Z.I.P.

Saw Monmouth play -- and beat Akron -- in basketball back in 2000. At Neal Blaisdell Center here on the isle. Didja ever hear Dizzy Gillespie play their fight song? That's sweet.

Regarding Mitch Browning -- I remember that before Brookhart took the job, a coordinator from Minniesota turned us down -- was that Mitch? Think he would give us any more chance this time?

Any chance for TV coverage of any games before the final four???THXNo national cable coverage. Not sure if regional type (Fox Sports, etc.) networks ever broadcast -- don't remember it ever being shown prior to College Cup. But, I'm willing to wait for three weeks. Hope for good weather in Nawth Ca'olina. Next year no worries, as I invite all to join Z.I.P. and L.A. Zip in sunny Southern/Central California Wine Country. How'd my pinot noire get a head?

And they beat Humboldt State -- twice in three weeks!

haha I sure hope they schedule morgan state again next year at the info! I'd love to see another sell out. Maybe if we move down to FCS we'd sell out every game?Who's tougher, Morgan State, Massillon or McKinley?

Since you asked, here were all the conference finals results - courtesy of Top Drawer Soccer. They don't mention that the MAC does not have an automatic bid this year.Also, for the question on why Butler will go on the road as a #12 seed, according to big soccer.com Butler did not put in a bid to host. Teams still have to do that - I could have seen something odd like that happening to us given our starange history. Anyway, the conference tournament results:America East: Stony Brook 2, UMBC 0Leonardo Fernandes and Raphael Abreu scored to give the 6-9-4 Seawolves a surprise bid to the NCAA Tournament.Atlantic 10: St. Louis 2, Dayton 0Michael Robson and Michael Roach scored for the Billikens in the final.ACC: Virginia 1, NC State 0Will Bates scored the winner and Diego Restrepo recorded the shutout in goal for the Cavaliers.Atlantic Sun: Stetson 2, Mercer 1Griffin Gilstrap scored twice to lead the Hatters to the crown.Big East: St. John's 0, Notre Dame 0 (St. John's advanced on penalties 4-2)St. John's won on penalties after 110 minutes of scoreless play. Derby Carillo came up with the pivotal post-match save.Big South: Winthrop 2, Liberty 1Matthew Skonicki and Stephen Nsereko each scored to lift Winthrop.Big Ten: Ohio State 1, Penn State 0David Tiemstra scored a last-minute winner for the Buckeyes. Big West: UC Irvine 4, UC Santa Barbara 1Gray Bailey, Carlos Aguilar, Spencer Thompson and Irving Garcia scored for the Anteaters. CAA: UNC Wilmington 1, Northeastern 0Nassim Berhouni scored the winner for the Seahawks. Brock Duckworth recorded the shutout in goal.Conference USA: Tulsa 3, Marshall 0Austin Neil, Justin Chavez and Jose Parada scored for the Golden Hurricane. Andy Aguilar recorded the shutout in goal.Horizon: Wisconsin-Green Bay 0, Butler 0 (Wisconsin-Green Bay advances on penalties, 3-2)Ivy: Harvard won the regular season title with a 1-0 victory over Penn. Richard Smith scored the winner and Austin Harms recorded the shutout in goal.Metro Atlantic: Loyola (MD) 1, Niagara 0Matt Tyrie scored late in overtime to lift the Greyhounds to the win. Kyle Wittman recorded the shutout in goal.MAC: Akron 2, Hartwick 1Darlington Nagbe scored the game-winning goal to give the Zips a perfect 20-0-0 record heading to the NCAA Tournament.Missouri Valley: Drake 2, Evansville 1Kevin Shrout scored the winner for the Bulldogs.Mountain Pacific: Sacramento State 2, New Mexico 2 (Sacramento State advances on penalties, 5-4)Matt Linenberger scored a late equalizer for the Hornets, who then prevailed on penalties.Northeast: Monmouth 2, Quinnipiac 1Chase Barbieri and Ryan Kinne scored for the Hawks to push their record to 18-1-1.Pac-10: UCLA drew with San Diego State 1-1. The Bruins had already won the Pac-10 title. California upset Stanford 1-0 on a Jacob Wilson winner, while Danny Mwanga scored twice in a 3-2 win by Oregon State over Washington.Patriot: Bucknell 1, American 0Brendan Burgdorf scored on a 15th-minute header to lead the Bison to victory.Southern: Wofford 2, Elon 1Wilson Hood and Kentrel Owens scored for the Terriers.Summit: Western Illinois 1, UMKC 0Another title for the Leathernecks as Oskar Gasecki scored the winner and Stephen Paterson recorded a shutout in goal.West Coast: San Diego clinched the regular season title with a scoreless draw against St. Mary's (CA) on Friday, who finishes 2nd.Thanks Doc And the ability to recite all this from memory is truly astounding!

Amazing no one is saying "Bring Back Big Jim Dennison", since the nation has long ago erected his statue on this site.

Alright, I will give my most complete opinionation available between office emergencies.1. Akron's first (tournament second) round opponent, USF, is tougher than the third rounder (e.g., the Boys from Orange Cty, or any of the other Californicators) is liable to be, and possibly the quarter-finalists (NWU/UT) as well. All-in-all though, it's good to get a West Coaster to travel so they learn we are not to be fooled with, such as by overlooking our Hermann Trophy nominee. And we have a possible rematch vs Irvine @ their place in Sept of 2011.2. THE Suckeye University went from a 'bubble team" to the #4 overall in three days??? Just so they don't have to play another Ohio university?3. St John's with only nine wins receives a first-round bye. Howdeydodat?4. I wish I had time to study all the events that went on over the weekend. Maybe Zach can enlighten us -- who won the Big East, MVC, Pac-10, MPSF, etc.5. Here's my one dark horse favorite to break the Big Guys lock on the Final Four: Harvard Crimson over UVa in the quarterfinals. And...Indiana vs St John's quarterfinal in the bracket below ours -- THAT is the easiest bracket in sight.

