Go WEST young man (and NORTH)

[Gregory Sager]

No problem. Just sorry that I couldn't oblige you, as this site was down all afternoon and was still down when I left for the stadium late in the day.

[Kuiper]

United Soccer Coaches has released its first Region X poll for games through this past weekend.  I agree with the first four.  I tend to think Pacific Lutheran could be higher.  It has played a harder schedule than Chapman, which lost to a team Cal Tech tied. Colorado College may ultimately prove strong too based on their Ohio swing results.  Southwestern is the team that doesn't belong in the rankings at all in my view.  It beat both Willamette and Whitman (@Southwestern), but both schools have not done well yet this year, so that may be less impressive than it seems.  Ties to Elmhurst and UT Dallas are not good results, especially since Elmhurst is 1-3-1 after losing to Lake Forest, and both the Elmhurst and UTD games were at Southwestern.  Redlands is 3-0 and probably has a better argument than Chapman for being in this group, including beating a tougher than expected UC Santa Cruz team.  Occidental might also be ahead of Chapman considering their one loss has been to the 3rd ranked team in the region.

https://unitedsoccercoaches.org/rankings/college-rankings/ncaa-diii-men-x/

Region X - Poll 1 - September 12, 2023
Rank    School    Prev    W-L-T
1    University of Saint Thomas (Texas)    NR    4-0-0
2    Trinity University (Texas)    NR    4-0-0
3    Texas Lutheran University    NR    4-0-0
4    Claremont-McKenna-Harvey Mudd-Scripps Colleges    NR    2-0-1
5    Southwestern University    NR    2-0-2
6    Chapman University    NR    3-1-0
7    Pacific Lutheran University    NR    1-1-2
8    Colorado College    NR    2-1-1

[Kuiper]

Conference play opens for some in the SCIAC and NWC with some big games:

Redlands @ Chapman 4pm Pacific - this has big regional ranking implications for two teams that have mostly been playing NAIA teams up until now

Half:  Redlands 1 Chapman 0
62nd minute:  Redlands 2 Chapman 0 (both Redlands goals on PKs)
79th minute:  Redlands 2 Chapman 1
Final:  Redlands beats Chapman 2-1.  Should get Redlands in the next regional rankings and push Chapman out.

Cal Lutheran @ Claremont-Mudd-Scripps 7 pm Pacific - CMS is coming off a tough, but generally successful, NW roadtrip.  Cal Lu looked strong, with their only loss to Texas Lutheran, until they stumbled this weekend with a tie to Pacific.  This game may tell us a lot about the direction of both teams

Half:  CMS 1 - Cal Lu 0

FINAL:  CMS 1 - Cal Lutheran 1.  Dramatic finish as Cal Lutheran's JP Melgoza scores the equalizer from what the game summary reports as 15 yards out at the right edge of the box at the buzzer.  CMS was down to ten men for the last 18 minutes of the game after one of their players received a second yellow card and was ejected.  Big tie for Cal Lu and major disappointment for CMS.

Cal Tech @ Occidental 7 pm Pacific - Cal Tech is off to its best start since at least 2006 (3-0-1) and just tied one of the better NAIA teams in Socal - a team that beat Chapman.  Oxy's only loss has been to Texas Lutheran at home, but otherwise it has faced relatively weak competition.  I'm not sure people from the east coast appreciate that Cal Tech is really close to Oxy - about 6.5 miles apart - and while there aren't likely to be many Cal Tech students who make the trip, there are lots of families with grads or faculty/staff from both schools who live in the area.  Oxy routinely has the best attendance in the SCIAC and last year's Wed 7 pm game at Oxy between these two schools had 783 in attendance when Cal Tech came into the game 1-5 overall and 0-4 in conference.  The game was really tight (tied 1-1 at half before Oxy managed a goal in the second to win 2-1).  I wouldn't be surprised if this game draws a pretty big crowd.  Maybe Cal Tech will let the guys at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (who are all considered Cal Tech employees because Cal Tech manages it for NASA) leave early to go to the game!

Half:  Oxy 3 Cal Tech 0.  Oxy showing why they were voted preseason favorites in the SCIAC and Cal Tech ... wasn't.  Cal Tech has had some really good play down the left wing and passing out of the back, but they can't really handle Oxy's athleticism and physicality, especially on set pieces.

FINAL:  Occidental 8 Cal Tech 0.  Apparently, Oxy took personally all the talk about Cal Tech, so they decided to kick the living you know what out of those poor Beavers until they had lost the will to play the game.  No mercy whatsoever.  Oxy outshot them 26-6 and 16-4 on shots on goal and, for good measure, out-fouled them 16-9.  It looked like the college varsity team against the high school JV team at times.  Cal Tech's coach will earn his salary just trying to get those kids back on the field next game. 

