2019 D3 Men's Soccer National Perspective

[Gregory Sager]

Calvin has "haters"?  That's news to me.

You've never met anybody affiliated with Hope, then.

I have encountered plenty of Hope fans who will root against or disparage Calvin even when it's to the detriment of the MIAA, and thus indirectly to Hope itself. And it holds true in reverse, too, among Calvin fans.

Don't get me wrong -- Hope and Calvin fans respect each other's schools and each other's teams, and they will even admit that the close affinity of the two schools and the myriad crossovers that they have in terms of families and friends make them very much sister schools. But on both sides They. Do. Not. Like. The. Rival. School. At. All.

[PaulNewman]

Calvin has "haters"?  That's news to me.

You've never met anybody affiliated with Hope, then.

I have encountered plenty of Hope fans who will root against or disparage Calvin even when it's to the detriment of the MIAA, and thus indirectly to Hope itself. And it holds true in reverse, too, among Calvin fans.

Don't get me wrong -- Hope and Calvin fans respect each other's schools and each other's teams, and they will even admit that the close affinity of the two schools and the myriad crossovers that they have in terms of families and friends make them very much sister schools. But on both sides They. Do. Not. Like. The. Rival. School. At. All.

Fair enough, but in the context of the article I don't think Mr. Zinner was referring to Hope (or any other school rivals) but rather the "media" here on this site.  I for one expected Calvin to drop a notch and I was wrong, but it wasn't about hating.

[Gregory Sager]

Do we know that the posters here are his only fan-based observers, though?

[PaulNewman]

Do we know that the posters here are his only fan-based observers, though?

I'm guessing his reference to Calvin haters was a play on comments about Calvin from posters (like myself) earlier in the season.  I don't presume that's his only source, but certainly I think that's more likely for schools he knows less about.  Although he has played against Calvin, I doubt he has sources from Hope outside this site (and I can't recall any recent Hope posters other than Messiah Nation which tends to embrace schools with either a Christian mission and/or are part of the Messiah coaching tree).  He obviously can speak for himself, but I think he's more likely to have personal, anecdotal and/or additional sources in terms of New England/NESCAC with perhaps some familiarity with Jersey, UAA schools and maybe OWU/Kenyon.  To the extent that any of us rely heavily on the site we have a fairly skewed group here (which is a great group but also very limited....The NESCAC crowd, some Messiah and general Mid-Atlantic fans, a couple of Chicago posters, our Brandeis correspondent, the W&L guy, yourself, a Kenyon guy, one or two OWUers, a Denison fan, the Ohio region savant otherwise wise known as Domino1195, and a few NJAC observers, with a shout out occasionally for Trinity (TX) and Loras). 

[PaulNewman]

Speaking of Carthage being hard to figure (with wins over top teams and head-scratching losses) check out Brockport St that early on beat Clarkson 5-1 when Clarkson was on a roll and Oneonta within the past week, but just lost to Houghton and sits at 8-7-2 with some other surprising defeats.

[Mr.Right]

Any school that has 2 buildings with the Devos name on them probably has some haters...As far as the futbol yea I think most fans on here feel for Calvin like the football fans in the 90's did for the Bills. 70% felt bad for them and 30% could care less. Personally,  I go back and forth on Calvin each year not sure how to feel about it.

[Mr.Right]

How about Oneonta St blasting Potsdam off the field yesterday 9-1(6-1) at the Half. Sets up today's important match between the leagues 2 best playing teams at the moment as Plattsburgh visits today. OH and btw its winner take all as the winner will get the SUNYAC Regular Season crown, rights to host the league Championship and IMO a POOL C.

[Gregory Sager]

Any school that has 2 buildings with the Devos name on them probably has some haters...

BTW, that's not a factor in the Calvin/Hope archrivalry, as the DeVos family has given very generously to both schools. Hope's state-of-the-art 3,400-seat basketball/volleyball arena, which opened 14 years ago, is called DeVos Fieldhouse.

[Mr.Right]

Any school that has 2 buildings with the Devos name on them probably has some haters...

BTW, that's not a factor in the Calvin/Hope archrivalry, as the DeVos family has given very generously to both schools. Hope's state-of-the-art 3,400-seat basketball/volleyball arena, which opened 14 years ago, is called DeVos Fieldhouse.

Totally get it...I should mention in fairness that Calvin has a reputation of being very inclusive and diverse within the Christian academic community but yea the DeVos line was more a jab....moving on

[Mr.Right]

How about Oneonta St blasting Potsdam off the field yesterday 9-1(6-1) at the Half. Sets up today's important match between the leagues 2 best playing teams at the moment as Plattsburgh visits today. OH and btw its winner take all as the winner will get the SUNYAC Regular Season crown, rights to host the league Championship and IMO a POOL C.

Scratch that just saw Plattsburgh is 8-6-0 so they most likely will need to win their tournament as well. I will say Plattsburgh are 7-0-0 in their last 7 games with 6 straight shutouts...

