Division 3 - 2015

It is tournament week – except the UAA and the Northwest Conference do not have conference tournaments.

For everyone else, each game from here on out is Win-and- you-get- to-play -another. These are some of the matchups that may be of interest:

UAA – Conference Games
11/7- #6 WashU at #18 Chicago (If WashU wins and #3 Carnegie Mellon beats Case Western Reserve, both would be 6-1 in the UAA, with WashU earning the championship, having given Carnegie Mellon its only loss of the season this past Friday.

College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin (CCIW)
11/7 Final – Could pit #22 Wheaton against #7 Illinois Wesleyan

Centennial Conference
11/7 Semi-Finals - Johns Hopkins vs. #25 McDaniel and #14 Swarthmore vs. Gettysburg.
(Johns Hopkins beat McDaniel 3-2 in 2OT on October 27 in a regular season game)
11/8 Final – Should be a good game.

Any of the Tournament Finals should be good games
11/6 – NJAC
11/7 –MAC, SCAC, CCIW, President’s, Empire 8, IIAC, NCAC. Liberty League
11/8 – NESCAC, ASC, SAA, ODAC, Centennial,

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2015 finals TODAY, Sunday 11-8-15

You can check http://www.d3soccer.com/landing/index for yesterday’s league championship results

Times are EST

- All winners have automatic bids to the NCAA Tournament
- You can find links to streaming video on the team “Schedule/Results” web page.
​

- Each team’s listed (NCAA Regional Ranking, Massey Rating) drive the
(NCAA Tournament Seedings, Relative strength of teams playing)

Noon
Bowdoin (New England #6, M-39) at Williams (New England #1, M-7)

1:00 pm
Roanoke (Not Ranked, M-176) at Lynchburg (South Atlantic #3, M-27)
Rhodes (Not Ranked, M-103) at Centre (South Atlantic #1, M-20)

2:00 pm
Johns Hopkins (Mid-Atlantic #5, M-19) at Swarthmore (Mid-Atlantic #2, M-6)
Texas-Tyler (West #4, M-18) vs. Hardin-Simmons (Not Ranked, M-68)

- I’m going to try and catch Hopkins at Swarthmore, because I haven’t watched Swarthmore this year, and it will be very competitive.


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Sunday's results are here:: http://www.d3soccer.com/landing/index

The NCAA Tournament Bracket will be announced beginning at 1:00 pm Monday.

A List of the top teams I’ve watched on-line or in person... All of the teams in my list are confident & capable in the attack and are generally not reliant on a single star player. I tried to list the core four in attack for each team. Offensively, I would subjectively list the teams s in this order:

1. Messiah: Elsaesser, Weaver, Burgard, Soto
2. Williams: Thomas, Kirshe, Lewin, Mitsuyama
3. Illinois Wesleyan,: Fox, Tomko, Seger, Bottorff
4. Lynchburg: Singer, Woll, Clark, Olds
5. Centre: Graves, Combs, Ingham, Harris
6. William Smith: Longo, Shue, Ruane, Callahan
7. Stevens Institute of Technology: can’t say because their stream had no audio, so tracking specific players was tough, but they had a very focused, deliberate, and incisive attack.

On-line, you can see how a team attacks and works the ball offensively, but it is harder to watch defenses than in person, because the camera doesn’t let you.

The previous list in order of defense, objectively using Saves made per Game as an indicator (If you aren’t making saves, your defense must be pretty good); strength of schedule is not taken into account.

1. Lynchburg 1.6
2. Messiah 1.8
3. William Smith 2.0
4. Carnegie Mellon 2.0
5. Centre 2.3
6. Illinois Wesleyan 2.4
7. Williams 3.0
8. Stevens 4.7

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DIII Bracket Analysis

I calculated: Rank Index Points (RIP) = (NSCAA Rank + Massey Rank + Bennett Rank) divided by 3.

I used the RIP to indicate the relative strength of teams and brackets. I graded each bracket by summing the RIPs for the top five teams in each bracket, regardless of how they were seeded within the bracket. (20 out of the 64 teams)

On the table, ** indicates a team that is not playing the first and second round games on their home field.

Disclaimer: These are imaginary numbers and no true meaning can be extracted from them.

a. The right side brackets appear to be slightly stronger than the left side brackets. The overall distribution is much more even than in 2014, when the values were 43, 51,53, and 88

b. Unlike 2014, when the two strongest teams were in the same bracket, the first four strongest teams are distributed among the four brackets.

c.. Ithaca, Puget Sound, Wheaton, and Brandeis don’t have home games, but have better RIPs than teams in their bracket that do have home games.


