Northern Arizona and San Diego State Games

Thought I'd preview this weekend's Northern Arizona (Friday) and San Diego State (Sunday) games.

Northern Arizona: Their record so far this year is 1-3-1. They have lost to Arizona State (record: 2-2-1, so far appearing not as strong as one might expect); TCU (4-0-1); and UC Irvine (1-4-0, although likely better than that record). They tied New Mexico (2-1-2). They beat Southern Utah (0-3-0). Overall, they look like a fairly weak team. Visualize Kennesaw State?

San Diego State: Different picture. Their record is 2-2-1, all wins and losses with a 1-goal differential. They have lost to Cal State Northridge (4-0-0) and Villanova (5-0-0). They tied Loyola, Maryland (0-3-1). They beat Cal Poly (2-4-0, but probably better than that record with a win over Indiana which in turn beat Tennessee) and Arizona State (2-2-1). Visualize Oregon?

I'm guessing a high-scoring affair vs Northern Arizona and a closer game against San Diego State.

PS - Has anyone heard which games the U-20s will be missing for the U-20 team camps?

UPSoccerFanatic wrote:

PS - Has anyone heard which games the U-20s will be missing for the U-20 team camps?

Near as I can figure out, they will miss the Rutgers game and the St. Mary's game. I'm not sure how much travel will affect them or how far they will have to travel, so you have to wonder about Penn St. and San Francisco as well.

Actually, I am starting to believe that these camps will be a blessing in disguise getting the team used to playing without the U-20 players. Being sucessful without those guys will be a confidence booster for later in the year where things start to get hairy.

Garrett in a previous podcast said that they would not have to miss games against ranked teams ( I believe) So that would rule out the Penn State game.

Auto - I also believe these missed games by the U20's will be a good dry run for the playoffs.

Garrett can really experiment with the people he believes have the best chance to be successful at a high level later on, when, as you say, "things start to get hairy."

NAU Coach pays a few compliments to Merlo in this article http://nau.newtier.com/index.php?module=pnNews&tid=23&sid=2416

Kudos to coach Luciano for putting the best possible spin on this game. I had the gut feeling this wouldn't be much of a test for the pilots, so I went to our friend Albyn Jones to see what his match predictor said.

UP win - 99.19%
Tie - .2043%
N.A. win - .4056%

That's 122.8:1 odds in favor of a Pilot win.


It will probably get all you fans who didn't get to Seattle another chance to see how the rest of the UP team is doing, and you might actually get to see who Garrett thinks has a shot at starting in the tournament, though it might be a bit early for that.


San Diego State is a bit worse for UP

UP win - 95.62%
tie - 2.139%
SD State win - 2.236%

So the odds of a UP win drop to 21.9:1

Which again may give Garrett a chance to do a lot of experimenting.

Fans may get to see the wonders of Sara Jackman or Kristen Kelly as a striker. I'll be willing to bet we will see them both in the midfield together at some point in the weekend. I think Garrettt is looking for a way to Keep Sophie forward. We may once more see Charney in the Middle, where I think she may end up as an Upperclassman.

That doesn't mean we don't have to show up. The odds aren't 0 of a loss for no reason, and Garrett no doubt wants to see shutouts and high UP scores. I'll bet a goal is that Kelsey doesn't take her hands out of her pockets.

Very cool comments from the NAU coach. It's cool when coaches have that type of perspective - that it's just a great opportunity for his players to experience what it's like to play in front of 4,000 fans with loud and crazy students in a beautiful soccer-only facility. I mean... I know nothing about NAU's field or the other fields in the Big Sky, but Portland State plays it's games at a high school and I'm sure some of the other teams play at similarly poor fields or even football fields. And that doesn't even factor in crowds.

Just another reminder of how lucky we are to have what we have. I'll definitely be there!

Certainly looks like a HS Stadium

Its nice how they put the light standards in front of the bleachers...

NAU is obviously not known for their engineering department

Maybe they wanted to give it that old timey feel, like Fenway or Boston Garden with seats behind posts and whatnot... Or maybe their fans are so rabid they need the standards to support fences and razor wire to keep them from storming the field... Speaking of... maybe Merlo should have a moat around the field. Then geezer and co. can drop a line in and fish during blowouts....

DaTruRochin wrote:Maybe they wanted to give it that old timey feel, like Fenway or Boston Garden with seats behind posts and whatnot... Or maybe their fans are so rabid they need the standards to support fences and razor wire to keep them from storming the field... Speaking of... maybe Merlo should have a moat around the field. Then geezer and co. can drop a line in and fish during blowouts....

That could be even more fun than throwing Pilot club M&M's at the opposing coach, which is what I do now...



Just kidding

Here's a short clip of the N. Arizona field during UP's 4-0 win a couple years ago--

Geezer, I'll add the moat to your fold down flat panel monitors... Maybe next we will have a luxury box for the pilot club.... of course located with a deck over the protective moat and mounted sling shots and air cannons to hurtle candy covered chocolate at opposing coaches....