out because I think we still struck gold with him. If he can't do it, I'm not sure who could. How might we be feeling right now if Paul Winters was coach? Do you he might have gotten more out of this lot? Could anyone? What if iCoach was still around? Wow. So I'll let Terry work his longer term plan and stick with him while he tries to gain some short term victories. What could help? I hate to mention this because its one of the things people tend to dislike the most about Akron, but the one advantage we might have is the open enrollment policy. Chuck Amato thought that non-qualifiers helped us years ago, lets go get him some now. I'm not talking about it as a long term strategy but at least to get the ship righted in the short term. JUCO's, kids who couldn't get in anywhere else because of grades or SAT's, welcome them, we're the Statue of Liberty school - bring us the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Open enrollment is a lemon, let's make some lemonade. Of couse there is a real risk here, you do have to worry about APR, so my solution there is we list all of the soccer players (men and women) as backup kickers (I suspect that is what's starting to occur at Can't ) so we can mix their GPA's and graduation rates in the bunch. Time to start thinking out of the box, I see movie potential in this one.

Nov. 19th

The top five in RPI are in order, Notre Dame, Akron, Maryland, Georgetown and UCLA. That's probably the top five seeds in some order. Notre Dame benefits greatly from the Big East and I have no problem if there are two Big East teams as one of the top four seeds but I think both Maryland and Akron can make a better claim for the top spot. Maryland's one loss was to a good Wake Forest team, 11-3-5, at Wake Forest and the Zips lost only to Notre Dame, at Notre Dame. Notre Dame's OOC isn't anything spectacular (partly it's good because they played Akron) and they lost to a Big Ten team that didn't even make their conference final (plus the Zips won the Big Ten this year ) in addition to two losses in conference. Outside of Louisville and UCLA, Maryland's OOC is nothing special and they played all but one game at home. So overall strength of schedule probably favors ND just a bit, but three losses should rule them out of the top spot. If I look at the top five, I go Akron, Maryland, Notre Dame, UCLA, Georgetown, (and to round it out) North Carolina, Connecticut and Marquette. And for a grin, do you know how many OOC schools the Zips played this year with a losing record? One - tOSU. Notre Dame OOC vs Duke 8-8-2 vs San Diego State 7-9-3 vs Clemson 6-9-5 vs Oregon State 6-9-3 vs Akron 17-1-2 vs Michigan State 11-9-1 at Michigan 10-9-1 at Indiana 11-5-3 at Northwestern 11-5-4 (L) Maryland OOC vs Louisville 12-5-1 vs UCLA 13-2-1 (D) vs California 8-7-3 vs UMBC 11-4-5 vs Georgia State 6-12-0 at College of Charleston 8-10-1 vs Rutgers 7-7-1 vs Colgate 5-8-6 vs Lehigh 4-12-1

A few observations - one, that victory just set the all-time record for a conference unbeaten streak, 47 games, just passed Furman. Zips have gone 44-0-3 in MAC play since 2007, Pretty incredible. Two, the contributions that three of our seniors have made and the impact since they were Freshman is pretty astounding. While I had not forgotten the fine job David Meves did on penalty kicks against Virginia in 2009, I had forgotten that Scott Caldwell was used as one of the PK takers - and made it - in that contest even though he had not played a minute of the game. Don't really need to rehash what they did in the National Championship win the following year, but all three made key plays in that game, especially Chad Barson's knock away of the game tying goal with a minute left. They also led the team last year into the Sweet Sixteen yet again in a rebuilding year when no one gave them much of a chance. I believe in these three young men and believe they have an excellent chance of leading the team in claiming another National Championship. I will be in Hoover, AL if they do. On the opposite end of the spectrum, the MAC home page congratulated the Zips on their 2-1 win which would be great if they hadn't won 2-0. It even continued on the inside story where it quoted the Akron Sports Information Department on the 2-0 win and mentioned this was the Zips 16th shutout. Ah, accuracy.

Notre Dame 3 Georgetown 2 OT Looks like ND, the Zips, Maryland and maybe UCLA as the top four seeds.

Shortest penalty ever. One inch.

Nice to see a Jamel Turner sighting. Big QB sack.

All right!!! Showing a little heart. Back to within one score. Chisholm looked awesome on that drive.

The band just played the 1812 overture as a salute to veterans. That also, however, was used as the theme music for "The Bad News Bears". Coincidence it was used today? And I seriously hope you're kidding about Bowden, maybe we can somehow fire Ianello again?

They just interviewed Bowden on his way in for halftime and he stated that was the worst half of football he's seen since he's been here. He was pissed. Wouldn't want to be in that locker room at halftime. And for a small crowd, the booing was really audible. Wow.