New England Soccer Discussion

[ECSUalum]

ECSU loses to Keene st 1-0 on an own goal!! Defenseman makes a errant pass back to the GK and into the net    However, Eastern was lucky not to lose by 3 or more as Keene missed 3 open goal shots!  Now Eastern's defense is suspect!!  Bad game for the Warriors all around!!

[NEsoccerfan]

Blooter, do you know what's up with DePietto? Saw he went down a few games ago and looks like he hasn't played since.

Hoping he didn't re-tear his ACL...

[OldNed]

Well it looks like St.Joe's has gotten through the hardest part of their schedule beating Bowdoin, Endicott and Gordon all on the road. They are 5-0-0 and have 0 GA to start the year. They also beat St.Joseph's(CT) 5-0 which is in their inaugural season and should be a force to be reckoned with for St.Joe's of Maine in coming years in their conference. Common sense tells me that St.Joe's(CT) has just about the same mission as St.Joe's(ME) except they are in a much more desirable location in New England. Since a ton of St.Joe's(ME) roster is from Rhode Island and Connecticut logic is eventually those kids will be enrolling in St.Joe's(CT) in the future. Am I over simplifying it? Possibly, considering I have never stepped foot on either schools campus or seen their facilities. Anyway, that recruiting battle is a couple years away. As for now, St.Joe's(ME) is 5-0-0 with 0 GA and have 12 games left. The 12 games left on their schedule would be considered cupcakes on any Nescac teams schedule except for maybe Johnson and Wales and Norwich which incidentally could be the only 2 teams left that have a chance to get a result against them. Is it possible St.Joe's(ME) finishes the regular season 17-0-0 with 0 GA? I would give that a 50/50 chance but maybe fair or not even with that record I believe they would still have to win their Conference Championship because of the weak SOS and OWP they will carry into the post-season. I give that a 35/65 because you may find some sympathetic members of that committee that would feel like St.Joe's would deserve a Pool C. That would really be a tough call if St.Joe's were to lose in their Conference tournament. Since St.Joe's has beaten Bowdoin 1-0 the past 2 years I give Wiercinski a 60/40 that he drops them next season..Just a hunch an could be wrong.

Mr. Right,
you're right on that outside of Johnson and Wales (Norwich is a little bit down this year from where they've been the past few years), St. Joe's doesn't have a lot of challenges ahead of them.  Johnson and Wales is a quality team - they flew under the radar a little bit last year and they haven't lost any significant players from 2017, so they're going to be a tough win for anybody.

I don't think St. Joe's goes another year with 0 GA - there are just too many things that can happen, like a handball in the box,  breakaway goal, or anything else fluky.  I'd love to see it, but I think it would be better for them  to give up a goal sometime soon so the pressure of trying to stay perfect doesn't affect them adversely.

As far as recruiting advantages for St. Joe's (CT), I'm not sure I see it - at least not yet.  Coach Dubois has done a really good job getting better and better recruiting classes since his first one.  I think for this year's seniors, they've turned out to be really good players over the last 3+ years, but as far as I know none of them were very highly recruited.  Contrast that with the current freshman class which has a number of all-state players and even a couple of all-New England high school players, and most of them have a more impressive club team pedigree, too.  Time will tell if success breeds success in recruiting with the Monks, and time will also tell with St. Joe's (CT) as their young program develops.

So Johnson and Wales scored on St. Joe's on Saturday at the 11 minute mark of the first half and they took a 1-0 lead over the Monks. According to the game recap, it's the first time St. Joe's was trailing since the 2016 NCAA game vs. Brandeis which they lost 3-0. St. Joe's was a little stunned for maybe 15 minutes but then they really showed their character and they poured it on.  They had a number of really good chances and finally broke through and scored the equalizer with 5 minutes left in the half and they scored the game winner 2 minutes later.  The second half was more of the same for St. Joe's and they were able to tack on another goal to finish it 3-1.