UPPER LEFT------------68------------------UPPER RIGHT--------63
Messiah----------------------1-----------------Carnegie Mellon------------4
Trinity, TX------------------7------------------Centre----------------------10
Swarthmore-----------------8-----------------Thomas More--------------14
Ithaca**---------------------24----------------Chicago**-------------------17
Rowan----------------------28-----------------McDaniel**----------------18

LOWER LEFT-------------73--------------LOWER RIGHT--------62
WashU**---------------------4----------------William Smith---------------3
Illinois Wesleyan------------8----------------Williams---------------------7
Puget Sound**--------------12----------------Stevens Tech---------------12
Wheaton**------------------23-----------------Brandeis**----------------15
Denison----------------------26----------------Amherst--------------------25

 

A few notable First Round games this weekend are:
[I used the November 10th NSCAA Rankings below]

Today Friday 11/13
6:00 pm EST #17 Texas Tyler at #2 Trinity
https://new.trinity.edu/live
– on 9/11 at Trinity, they drew 1-1 in 2 OT (no goals scored in OT )
- I'm going to watch this instead of USMNT vs. St. Vincent and the Grenadines

Saturday 11/14
12:30 pm EST #13 Puget Sound (16-0-4) vs. Augustana (18-2-1) at Wartburg
http://www.wartburg.edu/knightvision/

1:30 pm EST Roger Williams (16-0-4) vs. Misericordia (15-3-2) at William Smith
http://hwsathletics.com/watch/?Live=578
- BTW I really like Roger Williams’ checkerboard kits – so sue me.

1:30 pm EST St. Lawrence (Massey #38) vs. TCNJ (Massey #39) at Williams
Maybe: http://www.nsnsports.net/colleges/williams-college/

 

Results for the First Round are here: http://www.ncaa.com/interactive-bracket/soccer-women/d3

One second round game was played today:

Hardin-Simmons ousted #2 Trinity 2-0; this is the third year in a row that high-scoring Trinity has left the tournament via shutout.​

A few notable Second Round games on Sunday 11/15/15:
[I used the November 10th NSCAA Rankings below]

The games are all at 1:00 pm, EST

#25 Chicago (13-6) at #8 Undefeated Thomas More (18-0-2)
https://www.boxcast.com/show/#/ncaa-division-iii-women-s-soccer-second-round-2

Undefeated Roger Williams (20-0-3) at #3 William Smith (17-1-1)
http://hwsathletics.com/watch/?Live=576

- I watched Roger Williams vs. Misericordia today. – RW has a different style of play than William Smith- Tomorrow’s Hawks vs. Herons will be kinda like gazelles (RW) vs. buffalo (WS).​

Brandeis (15-2-3) at Amherst (11-3-2)
http://www.nsnsports.net/colleges/amherst/

- A battle of Massachusetts.

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Results of the games I noted yesterday:

Undefeated #8 Thomas More scored at 49:41 and held on to win 1-0 vs. #25 Chicago. Chicago had more shots [13-6] and corners [5- 0] than Thomas More, but could not earn a goal.

On a relatively balmy 59 degree day in Geneva (compared to 39 degrees with strong winds yesterday), The #3 William Smith Heron buffaloes stampeded the previously undefeated Roger Williams Hawk gazelles 5-1, with the RW lone goal coming in the 88th minute on a great shot to the upper 90 of the far post from 30 yards out. William Smith senior defender Zoe Jackson-Gibson smothered RW leading scorer Mariah Kaiser (16G, 8A), marking her 1 on 1 the entire match, as she did with Messiah's All-American Nikki Elsaesser earlier in the season. Five different Herons scored goals and 3 of them chalked up both a goal and an assist.

Brandeis scored at 4:50 and Amherst scored at 75:45, with the game ending 1-1 after two scoreless overtime periods. Brandies advanced on PKs 3-2. Brandeis and #6 Williams continue to carry the flag for Massachusetts.


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I am in full agreement on Centre; last year the attacking duo of Alex Combs and Ann Mitchell impressed me a lot, and this year Combs is back and I really like the play of Jr. forward Destinie Graves. The team is strong back to front.

Similar to your thoughts on Lynchburg, I feel the Trinity loss is not unexpected, even given their high national ranking. They barely escaped Texas Tyler in the first round, winning in PKs; and Hardin-Simmons (national champion in 2010) has an excellent pedigree, being a big rival to Trinity in recent years.

