UCSB Game

[tbozeglav]

convinced myself to not post right after the game. instead, went to the bar, got tons of beers, and slept it off.

Thoughts as they come to me:

• Our passing was horrid and felt too lazy. We werent making many direct passes allowing defenders to slip in and take it away. Additionally, i felt like many of our passes were done with too much traffic allowing for UCSB to intercept them
  
• On the flip side, wtf was with all the passing in the final 3rd? with the game tied and time dwindling, why weren't we attacking, taking shots, and trying to win the game? Seemed like nobody wanted to step up and wanted to pass it off... Im sure thats not the case, but it sure as hell seemed like it
  
• UCSB played us REALLY well. Very strong and athletic and was able to just manhandle us around the ball at times. Whenever we would drive the ball, they seemed to always have a guy nearby to defend, if not another to try and intercept the ball.
  
• That crossbar deserved to be the player of the game.
  
• I didnt notice myself while watching (too frustrated), but if Luke was in fact pulled from the game, I would be concerned as to what happened to prompt that. That cannot happen again....
  
• Meves.... UCSB's 2 goals in regulation were pretty good, though the first one I though Meves played it too far to his right to protect the far post. The second goal was just a fantastic play by the UCSB guy (name escapes me). The OT goal... well, i guess that happens so I am not sure how to grade Meves there. He was certainly frustrating at times tonight, but at least his tackle when picking up a ball was epic HAHA!
  
• While UCSB is far better, I view this game as the CSU game last year. Hopefully things repeat themselves
  
• I am hoping this team comes together over the next 2 days and puts a shelling on NIU.
  

[GoZips]

For me, chalk this game up to logistics.

Professional football teams do not make three time zone travel plans for the day before

their game. They arrive two or three days prior to allow the players to adapt to the time

difference.

Had it been up to me I would have sent the team straight out of Chicago right after the

Western Michigan. Thus, giving the players three days to allow their body clocks to

adjust to Pacific time.

The Zips are not out of the woods now returning three time zones and facing Northern

Illinois on Saturday. The home win streak is in real jeopardy.

[fknbuflobo]

For me, chalk this game up to logistics.

Professional football teams do not make three time zone travel plans for the day before

their game. They arrive two or three days prior to allow the players to adapt to the time

difference.

Had it been up to me I would have sent the team straight out of Chicago right after the

Western Michigan. Thus, giving the players three days to allow their body clocks to

adjust to Pacific time.

The Zips are not out of the woods now returning three time zones and facing Northern

Illinois on Saturday. The home win streak is in real jeopardy.

I agree. The home streak is in jeopardy. Zips had better figure it out soon or this season will be looked upon as a significant regression.

[bisbee]

We all agree that they looked terrible yesterday.This is still only a one loss team with 3 freshmen starting. 6 of remaining 9 regular season games are at home. I think we will be OK come playoff time. No way this team ought to be as good as Zips teams from past few years. But lets not panic at this point. I am sure Porter will get them back on track.

[TheTank123]

For me, chalk this game up to logistics.

Professional football teams do not make three time zone travel plans for the day before

their game. They arrive two or three days prior to allow the players to adapt to the time

difference.

Had it been up to me I would have sent the team straight out of Chicago right after the

Western Michigan. Thus, giving the players three days to allow their body clocks to

adjust to Pacific time.

The Zips are not out of the woods now returning three time zones and facing Northern

Illinois on Saturday. The home win streak is in real jeopardy.

I agree. The home streak is in jeopardy. Zips had better figure it out soon or this season will be looked upon as a significant regression.

Come on man. They lost 1 game on the road to a very good UCSB team. These kids have been playing together for 9 games. Anyone who wasn't expecting some form of regression is insane. Three new starters on defense and three new starters in the midfield is tough for any team to integrate. Take a look at the UCSB roster. Not one freshman played, 2 sophomores, and the rest were juniors and seniors. That's a 3-4 year age difference for a lot of these players. They will be fine.

[Z.I.P.]

Come on man. They lost 1 game on the road to a very good UCSB team. These kids have been playing together for 9 games. Anyone who wasn't expecting some form of regression is insane. Three new starters on defense and three new starters in the midfield is tough for any team to integrate. Take a look at the UCSB roster. Not one freshman played, 2 sophomores, and the rest were juniors and seniors. That's a 3-4 year age difference for a lot of these players. They will be fine.