[D3Grad]

I will say St. Thomas has shown significant improvement since the worrisome 1-3-3 start to the season.  Since then they have rattled of 9 straight wins.  The team has dramatically improved their offensive presence.  There have been numerous player, position, and formation changes that may contribute to the success.  They are hitting their stride at the right time going into conference playoffs and hopefully NCAA tournament.  I wonder if the MIAC gets 2 teams into the postseason with the success of the ARC conference in the region.  I hypothesize St. Thomas might get a bid if they lose conference final to Gustavus due to recent success and SOS.  If the reverse happens and St. Thomas beats Gustavus in the conference final does Gustavus get a bid?  The low SOS leads me to say no but not sure.  Thoughts?

[stlawus]

Oneonta going all in on this season as Hernandez is a senior.   There is no such thing as a window closing for Oneonta but if there's ever been a prime opportunity for them get a natty it's this year.   Hernandez is unstoppable right now and they need to cash in on his wondrous senior campaign.   

[discnerd]

Discnerd's Top 25

Rank	Rank.diff	Team	Conference	Rating	Rating.diff
1	1	Christopher Newport	CAC	6.497	0.449
2	-1	Amherst	NESCAC	6.321	-0.424
3	1	Calvin	MIAA	5.76	0.063
4	-1	Johns Hopkins	CC	5.625	-0.327
5	4	Oneonta State	SUNYAC	4.761	0.656
6	1	Franklin and Marshall	CC	4.745	0.206
7	1	Tufts	NESCAC	4.335	0.098
8	2	Messiah	MACC	4.068	0.017
9	8	Connecticut College	NESCAC	4.03	0.753
10	1	Oglethorpe	SAA	4.018	0.053
11	-6	Mary Washington	CAC	3.672	-1.947
12	1	Gettysburg	CC	3.641	-0.182
13	1	RPI	LL	3.63	-0.153
14	6	Catholic	LAND	3.609	0.436
15	-3	Covenant	USAC	3.509	-0.378
16	0	Roanoke	ODAC	3.393	-0.308
17	17	Eastern Connecticut	LEC	3.392	0.573
18	-3	Chicago	UAA	3.367	-0.357
19	3	Montclair State	NJAC	3.347	0.212
20	6	Hobart	LL	3.25	0.251
21	25	St. Mary's (Md.)	CAC	3.114	0.618
22	11	Swarthmore	CC	3.088	0.249
23	-2	Ohio Wesleyan	NCAC	3.07	-0.093
24	-6	Buffalo State	SUNYAC	3.018	-0.235
25	-19	Washington and Lee	ODAC	2.99	-2.218

[YoungBuck]

Stat of the Day:

Of the top 10 teams in this weeks USSC Poll, only Amherst has less than 5 players with multiple goals.  While NESCAC fans may cite good competition and strong opposition defense, Hopkins, F&M, Tufts, Chicago, and John Carroll all have scored fewer total goals than Amherst, but have achieved a greater offensive balance:

1. Amherst (36 goals scored - 4 players with multiple goals)
2. Calvin (62 - 12)
3. Hopkins (28 - 9)
4. F&M (30 - 6)
5. Tufts (32 - 10)
6. Chicago (24 - 7)
7. John Carroll (34 - 9)
8. RPI (37 - 7)
9. Luther (47 - 8)
10. Oneonta (49 - 8)

Amherst's Giammattei (17 goals - 47% of team's goals), RPI's Gaudiano (15 goals - 41%), and Oneonta's Hernandez (20 goals - 41%) have all accounted for more than 40% of their team's production this year.  Meanwhile, no one on Hopkins, Tufts, or Chicago has hit the 5 goal mark.  F&M and JCU have 2 or 3 main goal scoring threats, but have also found good production throughout their rosters this year.  Calvin and Luther seem to have found an elusive combination of offensive potency and balance, albeit against relatively weak schedules.

[Gregory Sager]

Calvin's schedule isn't weak. The Knights have played five matches thus far against NCAA-regionally-ranked opponents: Ohio Wesleyan, Ohio Northern, Chicago, Hope, and Kalamazoo. It's not Murderer's Row or anything, but it's good enough for an SOS that's just a shade under .600. Heaven knows that the abandonment of the double round-robin starting two years ago was the best decision that the people who run the MIAA could've ever made, and Ryan Souders seems to be making the most of that decision. Massey ranks Calvin's SOS 48th in the nation, which is better than RPI's or SUNY Oneonta's.

Luther had the 13th highest SOS of the 66 teams ranked in this past week's NCAA regional rankings, and three of Luther's opponents (St. Thomas, Central, and Loras) are RR. But the Norse have an SOS that's only ranked 100th by Massey, which may not be weak in the strict sense of the word -- after all, it's in the top quarter percentile in a division that has 419 teams -- but it's not at all impressive by national standards. The one thing that I'll say for Luther's schedule is that the Norse have hardly played any losing teams this season; only four of their 16 opponents to date (Johnson & Wales CO, St. Scholastica, Coe, and Nebraska Wesleyan) are under .500 at the moment.