MSoc v. Howard Bison 7 PM TedMac Field

asu66 · Unread post by **asu66** » Sat Oct 10, 2015 10:19 am

Our Men's StrikerApps (4-5, 0-1 Sun Belt) are at home this evening for an official SunBelt match with the Howard Bison (0-10-2, 0-0 Sun Belt).

I won't bore anyone with a lot of numbers. Both of these teams are lowly-rated. Both are desperate for a win. Our guys will be shooting for two in a row after taking a 1-0 win over hapless UNC-A last week. Howard is coming off of a 2-2 draw at equally hapless JMU. The Dukes program is really down when it can't handle Howard on the Harrisonburg pitch.

Hey, mon, Howard will play three players from Trinidad; and five from Jamaica. In the real world, that should be enough import talent to do in the Apps rather nicely. But, nooooooooooooo. Not necessarily. Howard's keeper sports a 3.55 GAA (goals allowed average).

That's bloody awful.

If the Apps can only pull off one SunBelt win this season, this is it, mon.

A word of caution, these two teams played to a draw last season in D.C.

I guess we need to keep our expectations in check.

asu66 · Unread post by **asu66** » Sat Oct 10, 2015 8:22 pm

asu66 wrote:

Our Men's StrikerApps (4-5, 0-1 Sun Belt) are at home this evening for an official SunBelt match with the Howard Bison (0-10-2, 0-0 Sun Belt).

I won't bore anyone with a lot of numbers. Both of these teams are lowly-rated. Both are desperate for a win. Our guys will be shooting for two in a row after taking a 1-0 win over hapless UNC-A last week. Howard is coming off of a 2-2 draw at equally hapless JMU. The Dukes program is really down when it can't handle Howard on the Harrisonburg pitch.

Hey, mon, Howard will play three players from Trinidad; and five from Jamaica. In the real world, that should be enough import talent to do in the Apps rather nicely. But, nooooooooooooo. Not necessarily. Howard's keeper sports a 3.55 GAA (goals allowed average). That's bloody awful.

If the Apps can only pull off one SunBelt win this season, this is it, mon.

A word of caution, these two teams played to a draw last season in D.C. I guess we need to keep our expectations in check.

Junior mid Donovan Japp scored in the 34th minute off of an assist from junior forward Stephen Chapman for the eventual game winner; and true frosh Daniel Avila tacked on an insurance goal in the 76th minute off an assist from senior defender Alex Beranger to seal an AppState win over Howard.

Maybe our guys have built some momentum and confidence from two straight wins--albeit against two of the weaker teams on the schedule.

DoubleA · Unread post by **DoubleA** » Sun Oct 11, 2015 7:36 am

Howard was one of the weakest opponents imaginable - its no wonder they have not won a game this season and sit near the bottom of RPI rankings. The Bison could barely hold possession and only managed one shot all night - a shot well off target. Next up, a Tuesday night trip to Clinton, SC to face another winless opponent and RPI bottom feeder, Presbyterian College.

Highbeam · Unread post by **Highbeam** » Mon Oct 12, 2015 6:02 am

App must never be over confident when we play these "RPI Bottom Feeders". Anybody can can beat anybody on any given day. This happened yesterday at UNCA. Coastal Carolina, future Sun Belt Conference member and ranked #6 in the country, was stunned and I do mean stunned by UNCA 3-2 in Asheville yesterday. Coastal probably come into the game over confident and they got beat. Never take your opponents lightly no matter how lowly they are. This is what an excellent new head coach can do for a lowly program.

DoubleA · Unread post by **DoubleA** » Mon Oct 12, 2015 6:52 am

Highbeam wrote:App must never be over confident when we play these "RPI Bottom Feeders". Anybody can can beat anybody on any given day. This happened yesterday at UNCA. Coastal Carolina, future Sun Belt Conference member and ranked #6 in the country, was stunned and I do mean stunned by UNCA 3-2 in Asheville yesterday. Coastal probably come into the game over confident and they got beat. Never take your opponents lightly no matter how lowly they are. This is what an excellent new head coach can do for a lowly program.

Wow, a stunner indeed. This should be huge for App, since we beat UNC-A and Asheville currently has one of the higher RPI rankings (100) of anyone on our schedule. Asheville should see a nice bump in RPI when the next rankings come out, and App should benefit as well.

Hey, I don't mean to harp on RPI so much, but the bottom line is we need to schedule better teams if App has any hopes of rebuilding the program and improving our rankings. There are many really good teams here in our own state that we should be playing, rather than traveling to Nashville to play Belmont or to Clinton, SC to play Presby. We are somewhat challenged from an RPI standpoint in that we play in an extremely weak soccer conference, so OOC scheduling is key to building our credibility and stature within college soccer circles.