I'm in most agreement with Tank on this one. Let's not commiserate, let's get to work -- because if we don't shore up the shape of our defense and passing, things could get worse.

On another thread, Teal Bunbury talked about how Caleb's style was to have ten guys playing defense -- that strategy broke down in SB County last night. At the half, Caleb complained about play being "too open", that his team didn't hold the ball at midfield. I think that was Coach Vom Steeg's strategy -- to hurry up the Zips in passing more quickly than they wanted. These were too very good college teams, who played a very exciting game for the spectators. As I said earlier, UCSB has some excellent players, but they are VERY inconsistent. Their post-season is not assured by this win. Now a Q: Is David Mayer still on this team?? He and Quinn looked so good early on. I miss David's confidence and on-ball skill.

[fknbuflobo]

OK. I will back away from the ledge. But it was disconcerting to see our MF shredded as it was last night. I hope it was a blip on the radar screen and not a fundamental flaw surfacing.

[tbozeglav]

OK. I will back away from the ledge. But it was disconcerting to see our MF shredded as it was last night. I hope it was a blip on the radar screen and not a fundamental flaw surfacing.

i think your hopes are closer to reality. UCSB, based on what I watched, played us very well and did an EXCELLENT job at disrupting our flow. There were times where we were able to settle into our game for a minute or two, but UCSB would find a way to disrupt our passing and press into the second and final 3rd of the field. I give a lot of credit to their preparation for the game.

Side note: the West has not been kind to us this year.

[Zip_ME87]

Side note: the West has not been kind to us this year.

On this note, let's not schedule like this again. A trip to the west for a tournament is fine, but not for a midweek game. BTW, is UCSB scheduling a trip to Akron next season? Their fans seemed to be ok with us coming to them, but afraid for them to come to Akron.

[TheTank123]

OK. I will back away from the ledge. But it was disconcerting to see our MF shredded as it was last night. I hope it was a blip on the radar screen and not a fundamental flaw surfacing.

i think your hopes are closer to reality. UCSB, based on what I watched, played us very well and did an EXCELLENT job at disrupting our flow. There were times where we were able to settle into our game for a minute or two, but UCSB would find a way to disrupt our passing and press into the second and final 3rd of the field. I give a lot of credit to their preparation for the game.

Side note: the West has not been kind to us this year.

I think the California teams are perpetually underrated. Far and away the best state in the country for youth soccer, it makes logical sense that their college teams would be good as well.

[bisbee]

The west coast teams also suffer from geographical problems. They are relatively isolated from the vast majority of mens soccer programs and thus don't get the same media coverage as teams to the east. additionally,it is tough for them to play teams from midwest and east because of the travel expenses involved. I definitely agree with your assessment about the California youth soccer programs. UCSb also has a significant number of foreign players on their roster (9 I think). There is a local private school that seems to supply them with a never ending number of African players. Not an excuse,just a fact.

[Z.I.P.]

The west coast teams also suffer from geographical problems. They are relatively isolated from the vast majority of mens soccer programs and thus don't get the same media coverage as teams to the east. additionally,it is tough for them to play teams from midwest and east because of the travel expenses involved. I definitely agree with your assessment about the California youth soccer programs. UCSb also has a significant number of foreign players on their roster (9 I think). There is a local private school that seems to supply them with a never ending number of African players. Not an excuse,just a fact.

Wow! That's the school that shares the parking lot with the Los Olivos Grocery, the stop-off for picnic supplies on the way to wine drinking! It's a very small school from appearances. Now I know what kind of "boarding" takes place there. I think most of the soccer players are from Ghana.