Who is ESPN's analyst?

Well, one coach told me Jimmy would be playing in the NBA. He's now the HC at VCU! So, who knows?!

OK, I thought I heard on this board that schools don't fire their coaches during the season...(?)What it means is, the run to the front of the coaching line-up has begun. Memphis wants to be first in line. Where does Akron want to be? Hey, JD, you might have to win Friday -- just to still be around in another week!

We know that Akron has only a couple of scholarships to hand out this year -- not sure if the present two will fill the complete ballot, or if there may be one more to come. However, other schools have more room to pack their rosters, and from ESPN Rise's recruiting list it appears that several members of the US U-17 World Cup team, which completed their run by losing out to Italy in the quarterfinals will be playing at the college level, rather than trying to make it abroad as professionals.I would say the top recent recruit is U-17 star Jared Watts, a difference maker for the USA team, verballing to Wake Forest. Great get for Jay Vidovich. UCLA had earlier gotten perhaps the MVP of the class 0f 2010 in U-17 starting GK Earl Edwards and also has Victor Chavez, who proved to be a key forward for the US. More recently, Michigan has gotten a verbal commitment form Sonny Saad and Creighton has received Tyler Polak, a backline mate of Akron recruit Perry Kitchen. One of the most athletic members of the U-17 team, Zach Herold is going to South Florida, which is building a top-10 level program for the future. The little (maybe 5-2) South African defender from Louisville I mentioned maybe a recruiting target of Akron and UL, Lepe Seetane -- he is going to be a Northwestern Wildcat. They Indiana HS fullback Eriq Zavaleta, who played, but did not impress at the WC, is in the Class of 2011. And apparently, Kitchen also falls into the "Did not impress" category, as he was subbed after one-half of the opener vs Spain, and did not return for the remainder of the tournament. Shades of Kofi Sarkodie. Hey--that's not so bad after all. See the total recruiting list:http://sports.espn.go.com/highschool/rise/...tory?id=3860470

Lack of interest? They could just as well cancel it this year -- since only one team has any chance of making the past-season -- no matter what happens! I guess that puts a little pressure on that one team, but maybe they need pressure, and the practice NIU and Hartwick will offer. I bet we lead HU at halftime this time (provided they beat - WMU?).

I'd look for St John's to somehow squeeze into the field. On the other hand, the other top-5 pre-season team that has struggled, Creighton, may need divine intervention. AND New Mexico will aided by the fact that it's their men's and not their women's team that's in question! UNM BYU

Glad to see the Zippers move up to the #1 slot, but man, this list makes me wonder! How in the world can Santa Barbara and Louisville be #32 and 34 with their wins? And Dayton with 13 wins is just #74. How do they get so far behind e.g., Harvard and Tulsa? Hopefully the committee will not rely too much on this RPI scheme, and leave out deserving teams.

Well...here's my prediction: We are going to get run over while playing right into their hands.When has a JD Brookhart-coached team ever shown the ability to adapt to what the opposition puts on the field -- or for that matter to what they have on the field themselves?So, my analysis says, to be competitive, Akron must not only STOP this dude Pierce who has 89 carries in the past three games, but must make plays and turn the ball over the same way Miami did last week -- and better yet, help out Patrick & Co. by putting points on the board defensively. Does anyone know if Devoe will be able to play this week? He seems to give us the long running threat we lack otherwise.

This sounds good to me, because as any Zips fan knows: We own Huber Heights! Our most recent recruits from there were NSCAA and Parade All-Americas Kofi Sarkodie and Chad Barson. --edit-- Gozips.com shows Barson from Lewis Center in Columbus area, but I thought that he and Kofi were both Huberians, and they played together for several years prior to Akron. So...Keith should be consulting with Caleb -- if he can get on Caleb's schedule -- regarding the twin recruiting targets from Dayton's NE side. Let's set our roots in Huber Heights.

Or the cheapest...

+1...With all due respect to the band, but futbol and bands don't mix. Sorry.what about the seattle sounders and their unique sound wave marching band?Having been to Qwest field this season, the best thing I can say about Drew's invention is that they are usually drowned out by the sound of the Sounders supporters section. They're so far from the field (at least were at the Barca game) that you can't hear them very well. They're just background noise to the real happening. They do add something to the pre-game march the supporters make to the stadium from the bar quarter though. They're a positive contribution to the atmosphere OUTSIDE the stadium.

+1...With all due respect to the band, but futbol and bands don't mix. Sorry.

Here's what stuck out on THIS one: Butler #4; Dayton #5; tOSU #6. But as we all know the rule -- if there are two midmajors in the same subregion -- they play each other on day 1!

And the GOOD NEWS is, he's NOT a carbon copy of Josh Egner. They have two completely different games. As different as night and day. As different as Andy and Bryan Hipsher. Well, that may not be the best example... And may cause Captain an apoplexy.

People, and I especially mean you Rowdies. Artificial noisemakers are the worst thing you can have at a futbol game. The intent is to make as much noise as you can with your OWN voice, chanting, singing, making general raucousness. If you want artificial, bring flares, smoke bombs, etc. Pretend your at the Bernabeu in Madrid or la Bombanera in Buenos Aires. Make Akron world famous among futbalistos!

Thank you for saving me $28.99 Zach! Blue Ribbon used to be worth the money, but it's gone downhill over the past few years. Ronnie Steward! Anything we get from him is gravy, man.

Still 1-0??? Should be in final 10 about now.