Pomona-Pitzer @ Whittier 7 pm Pacific - I think P-P is better than their record (1-2-1) after a tough Texas road swing against St. Thomas and Trinity, but Whittier won't be a pushover.  Last year, Whittier was down a man most of the second half and evened the score at 2 before P-P managed an 81st minute winner.

Half:  Pomona-Pitzer 1 Whittier 1
FINAL:  Pomona-Pitzer 3 Whittier 2.  P-P came through with two goals in the second half a few minutes apart and held on after Whittier scored a second in the 83rd minute.

Linfield @ Willamette 8 pm Pacific - Willamette (0-4) gets a do-over with conference play starting.  They should be able to easily handle Linfield (0-3-1) at home, but if they have any difficulty then we'll know their record is not simply the result of playing a murders row of games to start the season (Southwestern, St. Thomas, Emory, and CMS)

FINAL:  Willamette 3 - Linfield 0. 

[Kuiper]

A few games that are interesting to me from Region X:

Friday:

Texas Lutheran (ASC) @ UT Dallas (SCAC)

UT Dallas is only 0-2-2 and Texas Lutheran is 4-0.  Nevertheless, UTD tied Wheaton (MA) and Southwestern and lost a close one to Babson.  Other than against Trinity, it also hasn't given up more than 1 goal a game.  Texas Lutheran hasn't exactly been an offensive juggernaut, winning two games 2-0 and 2-1 and tying two games 0-0 and 1-1.  This game might be closer than people expect.

Hardin-Simmons (ASC) @ Trinity (SCAC)

Trinity seems to be firing on all cylinders at 4-0 and H-S is 0-2-1.  If H-S is going to turn things around, this weekend against Trinity on Friday and Southwestern on Sunday is going to be the time to do it.

Saturday:

Pomona-Pitzer (SCIAC) @ Cal Tech (SCIAC)

P-P had a good, but not easy, 3-2 win over Whittier to open conference play.  Cal Tech was dismantled 8-0 by Occidental.  This game is pretty important for both teams.  If P-P has any hopes of qualifying for the conference tournament, they need the points against Cal Tech because it only gets harder from here with Oxy next week.  How Cal Tech responds to the thrashing they just took will tell you a lot about their resilience and whether this is really a turning point season for the program or just an incredibly easy set of pre-conference matches.  If they can beat P-P, they at least have a chance to take three games in a row with La Verne and Whittier coming up.

CMS (SCIAC) @ Chapman (SCIAC)

CMS is coming off a heartbreaking tie at the buzzer with Cal Lutheran and Redlands awaits next week.  Chapman lost to Redlands in a close one 2-1 and it probably needs this game to keep apace with the conference leaders in defense of last year's title.

Whitworth (NWC) @ Pacific Lutheran (NWC)

Pacific Lutheran looks like the best team in the NWC, but they are only 1-1-2 and their only signature results are a win against Colorado College and a tie against CMS.  It seems like the AQ, determined by conference regular season results only, is the only way they are going to get to the tourney this year.  They need to start out asserting dominance in NWC play.

Whitman (NWC) @ Puget Sound (NWC)

Puget Sound is the mystery team of the conference.  They are 2-0, but have only played a couple of lower-end NAIA teams.  This is a match that will help shed light on which of these teams looks like the top of the bottom, rather than the middle (or the bottom of the middle), of the NWC.

La Verne (SCIAC) @ Cal Lutheran (SCIAC)

Cal Lu should be flying high after the last second goal to earn a tie v. CMS, but they are only 2-1-2.  La Verne is quietly 4-1.  If Cal Lu isn't careful, La Verne's Adan Villarreal can do some damage.  He has 7 goals and 2 assists on only 15 shots in 5 games (256 minutes).  Give him an inch and he'll calmly pick his spot on the back of the net.

Occidental (SCIAC) @ Whittier (SCIAC)

Oxy found its mojo against Cal Tech.  They should beat Whittier easily, but as I said in the P-P game, Whittier isn't a pushover and really only lost because Pomona-Pitzer's center back hit a left-footed wonder strike free kick from about 25 yards out over the wall and curled into the near post.  Oxy has to get consistent results, not just flashy ones against over-matched opponents, to assert its dominance.

Sunday:

Whitman (NWC) @ Pacific Lutheran (NWC)

As I said with the Whitworth game on Friday, Pac Lu has to start out strong in NWC play.  Whitman is 0-3-1, but always seems to play the top NWC teams tough.  The back-end of these two games in a weekend Northwest Conference games can also be tricky to navigate.  If you get injuries or have to play your starters long in the first game, it can make the second game more challenging regardless of opponent.