The goal Johnson and Wales scored was from a free kick on the left side maybe 20-25 feet out from the penalty area.  I'm not sure if it was a set play or not, but JWU kicked long and from where I was sitting in the stands it looked like the ball was clearly going to go out of bounds past right side of the SJC goal, but a JWU player must have been right on the end line and he headed the ball back into play.  I think Blake Mullen and the SJC defense gave up a little bit on it and they were slow to react when the ball was headed back into the box where Nick Gutekunst fired it the left side past a sprawling Mullen. Good goal for JWU.

I was a little nervous to see how SJC would react after giving up that goal, but they acquitted themselves well after that. I'm actually a little relieved they got scored on now, so the pressure of giving up no goals isn't going to be an issue now.  Just play and take care of business and see what happens from here on out.

[blooter442]

Blooter, do you know what's up with DePietto? Saw he went down a few games ago and looks like he hasn't played since.

Hoping he didn't re-tear his ACL...

No idea. I was a little confused about how they were setting up but his absence perhaps explains some things.

I think this break the Judges are in will help. They've quite frankly looked gassed the last two games. 5 in 11 days willl do that to you.

[Mr.Right]

Looks like Margolis giving Cohen another shot in Net v Mass Maritime. Probably a good move to restore his confidence. Other than that switch it looks to be pretty much the regular starters except maybe for 1 or 2 field players.

[Mr.Right]

Brandeis stream is back behind the benches...This is good news...


Ahhh 1-0 Brandeis 3rd minute....Mass Maritime is facing a well rested, pissed off Brandeis team so this might be a blowout fast plus Brandeis will want to get their bench on the field ASAP with Tufts on Friday night.

[Mr.Right]

Springfield nursing a 1-0 lead over Gordon with 5 minutes left. This would be an important road victory for Springfield especially with Babson on the schedule Saturday.

[NEsoccerfan20]

Good come from behind win for Endicott... beating WPI 2-1. Evan Couchot with both goals.

[blooter442]

Good come from behind win for Endicott... beating WPI 2-1. Evan Couchot with both goals.

Didn't see that one coming! Good for the Gulls.

[rudy]

This isn't exactly new England d3 soccer but I thought some of you New England soccer fans might enjoy this behind the scenes look at the 2015 Milton Academy soccer season. Many of these players are playing or were playing in college now at schools like Babson, Hamilton, Harvard, Amherst, Boston University...while others went out of New England...Maryland, Lafayette, Messiah, and one is in Poland playing professional club.

https://youtu.be/kPXcadJFzHc

[Mr.Right]

Tufts 2-0 Brandeis almost Halftime. Very sloppy start for Brandeis and it cost them. Tough to see on the stream but the 1st goal looked like Tufts got behind the defense and almost a backheel back to Tasker who easily tapped it in. Brandeis RB looked to be at fault for a misplay or failed clearance. 2nd goal was very lucky but no communication between GK Cohen and RB who slotted a nice ball into his own net while Cohen was going other direction. RB was involved in both goals and it just looked sloppy. By the time Brandeis woke up they were down 2-0. Honestly Tufts has not looked much better but they take advantage of 2 misplays. Brandeis has looked better since and have time but need to get a goal in the first 15 minutes of 2nd Half. RB was not ready for primetime tonight.

[blooter442]

Rainy night in Waltham. Only my second time seeing the Judges live this year but their work rate is very good. Their precarious situation is what it is but has not come about due to a lack of effort. Game is barely five minutes old but Brandeis is having a lot of joy down Wheaton's right side. Warren looks very dangerous with his pace.

[blooter442]

Game has even itself out a bit, the visitors had a good chance that Irwin came off his line to snuff, then I think it was Gans that fired a dipper just over. Then Wheaton broke, Irwin made a nice save and Brandeis scrambled the resulting corner away. 0-0 @ 20 in.

[blooter442]

I will say that the one thing I notice is that Brandeis midfield is a bit light in terms of physicality, at least compared to the last few years. They don't have an enforcer like Hernandez, or Ocel to a lesser degree (in terms of physical presence). Miskin is a tidy player who keeps the ball well but isn't an enforcer, and Gans is similar. Handler and Breiter are both attackers by trade. Panson is the one I see being one for the future.

Brandeis with two decent chances but saved and held by the GK. 30' in, 0-0.

[blooter442]

Less than a minute after halftime and Wheaton hits the post and kid shanks the rebound from close range. Still 0-0.