Quote from: SKUD on June 24, 2024, 09:51:27 PM67 days till August 30th kick off! 

59 days

Call this the Clarks Summit memorial schedule post (since all of these teams were on Clarks Summit's 2024 schedule):

Pittsburgh-Bradford

They were supposed to play Clarks Summit for their opening game on Aug. 31, but since they play the next day on Sept 1 against Keystone they should be fine, right?  Right?  (last week Keystone announced cutting 29 faculty/staff positions plus several departments to save money after signing a letter of intent with an unnamed investor who needs approval from the accreditation agency).  The home opener is the second weekend against Thiel.

Gwynedd Mercy

According to Clarks Summit's schedule, they were to host Gwynedd Mercy on Saturday Sept 7.  Gwynedd Mercy either took them off the schedule already or didn't have much faith in the likelihood of the game as they have games on 9/3 and 9/11, but nothing on 9/7.  They also have 19 games on the schedule, so I'm guessing they replaced the Clarks Summit game already.

Penn State Schuylkill

They still have Clark's Summit on the schedule for Wed. 9/18.  With only 16 games on the schedule, including Clarks Summit and Lancaster Bible College JV, I'm guessing they will want to find a replacement game.

Gallaudet

Opens by hosting Southern VA and Alfred State.  Clarks Summit was supposed to be the conference opener on 9/28, but if nothing is switched around, they won't open conference play until 10/2 with Valley Forge.  Other interesting note is that they play home and away games against Regent as if they are a conference opponent.  Regent is in its DIII exploratory year.  I wonder if they are a candidate for the UEC even though their sponsoring institution is Christopher Newport and there would be more geographical logic in them being in the C2C (if there is any geographical logic in that conference).

Bryn Athyn

Clarks Summit is the last regular season game on the schedule - Oct. 26 - so probably not hard to just let it go.  That would leave them with only 14 games though.

Gettysburg

They've only posted this on instagram thus far, but it's definitely one of the more geographically diverse set of opponents among Centennial Conference teams.  They open by hosting Sewanee and Carnegie Mellon and the following weekend they host Carthage and Cal Lutheran.  They also travel to Southern Virginia and host some historically challenging local non-conference teams in Lebanon Valley and Lycoming.  Only 4 away games in conference -- only two of which qualified the conference tourney last year -- sets them up for success.  They also start pre-season early with a trip to Costa Rica in August.  I've always wondered whether this is an advantage in giving them a running start on the season or tires a team out when the crucial late-season games arrive.  We'll see soon enough.

Dickinson

Travels the second weekend to St. Mary's of Maryland to take on the Seahawks and Salisbury.  It then plays at Messiah in a midweek Wednesday game and the next day hosts Gettysburg's "developmental" team.  That's interesting on two levels:  1.  I didn't know Gettysburg had a developmental team, but they had 36 players on the roster last year, so it stands to reason that many won't get much or any playing time without some scrimmages like this.  They don't list one on their website and they don't even acknowledge the existence of this game on their instagram schedule post, but they play Lebanon Valley the day before, so this is a scrimmage designed to allow them to not rotate against Lebanon Valley, while still giving playing time to players that don't play that game.  2.  It also suggests that Dickinson thinks of itself as having a developmental team, since it had 33 on the roster last season.  Even if it doesn't, the scheduling of this game seems to be an indication that Dickinson doesn't expect to rotate much against Messiah, but can reassure players that if they didn't play against Messiah, they will play the next game against Gettysburg's developmental team.  It's one way to deal with the problems of increasing roster size without completely creating a separate team.  Everybody considers themselves part of the "varsity" team, but not at the cost of basically sitting the entire season without playing opportunities.

Profiles of schedules for schools in conferences where teams tend to schedule very few non-conference opponents because their conferences are large and/or teams play each other twice

George Fox

Doesn't play on opening weekend, but it travels all the way across the country to Boston to take on Emerson and Emmanuel on the second weekend.  It only plays one other game -- against NAIA side Corban - before starting NWC conference play.

Puget Sound

Opens by taking on DII side Seattle Pacific and then travels to Southern California the second weekend to take on Redlands and Pomona-Pitzer before starting NWC conference play.