Coincidental trivia (Sorry -- non-soccer related!): About three miles away -- believe it or not, across the street from Michael Jackson's Neverland Ranch is another high school. In 1948 a former Akron Central HS, and Can't State basketball star hired an agency to find him a basketball coaching job. They sent him to that school, which was just starting up, and he spent several years coaching HS ball there, but went further afield, and essentially invented the modern method of scouting college basketball teams. He created in his house in Santa Barbara, a coaches guide to every Div 1 college team in the nation, for which he was paid well, and he was able to hire a small army of scouts across the nation. Because of his acumen at scouting teams and basketball prospects -- especially centers, he was hired in the 1960s as an assistant coach and scout by the Los Angeles Lakers. He would go on to coach for the Lakers for over 40 years, coaching every center between Wilt Chamberlain and the guy the've got now. His name is Bill Bertka, and I had the pleasure of meeting him in Hawaii, in 1994 when he was scouting the North Carolina-Michigan game. I knew who he was, because he wore a T-shirt for the Akron Awnings semi-pro football team from the 1930s-40s. My dad and uncle played for the Awnings. True story!

[bisbee]

The west coast teams also suffer from geographical problems. They are relatively isolated from the vast majority of mens soccer programs and thus don't get the same media coverage as teams to the east. additionally,it is tough for them to play teams from midwest and east because of the travel expenses involved. I definitely agree with your assessment about the California youth soccer programs. UCSb also has a significant number of foreign players on their roster (9 I think). There is a local private school that seems to supply them with a never ending number of African players. Not an excuse,just a fact.

Wow! That's the school that shares the parking lot with the Los Olivos Grocery, the stop-off for picnic supplies on the way to wine drinking! It's a very small school from appearances. Now I know what kind of "boarding" takes place there. I think most of the soccer players are from Ghana.

Coincidental trivia (Sorry -- non-soccer related!): About three miles away -- believe it or not, across the street from Michael Jackson's Neverland Ranch is another high school. In 1948 a former Akron Central HS, and Can't State basketball star hired an agency to find him a basketball coaching job. They sent him to that school, which was just starting up, and he spent several years coaching HS ball there, but went further afield, and essentially invented the modern method of scouting college basketball teams. He created in his house in Santa Barbara, a coaches guide to every Div 1 college team in the nation, for which he was paid well, and he was able to hire a small army of scouts across the nation. Because of his acumen at scouting teams and basketball prospects -- especially centers, he was hired in the 1960s as an assistant coach and scout by the Los Angeles Lakers. He would go on to coach for the Lakers for over 40 years, coaching every center between Wilt Chamberlain and the guy the've got now. His name is Bill Bertka, and I had the pleasure of meeting him in Hawaii, in 1994 when he was scouting the North Carolina-Michigan game. I knew who he was, because he wore a T-shirt for the Akron Awnings semi-pro football team from the 1930s-40s. My dad and uncle played for the Awnings. True story!

The Akron Awnings

[bisbee]

Apparently the mascot of the Dunn School is the Earwig Wonder who has the joy of wearing that mascot costume

[GoZips]

Folks, most of you are missing my point. I am NOT criticizing the team.

I am referring to physiology. The human body and mind. Scheduling a mid-week

game 2,500 miles from home is a disaster. I doubt that coach Porter will ever do

this again.

Not only did the team not have time to adjust to the three time zone time difference

they fly home on short rest to face a pretty decent opponent in NIU.

The trip to UCSB was poorly thought out. Anyone who travels to the west coast

from Ohio regularly knows exactly what I am talking about. It is a trip too far.

[bisbee]

Folks, most of you are missing my point. I am NOT criticizing the team.

I am referring to physiology. The human body and mind. Scheduling a mid-week

game 2,500 miles from home is a disaster. I doubt that coach Porter will ever do

this again.

Not only did the team not have time to adjust to the three time zone time difference

they fly home on short rest to face a pretty decent opponent in NIU.

The trip to UCSB was poorly thought out. Anyone who travels to the west coast

from Ohio regularly knows exactly what I am talking about. It is a trip too far.

I have to agree with you. It's tough enough to play 3 games in eight days but factor in the travel,time changes,and stress and you have a set up for potential poor performance. Hopefully they get refocused and ready for Saturday and the friendly confines

of First Energy-Cub Cadet.

[Zip_ME87]

Folks, most of you are missing my point. I am NOT criticizing the team.

I am referring to physiology. The human body and mind. Scheduling a mid-week game 2,500 miles from home is a disaster. I doubt that coach Porter will ever do this again.

