Not a Good Sign

Slightly easier to remove a PDL team playing 14 games, almost all in one division than to remove a USL Pro team playing 26 games, against everybody in the league.

You need fewer teams going away, not more. And besides being teams from island nations, they were not connected, so, no, there was no real need to pull that trigger then.

Antigua is showing up, which is more than Bermuda was prepared to do. They're terrible, but they only lost 1-0 at Phoenix.

 

Antigua COULD break the all-time D3 record for fewest goals per game in a full season IF they score five or fewer in their last seven matches. They've got 8, and 14 would keep them off the all-time bottom, but 13 gives them the all-time record (the 2001 Northern Virginia Royals scored just 9 goals in 17 games).

Oddly enough, last year's Antigua team already has the second-worst goals-per-game average (tied with the 1998 Tallahassee Tempest at .67 per game) in D3 history (since 1996).

They're not going to get the all-time goals-against-per-game record (the 1998 Eastern Shore Sharks gave up an even 5 goals per game) because they'd have to give up 130 goals, so they'd have to allow 69 more in the last 7 games and that's not going to happen.

The 2005 Northern Virginia Royals and aforementioned 1998 Eastern Shore Sharks each had goal differentials of -74. Antigua is at -53, so I don't think they can get there in seven games, but you never know.

The more you look at it, that 1998 Eastern Shore team was really the worst team ever in D3 before this year. They went 0-18, scored 16 goals and gave up 90, and their leading scorer, someon named Todd Pettigrew, had four goals. Their goalie who played the most minutes had a 6.67 GAA.

They lost games 2-0, 5-0, 5-2, 7-0, 7-1, 3-0, 7-0, 5-0, 5-1, 5-0, 3-2, 1-0, 5-1, 2-1 (ot), 2-0, 2-0, 7-0, 10-2, 5-2, 7-2, 8-2, 3-2 and 5-0. So they were shut out 12 times.

With nowhere to go but up, they went 2-16 (scoring 18 goals and giving up 81) in 1999, apparently beating Delaware twice (2-1 in overtime on May 1 and 4-3 in shootout on July 30) and Northern Virginia (3-2 on July 16), but one of those can't be right as they only won two games, ever. They lost at South Jersey 11-0 on August 7, 1999. The South Jersey Barons are, today, the Ocean City Nor'Easters and play near where the Sharks played.

 

(Just to close the loop, Eastern Shore's 2-1 overtime win at Delaware on 5/1/1999 was in a non-league game, a US Open Cup qualifier back when they used to have special games just for that purpose. The 3-2 win at Northern Virginia on July 16 and the 4-3 shootout win against Delaware at home two weeks later were the only league wins in the history of the up-til-now worst D3 team ever.)

 

Do you know how long soccer games are? Or can you not tell on Google Maps?

 

Antigua is, without question, the worst team ever at this level. I think the 1998 Eastern Shore Sharks would beat them.

 

They are not the only team for which that is true.

$40,000, though? That's all? And they said they could have gotten by on half that? Well, by this point, and if you don't pay your players, sure.

And they took another 6-0 drubbing last night. If they score five goals or fewer in the last six games, they'll be the lowest-scoring DIII team of all time (and I might take that bet). And with their goal differential now at -64, that all-time record (-74) is within reach.

 

8 goals in 20 games, so they should score about 3 goals in the last six (even that is optimistic, rounding). 74 goals allowed in 20 games, so they should allow about 22 in the last six. Yeah, they should clear that pretty well.

 

It'll be close. Could they allow 28 goals in the last six? They could, certainly. They won't get the goals allowed per game record, but they will get most of the others.