Emmanuel

In addition to playing George Fox, it opens with games against Suffolk and Rhode Island College and then the rest of its schedule are entirely teams from the GNAC.

Anna Maria

They open against Nichols and Westfield St. and the only other non-conference game is the second-to-last game of the season when they play Clark.

Elms

They open at Fitchburg State and then host Westfield State and SUNY Cobleskill before GNAC play starts.  They also play MCLA later in the season.

Regis College

They play one game - hosting Mass Maritime - before starting conference play, but they do play Westfield State in the middle of conference play

Some schedules from deep in the heart of Texas

Howard Payne

Howard Payne's schedule is only on Instagram right now.  They open hosting Lyon and then 6 straight SCAC opponents before starting ASC conference play.  Interestingly, they have 5 non-conference games away and only 2 at home.

McMurry

McMurry also only has its schedule on Instagram currently.  It also host Lyon to open and then 6 straight away non-conference games, most of which are ASC opponents, but also include fellow SCAC member University of Dallas in a non-conference game.

Schreiner

Some interesting names on this schedule, including Texas A&M San Antonio (NAIA) and Huston-Tillotson (NAIA), which suggests that there weren't ASC schools to go around because enough of them scheduled games with out-of-state teams

Warren Wilson

After going 0-14 last year, I didn't expect Warren Wilson to schedule a pre-season scrimmage against D1 VMI, but there it is on Aug. 26.  Not sure whether it says more about Warren Wilson's ambitions or VMI's prospects.  Not only is it on VMI's schedule, but it is slated to be broadcast on ESPN+.  Warren Wilson has the unique ability to schedule entirely non-conference opponents as a member of the Coast2Coast conference, but I'm not sure where they can get a win this year.  Maybe Tococca Falls, a NCCAA school that went 3-11-1 last year, including losing to Piedmont 8-1, which only beat Warren Wilson 5-0 last year.  It did play Brevard and Ferrum close last year, so perhaps that's another possibility.

Baldwin-Wallace

21 games on the schedule, in part because they are participating in the Penn State Behrend tournament, which gets them three games, including two in one day, and the Mount Union tournament.  Not sure how they play two games in one day like in club, but the opening game of the season the day before against Lycoming is going to be tough enough that the two games the next day will probably be where they heavily rotate the squad.

Baldwin Wallace will only be playing one game that day. They *likely* just listed out both game slots as options because the tournament is fluid rather than being a set schedule. Winners of the Saturday games will play at one time on Sunday and losers will play the other.

Some upstate NY schedules

Hilbert

Same non-conference schedule as last year with the order switched a bit, although they have their first two games at home this year instead of starting on the road.

Nazareth

The big changes are the additions of SUNY Brockport and SUNY Geneseo to the Empire 8 schedule (SUNY Poly comes in as well, but Nazareth beat them last year in non-conference play).  That will make it much harder for Nazareth to repeat last year's 5-2-1 conference record.

Houghton

Wells' closure takes away one of Houghton's three wins from last year.  That puts some pressure on the opening match against Hilbert, which was another of their wins, since the third win against Keuka was only 1-0.  Pitt Bradford, a team they beat 4-0 two years ago, seems the most likely of the new additions to give them a chance at another win.

Rutgers Newark

Pretty challenging schedule.  They open by traveling to Virginia to take on Randolph-Macon and Mary Washington.  A couple of weeks later they host Johns Hopkins and Lycoming.

Bard

They started the season last year with a string of wins against weak opponents and it looks like they have continued that strategy this year.  We'll see if they can snatch a win in the Liberty League this year.  They do have some games at home this year against teams they tied last year (Vassar and RIT).