Not only did the team not have time to adjust to the three time zone time difference they fly home on short rest to face a pretty decent opponent in NIU.

The trip to UCSB was poorly thought out. Anyone who travels to the west coast from Ohio regularly knows exactly what I am talking about. It is a trip too far.

I have to agree with you. It's tough enough to play 3 games in eight days but factor in the travel,time changes,and stress and you have a set up for potential poor performance. Hopefully they get refocused and ready for Saturday and the friendly confines of First Energy-Cub Cadet.

I'm in absolute agreement. It's one thing to not shy away from anyone, but to travel to Western Michigan, return home, travel 2000 miles a few days later, play a game with no adjustment to the time difference, and then return home another 2000 miles to play a few days later is tough...especially for college student athletes who also have class work to do. I hope Caleb won't schedule like this again. Who cares about West Coast teams and their not being able to schedule well outside their region...Akron is my team and the only team about which I give a darn.

[TheTank123]

Folks, most of you are missing my point. I am NOT criticizing the team.

I am referring to physiology. The human body and mind. Scheduling a mid-week game 2,500 miles from home is a disaster. I doubt that coach Porter will ever do this again.

Not only did the team not have time to adjust to the three time zone time difference they fly home on short rest to face a pretty decent opponent in NIU.

The trip to UCSB was poorly thought out. Anyone who travels to the west coast from Ohio regularly knows exactly what I am talking about. It is a trip too far.

I have to agree with you. It's tough enough to play 3 games in eight days but factor in the travel,time changes,and stress and you have a set up for potential poor performance. Hopefully they get refocused and ready for Saturday and the friendly confines of First Energy-Cub Cadet.

I'm in absolute agreement. It's one thing to not shy away from anyone, but to travel to Western Michigan, return home, travel 2000 miles a few days later, play a game with no adjustment to the time difference, and then return home another 2000 miles to play a few days later is tough...especially for college student athletes who also have class work to do. I hope Caleb won't schedule like this again. Who cares about West Coast teams and their not being able to schedule well outside their region...Akron is my team and the only team about which I give a darn.

I really think you guys are missing the point of this game. The outcome means absolutely nothing save for "streaks" and records over the last however many seasons. This is the exact kind of game that Porter wants before we get to the playoffs. Travel, adversity, good teams, etc. Yes, the team did not look its best. Does the outcome of the game matter? Not for anything tangible.

[mes102]

Well, may not mean much for all of you now. But it mattered to me in two ways:

1) You can almost say home field advantage through the quarterfinals is out the window. One more tie or loss, and most likely we'll get just two home games with the quarterfinal on the road.

2) Last year's College Cup, the AK-Rowdies that went on the trip, met some/a lot of the Gaucho Locos and hanged out a lot before, during, and after the games. This game was a "bragging rights" type of game for the students that went on that trip.

My thoughts on the game. Worse defensive effort I've seen from the Zips since I started going to UA in fall of 2009. However, I feel GoZips hit the shot at the buzzer on this one. When you have an inexperienced bunch of newcomers, and you take a mid-week trip to Santa Barbara? The effort may not be all there, and to me, it showed. Have to remember, a lot of our players probably have never traveled over 2000 miles in the middle of the week before. The Cal-State Northridge tournament was not kind to us, and I feel this might be a part of those results as well.

Luckily for us, the College Cup is in Alabama. Hopefully we don't have to go to the West Coast for a quarterfinal match, or we may be in trouble again...

[bisbee]

Well, may not mean much for all of you now. But it mattered to me in two ways:

1) You can almost say home field advantage through the quarterfinals is out the window. One more tie or loss, and most likely we'll get just two home games with the quarterfinal on the road.

2) Last year's College Cup, the AK-Rowdies that went on the trip, met some/a lot of the Gaucho Locos and hanged out a lot before, during, and after the games. This game was a "bragging rights" type of game for the students that went on that trip.

My thoughts on the game. Worse defensive effort I've seen from the Zips since I started going to UA in fall of 2009. However, I feel GoZips hit the shot at the buzzer on this one. When you have an inexperienced bunch of newcomers, and you take a mid-week trip to Santa Barbara? The effort may not be all there, and to me, it showed. Have to remember, a lot of our players probably have never traveled over 2000 miles in the middle of the week before. The Cal-State Northridge tournament was not kind to us, and I feel this might be a part of those results as well.