The First Round matchup of Texas Tyler and Trinity was pretty obviously unfair to both teams, and should have been seen as such by the NCAA.

RE: Expensive D3 schools. This seems to come with the territory. As you know, D3 predominantly includes private, liberal arts colleges and universities in the East and Midwest, many of which were founded more than 100 years ago. In the Forbes 2015 List of Top Colleges, D3 schools are #1,2,7,9,10, and #17-20 (nine of top twenty).

BTW, in the D3 final 16, we have Owls, Falcons, Herons, Warhawks, Ducks, and two Knights.


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On Saturday I get to see #3 William Smith - #11 Brandeis at 11 am and #6 Williams- #14 Stevens at 1:30 pm.

Forecast is mid-40's and cloudy. I saw Brandeis tie Rochester 1-1 three weeks ago; Brandeis will be a tough match for William Smith. I haven't seen Williams in person since 2011 - I'm looking forward to it.

I Won't talk about Sunday, yet.

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Games this weekend - try and go to one near you
http://www.ncaa.com/interactive-bracket/soccer-women/d3

NCAA D3 Statistical Leaders in Action this Weekend

2015 Total Goals
#3 Nikki Elsaesser, Messiah – 28
#8 Olivia Huber, Thomas More – 26

2015 Total Assists
#1 Reba Nassif, Stevens– 19
#4 Kami Jones, Hardin -Simmons – 15
#7 Nikki Elsaesser, Messiah - 14
#10 Josey Meyer, Hardin –Simmons – 13

2015 Team Goals per Game
#2 Hardin-Simmons – 5.00
#5 Messiah – 4.18
#7 Swarthmore – 3.90
#8 Stevens – 3.86

2015 Team – Goals Against Average
#2 Messiah – 0.134
#4 William Smith – 0.245
#7 Swarthmore – 0.331
#8 WashU – 0.343
#10 Illinois Wesleyan – 0.358

Career Record Leaders
#5 Total Points per Season –Olivia Huber, Thomas More - 88 in 2014
#1, #3, and #12 Shutouts per Season – Audra Larsen, Messiah - 22 in 2012, 18 in 2013, and 16 in 2014

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I watched parts of couple of Stevens games on line. My streaming is not great, so sometimes the feeds break up. The Stevens feed sometimes has no audio, not even ambient crowd/stadium announcer sound, which makes identifying specific players very hard. Stevens looks pretty good to me.

One game, I think it was Nazareth, they were behind 2-1 at half, picked up the equalizer at 58:01 and won in the first OT. I would say the equalizer was a very business-like goal featuring good skill and teamwork in the build-up .Iin the first 12 minutes of the second half they looked like they were going to score, not like they were trying to score.

Reba Nassif, being #1 in D3 in assists is probably a fun player to watch.

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TODAY= FRIDAY



11:00 am Calvin at Carnegie Mellon


1:30 pm Undefeated Thomas More vs. Centre at Carnegie Mellon





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• Centre topped Thomas More 1-0 with a score in 89TH minute. The stream didn’t work for me so I didn’t watch.

• Calvin advanced after scoring in the first overtime of a 0-0 game vs. Carnegie Mellon.

Today - Saturday

1:30 pm ET Hardin-Simmons (19-2-1) vs. Swarthmore ( 18-2-1) at Messiah
http://gomessiah.com/sports/2015/11/16/WS111615-2015sectionals.aspx

I find this match-up intriguing for non-soccer reasons:

Abilene, TX is 1500+ miles away from Swarthmore, PA.
Dallas is the nearest big city to Abilene and is 200 miles away.
Philadelphia is the nearest big city to Swarthmore and is 20 miles away.
Both schools are about the same size (1550 at Swarthmore and 1650 at Hardin-Simmons) and have slightly more women than men
Hardin-Simmons’ Roster has 25 players from Texas, with one each from New Mexico and Arkansas.
Swarthmore’s players hail from 14 states and one Province, including 9 players from California.
​

For other games, take your pick:
http://www.ncaa.com/interactive-bracket/soccer-women/d3




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Game Reports from Geneva, NY

42 degrees, overcast with a light breeze. 2/3 of the players wore long sleeves and/or wore gloves – no tights today. The grass pitch was in good shape, and was groomed in circles, rather than the stripes from the previous 3 or 4 games.​

William Smith 1 – Brandeis 0 – 1 OT
In the first 20 minutes, The William Smith keeper and defenders had a few ugly misplays, none of which were converted by Brandeis. Brandeis had very fast wing players and fed them the ball nicely in potentially dangerous counter attacks – services into the box were ineffective, however. In the last half of the first half William Smith generally played in the Brandeis half of the field, without generating any highly dangerous chances

In the second half, William Smith applied increased pressure offensively, managing to get the ball to players in the box in front of goal – Brandeis defenders and the keeper blocked several short-range shots. In the OT period, William Smith continued to apply that pressure and scored on a rebounded ball in the box.

