Spring "Season"

[PlaySimple]

The Ohio Athletic Conference (OAC) and The College Conference of Illinois & Wisconsin (CCIW) have posted small spring schedules for the men's and women's soccer teams.

The fall sports of football, volleyball, men's soccer, and women's soccer will be contested in the spring in the OAC. For women's soccer, it appears that all 10 schools will be participating. From the OAC website:

"Men's and women's soccer will take the originally-scheduled fall 2020 round robin and move it to the spring, beginning on Sunday, March 14. The men and women will play at opposite sites each Sunday and Thursday (Monday, April 5 after Easter). Sunday contests will begin at 2:00 p.m., while Thursday matches are either 4:00 or 7:00 p.m. at the host's discretion.

On Sunday, April 18, the top seed will host the second seed for the Conference Championship. The third-seed will host the fourth-seed, etc. so that all 10 teams play 10 contests."

The teams will play conference-only competition and the number of games will not exceed the NCAA 50-percent waiver so that all student-athletes will retain one of their four seasons of participation.

Here is a link to the OAC schedules: https://www.oac.org/sports/wsoc/2020-21/schedule

For the CCIW there will only be 5 games played. All schools with the exception of Wheaton are participating. Wheaton will only have men's soccer and women's volleyball competing. I'm curious to know why the women are not competing in soccer. The CCIW is also contesting the fall sports of football, men's & women's soccer, and women's volleyball

Because there are only 5 games being played, and as with the OAC, the NCAA 50-percent waiver will not be exceeded so that all student-athletes will retain one of their four seasons of participation. Any conference that has been able to move fall sports to a modified spring schedule has done likewise. The CCIW website states that "Games may be classified as scrimmages, exhibitions or countable contests as determined by each institution." Also stated is that "There will be no conference championship or awards in these sports and Campus and conference officials will continue to monitor federal, state, local, and campus conditions and testing availability and will make changes as necessary."

Below are the "schedules." If you notice, there is a range of dates to be played. I assume that the actual dates will be worked out between the individual schools.

https://static.cciw.org/custompages/CCIW_Links/General/Administrative/Future_Schedules/Fall_2020/Spring.2021.WSO.Schedule.pdf

If anyone sees any other information about spring schedules in other conferences, please post.

[Ron Boerger]

The SCAC adopted a seven-game conference-only schedule for women's soccer in October and reiterated that schedule was unchanged last month.   Play starts Feburary 27th and there will be a conference champion determined with quarterfinals at the higher seed April 17th and semis/final at Texas Lutheran April 23-25th.  All schools sponsoring the sport are involved.   

https://scacsports.com/news/2020-2021/21wsoccer2.pdf

The ASC announced their schedules in August and there have been no updates since:  "The men's and women's soccer ASC schedules will be played over nine weeks, beginning the week of February 10. The 12 teams are divided into two divisions [...]. Teams have seven regular season conference matches among their division opponents and will play women/men doubleheaders each date.

The top four seeded teams in each division qualify to the ASC soccer tournaments which will be played over two weekends. Quarterfinals are set for April 3 with the semifinals on April 8, and finals on April 10. The winners of the soccer tournaments will be declared the 2020-21 ASC champions."

Teams can choose anytime between Wednesday and Saturday to schedule matches; the overall schedule is here.

 

[Stryker]

It has been interesting to watch how different leagues address the Spring season for women's soccer in this Covid era.

The Empire 8 Conference has elected to have a full slate of league games this Spring, plus a Conference Championship tournament. The 2021 Empire 8 Spring Women's Soccer season got underway on March 14. 
Fans can watch the action all season long, free of charge on Empire 8 TV.

The 2021 Empire 8 Conference Women's Soccer Spring Tournament will feature the conference's top six teams from regular season play. First round action will feature the No. 3 seed hosting the No. 6 seed and No. 4 seed hosting the No. 5 seed on Tuesday, April 13. The top seed will host the winner of the No. 4 and No. 5 seeds in one semifinal and the No. 2 seed will host the winner of the No. 3 and No. 6 seeds in the second semifinal on Thursday, April 15. The two semifinal winners will meet on Saturday, April 17 in the E8 Championship.