Luckily for us, the College Cup is in Alabama. Hopefully we don't have to go to the West Coast for a quarterfinal match, or we may be in trouble again...

With only half the season gone how can you already be talking about losing home field advantage? It's not as if how Akron does from now on is the only determining factor. Everyone else also has to play. As a new comer to all this I am surprised at how upset some people are about a single loss. Like most teams we play much better at home and 6 of last nine are at Zips. Tank makes some good points about the travel stuff. This sort of thing could very well happen in the playoffs. Much better to figure it all out in what really is a game that doesn't matter then at playoff time. As I said in a previous post I thought the trasvel certainly could have affected how they played but I did not consider that this could have served as an "experiment" and learning experience for things to come. Porter is probably smarter than alot of us are giving him credit for vis a vis the trip to Santa Barbara. Bragging rights for students is not what these games are ultimately about for this program.

[Zip_ME87]

I really think you guys are missing the point of this game. The outcome means absolutely nothing save for "streaks" and records over the last however many seasons. This is the exact kind of game that Porter wants before we get to the playoffs. Travel, adversity, good teams, etc. Yes, the team did not look its best. Does the outcome of the game matter? Not for anything tangible.

I think you miss the point. The travel for this game is not the same as the College Cup. More days are allotted for travel for the Cup. Also, at Akron, classes and exams are complete before the Cup. If you mean travel for the NCAA Tournament prior to the Cup, it's still not the same. Only 1 game is played each week during the tournament. Yes, the pressure is greater because of the one and done situation, but the travel is not as difficult. I totally disagree with taking a long trip like this midweek with weekend games on either end...not good mid-season strategy. I didn't play, and I'm exhausted from the trip. There are plenty of great teams in the East and Midwest much closer who can provide the challenge/atmosphere. I have no problem playing a tournament like at Northridge (maybe Irvine in the future), but not a midweek, 1-game trip.

[mes102]

I'm not saying that bragging rights is for the program. You're completely misunderstanding my concept. I said FOR ME, it was a big game. To be honest, the Ohio State game is not more important as the games of UC-Santa Barbara, New Mexico, Cleveland State, and so on..

Everyone else is saying "It's better to see how we handle travel now than in the playoffs." With us not playing any MAC games yet, schools like UConn, North Carolina, and Maryland will have tougher conference slates than us. Don't forget about schools like Indiana, Louisville, and Notre Dame possibly making a run. Wouldn't count out New Mexico or UC-Irvine either. In year's pass, RPI meant a lot to the selection committee. I feel that it will be the same this year. Even though the rest of the MAC is gaining reputation(too bad more MAC teams didn't have men's soccer programs), but it's still not going to help our cause if someone rises up in the rankings that's already in top 15. If Michigan was ranked in top 15, after they lost to us, who knows how high they would of been seeded... Indiana can be a team to win out in Big Ten without the Big Ten being that great this year. That's another reason I feel we need to schedule more Big East/ACC schools than Big Ten schools...

I don't see us having home field advantage through three games...I definitely lock us for two home games. Just not three...

[Z.I.P.]

This game was an opportunity to play on national TV, in a game that the college soccer world paid attention to. Could Caleb have told the NSCAA, "Thanks, but no thanks". Sure, he could have, but that would have burned a bridge that's important to cultivate. I think he will think hard about this sort of scheduling situation in the future -- our program is at a point where we have a lot of credibility in the community, but it's still hard to say "no thanks" to the chance for national exposure for the program.

In a way, I'm impressed with the level of criticism from our own fans -- it shows just how high the bar has been set. Just DO realize as Bisbee said, the season's barely half-way over. I think, if we take care of business, we still have a good chance, especially if our W Coast opponents finish strong (though they can beat up on each other) to get a top-4 seed come November. And even if they don't -- that doesn't mean they will have to play on the road, since there are upsets and the games are played at the highest seed -- unless the NCAA doesn't like your field!

I was thinking, remember how we "won the Big-10 title" with our OOC performance in past years? This season we were competing for the Big WEST title! Are we in second place now?