CCIW

[The Sock Heir]

NPU moves up from eleventh to eighth in this week's d3soccer.com poll. Chicago, which is at the tail end of the Others Receiving Votes category of the poll, hosts the Vikings tonight down at 55th and Cottage Grove.

I'm thinking Park has a rough match ahead of them, as usually is. However, they win 2-1 away.

[markerickson]

I didn't provide an opinion.  I gave a factual message.  And that message was not slanted in favor of 43 or 44.

[GarbageGoals33]

How do you give someone Karma? haha

[keeker]

That's a silly and pointless statement.

Just making an observation that NPU has 8 or 9 Swedes starting every game, which is fine. And the fact that their ave. age is mid 20's, which is fine. Just an observation, that's all.  Anyway, I will be at the game tonight to see my favorite player Kyle K. go up against a 28yr old. Will be a good game. I predict 3 -1 NPU.

[Gregory Sager]

NPU moves up from eleventh to eighth in this week's d3soccer.com poll. Chicago, which is at the tail end of the Others Receiving Votes category of the poll, hosts the Vikings tonight down at 55th and Cottage Grove.

I'm thinking Park has a rough match ahead of them, as usually is. However, they win 2-1 away.

Hope you're right. This one has me nervous.

I didn't provide an opinion.  I gave a factual message.  And that message was not slanted in favor of 43 or 44.

I didn't say it was slanted. But there was definitely opinion within it in both your choice of adjectives and your premise, and it wasn't necessary in order for you to make your overall point about Swedish students.

That's a silly and pointless statement.

Just making an observation that NPU has 8 or 9 Swedes starting every game, which is fine.

Seven, to be accurate. Plus one Norwegian, one Ohioan, and two players from Illinois.

And the fact that their ave. age is mid 20's, which is fine. Just an observation, that's all.  Anyway, I will be at the game tonight to see my favorite player Kyle K. go up against a 28yr old.

Heh, nothing like lining up your excuses early.

[Gotberg]

I didn't provide an opinion.  I gave a factual message.  And that message was not slanted in favor of 43 or 44.

Mark, you could have just said that the exchange rate favors the Swedish Krona against the Dollar without the political commentary.

[The Sock Heir]

NPU 1 - 1 U of C a bit before half.

[keeker]

NPU 1 - 1 U of C a bit before half.

What a great game. I tell ya, div3 soccer is getting better every year. Great goal by NPU early and nice free kick by uc. Didn't expect a tie, though.

[blue_jays]

Looking at the standings is a bit surreal. Augie and NCC both sit at 7-2. The West Vikings are playing quite the defense to win close games and North Central's Paul Box is an absolute horse watching in person. Elmhurst and Wheaton have hit the skids dramatically. Carthage has played much better of late. North Park is clearly the best team in the league and one of the best in the region with their foreign imports, so big props to them. However, it's hard to crow about 23-25 year olds beating 19-20 year olds... (cough, cough)

[The Sock Heir]

I'm confused. There's only one set of rules that all of D-III is operating by, correct? If so, all of the "cough, cough's" ad nauseam seem petty and extraneous.

[markerickson]

Who is this 28 year old?  I'd wager that Grahn, a graduate student, is the oldest on the team.  I doubt he's even 25.  And to claim the average age is 23 seems like an uneducated post. 

[deepthroat]

lots of sour grapes/jealousy in this thread. NPU soccer going to be this good for a while, govern yourselves accordingly.

[Gregory Sager]

Sock Heir, it's that old green-eyed monster called envy that's rearing its ugly head here. NPU has a good thing going with the Swedish connection, so some of the fans of opposing sides feel that they have to try to make themselves feel better by denigrating NPU's Swedes. You and I both know that blue_jays, keeker, and their ilk would take a Grahn or a Pettersson or a Hals or an Aaronsson on their roster in a heartbeat if they could -- and you'd never hear a peep out of them about the ages of those players if they were wearing the kits of the schools favored by those posters.

This whole conversation is just ridiculous. It started out with a goofy statement by keeker that "if you took out Swedish men from the picture, NPU is mediocre at best." (Sure. And if you took out Virginians from the picture, Christopher Newport is mediocre at best. And if you took out Ohioans from the picture, Mount Union's football team is mediocre at best. And so on.) There's nothing illegal, unethical, or immoral going on here at all on the part of North Park. North Carolina Wesleyan has eight Europeans, four Africans, and a South American on the men's soccer roster. Methodist has four Europeans and an African. Trinity (TX) has four players from Latin America, plus an Englishman and an Australian, and Amherst has five players from overseas. It's pretty commonplace for college soccer programs on all levels to utilize foreign players, because -- guess what? -- soccer is the world's most popular sport, and it's generally played more avidly and universally by people in other countries than it is here. And North Park, which is located in a world-class city, presents an especially attractive location for a college education if you're a foreign student looking to come to the United States for it. Even without the men's soccer program NPU has always had a large contingent of foreign students, particularly from the Scandinavian countries and Korea.

Who is this 28 year old?  I'd wager that Grahn, a graduate student, is the oldest on the team.  I doubt he's even 25.  And to claim the average age is 23 seems like an uneducated post.

Exactly. Have keeker and blue_jays been standing outside the gates checking passports when the NPU bus rolls up?

[Gregory Sager]

Back to soccer. It was a very exciting, albeit very wet, contest last night at Stagg Field between NPU and Chicago. The Vikings scored early on a perfect cross from Hals to Grahn, but the latter part of the first half was marked by very ragged play by the Park that featured one of their periodic foulfests. The Maroons took advantage of one of the fouls, with Stanton Colville slicing a perfectly-executed free kick from thirty yards out into the upper right-hand corner of the net that Tim Ahlberg was helpless to defend.

NPU dominated play in the second half, but give credit to Chicago: The Maroons played tough defense, making no errors whatsoever in their half of the field and limiting NPU's good looks at the net to only two or three. The Vikings were sloppier at their own end, but they kept possession for so long that the Maroons were even more limited in their own chances for a goal.

It was an unsatisfying tie if you're a Vikings fan, but in the overall picture I doubt that it'll hurt North Park. It'll certainly give some juice to the Maroons' morale going into UAA play.

[blue_jays]

Just a bit of age joking, no sour grapes here. You North Parkers need to stop taking the bait because it will continue for years to come as long as NPU keeps getting foreign players. And duh, yes I would want them on my team. Scientific studies show that fans want the best players to be on the teams that they root for.