Williams 2 – Stevens 1
I saw one cow suit – made popular in Williams’ run to the NCAA Title Game last year - among the Williams spectators, who overall appeared to outnumber the Stevens fans. I noted that the Williams keeper wore head protection a la Petr Cech. Early in the game, Williams had Stevens on its heels by way of the aggressive runs of first year forward Kristina Alvarado, the hard-nosed play of junior Kristi Kirshe, and elegant playmaking of senior Mai Mitsuyama. I was told Williams platoons its attacking 6, when I noted that the starters only played about 25 minutes.

To Stevens’ credit, even though the second platoon picked up where the first platoon left off, Stevens did not deflate after being scored on in the 13th minute. In the last 20 minutes of the first half, they held heir share of possession and attacked well. Stevens' junior Raba Nassif plays target forward, leads D3 in assists this year, and is the flagship player of the team. She carried the team physically and emotionally for most of the game.

With the exception of Kristina Alvarado’s second goal in the 50th minute, Stevens played Williams pretty much even up in the second half. Stevens' goal in the 83rd minute was a put-back when the Williams keeper bobbled the ball as she came off her line to pick it up under pressure.

I noted that Williams’ junior forward Audrey Thomas did not play at all. I asked a couple of fans if she was injured, but they didn’t know. Also , a rare triple substitution was made at 36:40 of the first half: Gabby Mathelier and Gabby Pagkalinawan came in for Stevens and Gabby Suarez came in for Williams.


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Thanks for the reps, Fitballer!

I would like to see a replay of the Swarthmore vs. Hardin Simmons game:

Swarthmore advanced in PKs by a 4-3 tally to tomorrow’s game vs. Messiah. OT all ended with a 1-1 draw. In the shootout, Swarthmore keeper senior Reba Magier saved 4 of 7 kicks by Hardin Simmons, including the last 3 saves in a row.

Top of 5th round: Swarthmore made the shot to tie the result at 3-3.
Bottom of 5th round: Magier made the do-or-die save, keeping the tally at 3-3.​

Top of 6th round: Swarthmore’s try was saved, keeping the 3-3 score.
Bottom of 6th round: Magier made the do-or-die save, score still 3-3.​

Top of 7th round: Swarthmore made the shot to go ahead 4-3
Bottom of 7th round: Magier made the save; Swarthmore advances 4-3.​

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...irrelevant BTW......... saying 'PK shootout' grates on the crabby part of me that shouts "it's offside,' not offsides:" They are Kicks from the Mark (KFTM) not Penalty Kicks (PKs).

 

I had to check to see for myself that You Are Correct - therefore I will refer to KFTPM in the future - after all it is not good to be crabby and incorrect at the same time.

 

Back from Geneva - the Williams Ephs advanced to the semifinals in Kansas City 3-0 in KFTPM, after a 1-1 draw with William Smith in regulation and no score in the two overtime periods.

Being sorely disappointed that my Herons are not advancing, I am not up to writing much of a report about the game.

It was 40 degrees and overcast with a breeze for the entire game. The Ephs scored at 7:31 when the Herons' defense dropped back in response to the Ephs' attack, and no one pressured the ball carrier coming up the middle of the field. I don't remember who the dribbler was, but she passed to Kristi Kirshe who passed to Audrey Thomas who put the ball past the keeper. The Herons spent the rest of the game trying to equalize and keeping the Ephs on their heels - finally finding the net at 85:27. In the second half, The Herons led the Ephs 8 shots to 3 and corner kicks 8 to 1. The Herons were able to keep the pressure on during the OT periods 7 shots to 2 and 2 corners to none, but the cold, wind and effort to equalize finally drained their energy. They had no reserve energy to punch through in OT and were apparently flat going into the KFTPM.

I'll be rooting for Williams to get the trophy that eluded them last year.