Whitworth (NWC) @ Puget Sound (NWC)

Basically the same story as the write-up of the Whitman -Puget Sound game on Saturday.

[Kuiper]

A few notable results from Friday:

UC Santa Cruz ties DII Academy of Arts 1-1.  UC Santa Cruz plays a lot of DII schools because of its location.  Academy of Arts is not one of the strongest ones, but they did just tie Dominican, which was 12-6 and 8-2 in conference last year, so I would consider this a good result for the Banana Slugs.

Colorado College beats Ozarks 2-1 in Colorado Spring.  Ozarks is a a decent team.  It has a 2-2 record and was predicted to finish middle of the pack in the ASC after finishing 10-5-5 last year and losing in the QFs of the conference tourney to UTD.  Still, I expected Colorado College to handle them pretty easily because the SCAC is generally better than the ASC by a good stretch this year, even though the game was being played at Richardson, Texas as part of a UT Dallas round robin.  Nevertheless, the game was tied as late as the 74th minute after Colorado College gave up an own goal.  They managed to pull out the winner a few minutes later and generally dominated the game, but it was harder than it needed to be because CC was wasteful with its chances and lacked precision in front of the goal.

Texas Lutheran 2 - UT Dallas 1.  It wasn't easy (as I expected in my preview), but Tx Lu pulled it out.  Big win to stay undefeated.

Hardin-Simmons 2 - Trinity 2.  Trinity ends its win streak, but the tie will feel like a loss since they had a 2-1 lead before conceding a goal with about 5 minutes left.  Hardin-Simmons is still winless, but this has to feel win-lite for them to come back at Trinity's field.  H-S will rue a missed opportunity for their first win though.  They had a PK in the first half that Trinity saved and they scored on another Pk in the second to take the 1-0 lead before conceding two goals to Trinity.

[Kuiper]

Chapman 1 - Claremont-Mudd-Scripps 0

What I would call a "professional victory" by Chapman.  They get a goal on a CMS own goal in the first half (a good corner kick to force the own goal), go down to ten men early in the second half (52nd minute I think) on a red card and then hold on for a 1-0 victory.  Thing is that it wasn't just bunker ball.  Chapman outshot CMS.  Maybe CMS was still suffering a hangover from the Cal Lutheran stunner at the buzzer, but they aren't quite firing on all cylinders on offense.

Cal Tech 1 - Pomona-Pitzer 0. 

I've got to give credit to Cal Tech coach Duncan Gillis.  He picked those kids up off the mat after the thrashing at Oxy, pumped them back up, and they went out and beat P-P at home.  Part of the difference is that Oxy's more physical, athletic, style is a killer for Cal Tech, but P-P plays a brand of soccer more similar to Cal Tech - cerebral, passing, less in-your-face - and that allowed Cal Tech to flourish.  It could have come out the other way, but it was a nice game of soccer, relatively speaking.

[Kuiper]

Pacific Lutheran puts in one of their most comprehensive performances to date, beating Whitworth 4-1.

Whitman beats Puget Sound 3-2 on a last second goal (89:56)

Redlands goes down 2-0 to NAIA side Vanguard in the first half before storming back for 3 in the second half to win 3-2 on a hat trick by Jarrette Barajas

St. Thomas ties D2 St. Edwards 2-2 after St. Edwards ties it up in the 86th minute.  Chippy game with 9 yellow cards, 6 for St. Thomas and one a double yellow resulting in an ejection in the 89th minute for Diego Lazo after he got his first yellow in the 86th minute.  If you can bait St. Thomas into those kinds of yellow cards, you can knock them off their game.

[Kuiper]

Occidental averted disaster tonight.  Down 1-0 to Whittier with about 5-6 minutes left in the game, Oxy gets goals in the 85th and 90th minutes to snatch victory.  Whittier lost on another late goal against Pomona-Pitzer.  They are an improved team, but they need to figure out how to see out a game to the end.

Cal Lutheran ties La Verne 1-1.  This result, coupled with Cal Tech's win and Whittier's tie, is another indication of the improvement at the bottom of the SCIAC.  Teams can't take any games for granted. 

[Kuiper]

UT Dallas beat Colorado College 2-1.  Big win for UTD, which gets its first win of the season to go 1-3-2.  Colorado College couldn't dig out of a deep hole, down 2-0 at halftime, and goes to 3-2-1.  It should drop out of the regional rankings.  I've said for awhile that UT Dallas is better than their record.  They have had some close games.  With their move to DII next year, their players may effectively be playing for scholarships and roster spots for next season.