Connecticut College

Always interesting to see the NESCAC schools pretty much jump straight into the deep end of conference play right away.  This season, Conn warms up by hosting USMMA and then the next game travels to play Amherst on Sept 7th.  That should be a humdinger of an early season game.  It also has a pretty hard set of games the following weekend, hosting Bowdoin on Saturday at 2:00 and traveling to play Tufts a little over 24 hours later on Sunday at 3 in the only double game weekend of the season for Conn and the end of a brutal stretch of 4 games in 8 days (with an away game at Salve Regina in-between Amherst and Bowdoin). Last year, Conn's only double game weekend was Colby and Middlebury and Conn tied the second game to Middlebury. It was also the end of a 4 game stretch in 8 days with games against Williams and Coast Guard as well, but all 4 games were at home and it came a little later in the season.  Given that, this seems like a harder schedule for Conn than last year, although dropping Babson makes the non-conference portion easier.

SLU

Exactly the same as last year.

Quote from: Kuiper on July 09, 2024, 12:36:28 PMConnecticut College

Always interesting to see the NESCAC schools pretty much jump straight into the deep end of conference play right away.  This season, Conn warms up by hosting USMMA and then the next game travels to play Amherst on Sept 7th.  That should be a humdinger of an early season game.  It also has a pretty hard set of games the following weekend, hosting Bowdoin on Saturday at 2:00 and traveling to play Tufts a little over 24 hours later on Sunday at 3 in the only double game weekend of the season for Conn and the end of a brutal stretch of 4 games in 8 days (with an away game at Salve Regina in-between Amherst and Bowdoin). Last year, Conn's only double game weekend was Colby and Middlebury and Conn tied the second game to Middlebury. It was also the end of a 4 game stretch in 8 days with games against Williams and Coast Guard as well, but all 4 games were at home and it came a little later in the season.  Given that, this seems like a harder schedule for Conn than last year, although dropping Babson makes the non-conference portion easier.

as a supporter it is tough with only 6 home games - not sure how that helps/hurts the new rankings system.

Quote from: Newenglander on July 09, 2024, 03:36:16 PM

Quote from: Kuiper on July 09, 2024, 12:36:28 PMConnecticut College

Always interesting to see the NESCAC schools pretty much jump straight into the deep end of conference play right away.  This season, Conn warms up by hosting USMMA and then the next game travels to play Amherst on Sept 7th.  That should be a humdinger of an early season game.  It also has a pretty hard set of games the following weekend, hosting Bowdoin on Saturday at 2:00 and traveling to play Tufts a little over 24 hours later on Sunday at 3 in the only double game weekend of the season for Conn and the end of a brutal stretch of 4 games in 8 days (with an away game at Salve Regina in-between Amherst and Bowdoin). Last year, Conn's only double game weekend was Colby and Middlebury and Conn tied the second game to Middlebury. It was also the end of a 4 game stretch in 8 days with games against Williams and Coast Guard as well, but all 4 games were at home and it came a little later in the season.  Given that, this seems like a harder schedule for Conn than last year, although dropping Babson makes the non-conference portion easier.

as a supporter it is tough with only 6 home games - not sure how that helps/hurts the new rankings system.

The Men's Soccer Committee chose to set the "dial" in the NPI system for home/away at 1.0, meaning that there are no extra points given for road wins.  So, it neither helps nor hurts, but it indirectly would hurt if Conn did worse on the road than at home.  On the one hand, it was 6-0-3 at home and 5-0-3 on the road last year.  Its 2 losses came in neutral site games, but those were also harder games because they were in the NESCAC and NCAA tournaments.  That suggests Conn doesn't have a clear home field advantage that will be lost this year.  On the other hand, it played some of its toughest conference opponents (eg Amherst, Middlebury, Tufts) at home last year and this year those games are away.  So, last year's home/away records might not be relevant.

MIT

After an opening trip to Pennsylvania last year, MIT stays local this year, taking on Curry and Southern Maine Indeed, local might mean staying home more generally, since some of its tougher opponents from last year - Tufts, U Mass Boston, and Babson - are all home games this year.  It also adds Endicott this year at home.

Endicott

Endicott also is staying home a lot this year, especially early on when its first 6 games are at home.  That includes new non-conference opponents in William Paterson, Keene State, and SUNY Plattsburgh.  It also hosts Middlebury this year.  Although it isn't playing Boston College like last year, it is traveling to play Colby.

Drew

Mostly the same as 2023. No New Paltz but game vs Kean or Hunter, plus added NYU and Immaculata.