In contrast, the Liberty League will not have any formal League games this Spring but is leaving it to the individual conference members to decide the amount of scrimmages that they wish to schedule. RIT has decided to allow a maximum of 3 Spring scrimmages with only one scrimmage allowed on the RIT campus during the Spring.

[WLCALUM83]

In the NACC, Rockford and IL Tech have opted out, all other squads have games scheduled. For now, the NACC Tournament is scheduled for April 21, and April 25.

[Ron Boerger]

SCAC quarterfinals:

• @ #1 Trinity 9, #8 Schreiner 0 - Tigers held a 56-2 shot advantage in setting the conference record for goals scored, margin of victory in a playoff game (note:  normally only the top six teams qualify for the SCAC championship)
• @ #2 Southwestern 1, #7 Austin 0 - Pirates' Sam Davis picked a perfect time to score her first goal of the season off a first-half corner; SW held a 19-4 shot advantage but Austin's Meredith Harris had ten saves to keep the 'Roos in it.
• @ #3 Dallas 2, #6 St. Thomas 1 - Dallas' Andrea Coppi did Sam Davis one better, scoring not only her first goal of the season but also the game-winner in the 71st minute.   The Crusaders held a 14-6 shot advantage.
• #5 Texas Lutheran 1, @ #4 Centenary 0 - in the only [mild] upset of the quarterfinal round, and continuing the trend of the prior two games, Raquel Morris' first goal of the season at 83' was the difference in an evenly matched game which saw TLU hold a 14-12 shot edge (but 7-3 on goal). 

Semis and finals will be this weekend at TLU:

• #1 Trinity v #5 TLU
• #2 Southwestern v #3 Dallas

The SCAC is allowing home fans only to attend games (if the hosting school's policies permit), which I'm not fond of in a championship setting.  If visiting fans cannot support their teams (and I understand why), the team hosting the championships IMO should not have that advantage just because they drew the hosting straw this year.

[Ron Boerger]

SCAC Semifinals (at Texas Lutheran):

• #1 Trinity 4, #5 TLU 0 - the top seed dominated run of play, outshooting the home side 28-5 and limiting TLU to two shots on goal.  Kaity Ward had the first two goals for Trinity, and D Lindsey Peng, this week named winner of an NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship, closed the scoring with a beautiful corner that curled untouched into the goal for her first of the season.
• #3 Dallas 1, #2 Southwestern 0 (2OT) - the Crusaders pulled off the upset with a golden goal from Andrea Coppi in the 109th minute in an evenly matched outing.  Coppi, a first-year, has scored all three of Dallas' goals in the post-season.
  

In their only meeting of the season, Trinity outshot Dallas 33-4, but the Crusaders' Macey Henderson turned away 16 consecutive shots on goal before Kaity Ward found the back of the net 5 minutes into OT to give the Tigers a 1-0 win on the road. 

[WLCALUM83]

In the NACC North playoffs, results held to expected form, #1 MSOE vs. #2 CUW in that final today.

In the NACC South, Benedictine advanced over CUC 4-2 on PK's, Aurora had to back out (COVID protocols), so it'll be a Dominican vs. Benedictine match-up today.

[WLCALUM83]

NACC North Final:  MSOE 2, CUW 1
Scoring:  CUW Esten  42' Penalty kick
              MSOE  Ratts  47'
                         Halverson 59' (This one was a thing of beauty, with a high arch over the wall of Falcon defenders that found the upper right-hand corner of the net.)

NACC South Final: Dominican 6, Benedictine 1, Long story short, the Stars broke this one open in the 2nd half.

[Ron Boerger]

SCAC Championship (at Texas Lutheran):

#1 Trinity 4, #3 Dallas 0 - the Tigers scored twice in the first six minutes and the Crusaders struggled to maintain possession throughout as they were outshot 49-2.

Lindsey Peng, Trinity, Outstanding Defensive Player
Kaity Ward, Trinity, Outstanding Offensive Player