Texas Lutheran continues their unbeaten run with a 3-0 victory over University of the Ozarks.  They are now 6-0 and have at least an argument for top team in the region with Trinity getting a tie v. Hardin-Simmons and St. Thomas getting a tie with St. Edwards (although I don't know if a DII opponent is treated differently for the USC Regional Rankings).  The fact that Texas Lutheran won at Occidental and at Cal Lutheran and St. Thomas and Trinity's wins have come against teams with weaker records where they didn't have to leave the state of Texas might give Texas Lutheran the edge.  In truth, I don't think they have shown a strong enough offense to be considered better than St. Thomas or even Trinity (their 3 goals today was the most goals they have scored in any game), but an unblemished record is an unblemished record.

[Kuiper]

A number of games in the Northwest Conference today:

Pacific Lutheran 6 - Whitman 0

The Lutes continue their dominant weekend coming back to NWC play (after beating Whitworth 4-1 on Saturday).  Craig Johnson had a hat trick and Alvin Kamau had a brace in a game where Pacific Lutheran thoroughly out-matched Whitman. 

Whitworth 1 - Puget Sound 1

Whitworth salvages a point after the Pac Lu game, scoring the tying goal in the 88th minute. 

Pacific (OR) 4 - Lewis & Clark 0

This was L&C's first official game as a member of the NWC (after their game yesterday against Willamette was postponed).  It didn't go so well, but L&C did hold off Pacific through the first half, which ended 0-0.  Not surprisingly for a team in their second year of existence, they have very little depth and the second half was their undoing, giving up 4 goals.  Pacific played 31 players (pretty much their whole roster), which helped keep things from getting out of hand.  Lewis & Clark played 18, which included two goalkeepers and the third GK, who came on as a field player.  Not sure why L&C couldn't play more players considering they have a roster of 30. Perhaps they have an injury or illness bug that could also explain why their Saturday game against Willamette was postponed. 

Linfield 1 - George Fox 1.  It's apparently a rivalry match.

[Kuiper]

Games of interest to me Monday-Wednesday of this week in Region X:

Monday 9/18

Incarnate Word (D1) and Trinity.  Won't affect anything, but it's sometimes interesting to watch a lower D1 team play a higher D3 team

Tuesday 9/19

Texas Lutheran @ Howard Payne.  I doubt it will be competitive, but every game looms larger for Texas Lutheran as long as they stay unbeaten

Wednesday 9/20

Whitman @ Whitworth.  The "Battle of the Whits" rivalry

Occidental @ Pomona-Pitzer.  Oxy crushed Cal Tech, but had to score two goals in the last five minutes of the game at Whittier to eke out a win.  We'll see which team shows up against P-P.  After Cal Tech beat P-P 1-0, Oxy may be at risk for looking ahead to their game @Redlands on Saturday.

Chapman @ Cal Lutheran.  Chapman should be riding high after beating Claremont-Mudd-Scripps.  Cal Lu will be smarting from its disappointing tie with La Verne.

CMS @ Redlands.  Many years, this is the matchup that will decide the SCIAC championship.  Redlands is 5-0, but has only played two games against D3 opponents and two of its other three games were against weaker NAIA teams.  CMS hasn't won since the Willamette game a couple of weeks (and 3 games in-between) ago.  Both teams have a lot to prove.

Whittier @ La Verne.  La Verne is quietly 4-1-1 and just tied Cal Lutheran. If they want to make the conference tournament, this game and the game this weekend against Cal Tech will be important.

[Kuiper]

United Soccer Coaches has released its first Region X poll for games through this past weekend.  I agree with the first four.  I tend to think Pacific Lutheran could be higher.  It has played a harder schedule than Chapman, which lost to a team Cal Tech tied. Colorado College may ultimately prove strong too based on their Ohio swing results.  Southwestern is the team that doesn't belong in the rankings at all in my view.  It beat both Willamette and Whitman (@Southwestern), but both schools have not done well yet this year, so that may be less impressive than it seems.  Ties to Elmhurst and UT Dallas are not good results, especially since Elmhurst is 1-3-1 after losing to Lake Forest, and both the Elmhurst and UTD games were at Southwestern.  Redlands is 3-0 and probably has a better argument than Chapman for being in this group, including beating a tougher than expected UC Santa Cruz team.  Occidental might also be ahead of Chapman considering their one loss has been to the 3rd ranked team in the region.

