App State MSoc (6-5, 1-1 Sun Belt) and home-standing Ga South (4-6-1, 1-1 Sun Belt) will battle Saturday night for sole possession of third place in the Sun Belt men's soccer standings in a match slated for the Erk Park pitch in the 'Boro.

The Mountaineers lead the all-time series between the two rivals 14-13-1. Recently, however, the Eagles have had the upper hand, winning the last two matches between the sides with back-to-back 1-0 wins.

The Apps will be looking to take sole possession of third place in the Sun Belt standings and to complete the fall sweep of the Iggles; having already topped their rivals in football on Thursday night and in both volleyball and women's soccer on Friday night. All three of those contests were played in Boone, NC.

App State is coming off of a 2-1 loss at #17 NC State on Tuesday; while Ga South will be trying to rebound from a 3-1 loss at #4 Clemson.

LiveStats... http://www.statbroadcast.com/events/sta ... p?gid=gaso

ESPN3... http://espn.go.com/watchespn/index/_/id ... n-m-soccer

VB was in Statesboro.

Ga South scored in the 3rd minute of play to take a 1-0 lead. :>( Play is now in the 20th minute.

Eagles win 1-0.

That was some ugly soccer on both sides and A bad loss for us against vs # 176, ranked GA Southern.

DoubleA wrote:That was some ugly soccer on both sides and A bad loss for us against vs # 176, ranked GA Southern.

???? RPI rankings--what's that???? Our leadership hasn't attached much importance to them in what seems like forever.

I believe yesterday's loss computes to three straight one-goal losses to Ga South; and three straight shut-out losses to them. They've held us scoreless for *geez* three straight years. If you can't score at least one goal in a game; you can't win a game. That's been the story of Appalachian soccer since the "middle" years of the Art Rex era.

Coach Rex, for those who may not know or might have forgotten, is the former ASU head soccer coach who managed election *go figure* into the ASU Athletics Hall of Fame with a winning percentage of .482. That speaks volumes about what our soccer program has been post Vaughn Christian and Hank Steinbrecher...with brief respite periods under T.J Kostecky '98, Aidan Heany '99 to '00, Dave Golan '01 to '02 and Shaun Pendleton '07 to '11. ASU hasn't won a conference championship in men's soccer since 1989--a 26 year drought.

66- Lack of concern over rankings, and accepting Ga Southern as our soccer rival rather than top in-state programs, speaks volumes about the athletic departments lack of committmemt to the MSOC program. This is hard to swallow for those of us who were around to witness Vaughn Christian and Hank Steinbrecher years. it will be interesting to watch what changes, if any are made. need for significant change has been glaringly obvious for some time now. Do we continue to let the program languish, and eventually cut it all together? Or do we put more resources into MSOC and try to reclaim some level of respect and notoriety?

Time to make a decision...Are we in it to win it? If not dump it because we are going to start paying COA very soon.

For the sake of the Sun Belt staying a MSOC conference, we likely have to keep it as a sport moreso than some other sports.

Conference won't have a leg to stand on when only three schools have MSOC and 2/3 of the conference doesn't partcipate. Coastal takes our spot, and they can find another affiliate member for MSOC. hopefully, it doesn't come to that.

DoubleA wrote:Conference won't have a leg to stand on when only three schools have MSOC and 2/3 of the conference doesn't partcipate. Coastal takes our spot, and they can find another affiliate member for MSOC. hopefully, it doesn't come to that.

P-l-e-a-s-e, no!

We can all speculate at this point about what is going to happen in the conference and MSOC but we all agree this program needs a new direction, new blood in the coaching position and a rock solid commitment from the Admin. I am optimistic that when the season is over Mr. Gillen will evaluate MSOC and make the necessary changes that this program needs. Last year Gillen assured the players that he would be involved when the season was over. We can see certain decisions made last year set the ground work for this years season decisions. Nelson's contract only renewed for one year and making Jeff Bilyk Associate Head Coach as examples.That was an ultimatum the way I read it. There were other areas of concern that were mentioned during the meeting that needed to improve but to me none have improved to a point you could say they are a success. I will say this, if Nelson stays you will see most of the players ask for their release so they can transfer.

If Gillin allows that to happen, it would mean he's decided to take the "chicken way out" to cutting the program and trimming the athletic department budget by that amount. That's no way to do business.

I think Gillin's cut from more sturdy cloth than that; and that he'll try to save the program first by putting a more skilled coach in charge and giving the new leadership resources to make improvements and build a winner.

Don't know if Bilyk is the right guy; but he was well-regarded in the Cornelius-Davidson-Huntersville-Lake Norman area. And those folks know excellence in soccer when they see it.

Sorry for spelling Gillin's name wrong in the previous post. Yes, I think Gillin would want to save the program and he would also want it to excel. There is to much history in App St MSOC to let it die on the vine. More money in the program would be a good start to where we can compete with the other better programs. More money means hiring a more established coach and assistants that are good at what they do and are good recruiters.

Jeff is a great guy and the players respond well to his coaching. Jeff's professional career is a plus but, I think we should have an open process in finding a new coach. We don't need to just hand it off to the next guy in line. That is how we ended up with our current coach. Look for two or three candidates that would fit in at App, including Bilyk, and let them fight it out. There are some great asst coaches in the ACC that would love to start their head coaching career at App St. I believe the players would respond well to a coach whose philosophy or style of play they agreed with. Currently, I see no confidence or agreement in the players on the field at this time.

The elevation of the current coach at the time seemed like the right thing to do given the circumstances. However, I think time has proven that a change is now needed for the sake of the program's future.

Jesse Wood of High Country Magazine has pinned an interesting narrative on the rise and fall of Appalachian State soccer. Very few coaches could produce a winner while operating under the kind of scholarship limitations we face.

The article starts on page 16.

http://www.hcpress.com/oct-mag-2015

No doubt, limited resources are a big constraint, which makes it difficult to attract top tallent and coaches. Furthermore, MSOC roster was cut to 24 back at the end of 2014 Spring season. This was a Title IX move, necessitated by expanded football roster. So we are basically limping along, starved for resources.

The issue of the High County Magazine that Charlie hot linked above also contained an editorial by Jesse Wood and Ken Ketchie entitled..."What it was, was soccer." It's a little cumbersome to access the single page (page 8), but here's an ISSUU link that will take you directly there. Be patient, it make take a few extra seconds to load--depending on your PC and your Internet provider. It's a bit of the "same 'ol, same 'ol" mindset, but much to my chagrin, it's fairly realistic.

http://issuu.com/highcountrymagazine/do ... 3/30654799