https://unitedsoccercoaches.org/rankings/college-rankings/ncaa-diii-men-x/

Region X - Poll 1 - September 12, 2023
Rank    School    Prev    W-L-T
1    University of Saint Thomas (Texas)    NR    4-0-0
2    Trinity University (Texas)    NR    4-0-0
3    Texas Lutheran University    NR    4-0-0
4    Claremont-McKenna-Harvey Mudd-Scripps Colleges    NR    2-0-1
5    Southwestern University    NR    2-0-2
6    Chapman University    NR    3-1-0
7    Pacific Lutheran University    NR    1-1-2
8    Colorado College    NR    2-1-1

Region X - Poll 2 - September 19, 2023
Rank    School    Prev    W-L-T
1    University of Saint Thomas (Texas)    1    4-0-1
2    Trinity University (Texas)    2    4-0-1
3    Texas Lutheran University    3    6-0-0
4    University of Redlands    NR    5-0-0
5    Occidental College    NR    4-1-0
6    Pacific Lutheran University    7    3-1-2
7    Southwestern University    5    3-0-3
8    Chapman University    6    4-2-0

Colorado College and Claremont-Mudd-Scripps out.
Redlands and Occidental in

With CMS playing at Redlands tomorrow, that should spice things up if they weren't spicy enough already

[Kuiper]

Texas Lutheran beats Howard Payne 2-0.  Pretty comfortable game for the Bulldogs, although, as usual, they generally don't score much more than they need to in to order to win the game.  Texas Lutheran moves to 7-0 on the season, but still hasn't started SCAC conference play, which should be much tougher than these ASC opponents.

[Kuiper]

Four games in the SCIAC tonight

Occidental 5 - Pomona-Pitzer 3

This is a game that really typifies Oxy.  They score 3 goals in the first 22 minutes and are dominating Pomona-Pitzer with a swarming attack.  Then, a few minutes after the third goal, they give up a goal to P-P.  Still, they are up 3-1.  P-P lost to Cal Tech 1-0, who lost to Oxy 8-0, so no problem, right?  Coach probably yells at them a little at halftime to not turn off like that and they come out with renewed vigor at halftime and score a fourth goal in the 63rd minute.  So, they're up 4-1 and figure they can cruise.  Turn off again and promptly give up a second goal to P-P four minutes later.  Then, P-P scores another goal in the 76th minute and it's a ball game at 4-3.  Things are tight again until Oxy puts them away in the 85th minute with their fifth goal to win 5-3.  I don't know what it is, but it's hard to put a lot of faith in Oxy as a championship contender when they turn it on and off so easily.  On the one hand, they have a lot of firepower.  On the other hand, they have an off switch during games.  It isn't because the coach brings in a lot of subs and the quality drops either.  If anything, he doesn't trust his bench enough and may be running his favorites into the ground.  Either way, Oxy is 5-1 and 2-0 in the SCIAC, but it needs to be more consistent both in games and from game to game.  I will have a lot more belief in them if they can beat Redlands away on Saturday.

Redlands 2 - Claremont-Mudd-Scripps 1

CMS was up 1-0 deep into the second half and let this game slip away.  For most of the game, CMS' passing game was on point and Redlands was chasing a lot of ghosts.  Then, Redlands turned up the press and scored two goals within 6 minutes of each other (in the 71st and the 77th minutes) to win the game.  Redlands moves to 6-0 and 2-0 in the SCIAC.  They play Occidental on Saturday at home in a key game among teams in the regional rankings out west.  CMS drops to 2-2-2 and 0-2-1 in SCIAC play.

Cal Lutheran 3 - Chapman 1

Cal Lutheran bounces back from its tie with La Verne and from a 1-0 deficit in the first four minutes against Chapman to defeat the defending champions.  Neither team has established any consistency of form yet, but both are able to knock off a team when they are on their game.  That could still make them dangerous come tournament time if one or both of them qualify.
Chapman drops to 4-3 and 1-2 in SCIAC and Cal Lu goes to 3-1-3 and 1-0-2 in SCIAC.  If there was any doubt, Chapman should finally drop out of the Regional Rankings now.

Whittier 4 - La Verne 0

Lawrence Dydell's hat trick powers Whittier to a big win over its lower half of the table SCIAC rivals La Verne.  Whittier moves to 3-3 and 1-2 in the SCIAC and La Verne, who I thought was trending in the right direction after its tie against Cal Lutheran, drops to 4-2-1 and 0-1-1 in the SCIAC.

[Kuiper]

One game of note in the NWC:

Whitworth 3 - Whitman 2.  Whitworth jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the first 16 minutes and kind of held on from there and Whitman fought their way back into the game and made it interesting at the end with a late goal.  I don't think either team is a threat to Pac Lutheran or probably even Willamette.