ACC 50th Anniversary Team

I like it!!!

 

This is great. Now we just need the all time best coaches in the ACC. I'm sure Tarantini will run away with that one!

 

Twellman at UMD should read 1998-99, not 1988-89.

Saw him make a SWEET pseudo-bicycle over his right shoulder with his left foot in a playoff game in 99.

 

that's funny. It's supposed to be a 50th anniversary team yet the furthest back the players go is Dorrance in 1971....all of 31 years ago.

 

Several of the ACC schools were playing soccer well before the formation of the conference. When the conference was formed in 1953 these schools had soccer programs: Duke, Maryland, NC State, UNC, and Virginia. Maryland played for the national championship in 1960, and the first national champion from the ACC was Maryland in 1968.

 

The List Is A Piece Of Crap

>They are celebrating the 50th anniversary of the league. I don't think the soccer program goes back that far which is why the earliest player is '71.

Tiger1,
I mean no disrespect to you, but ACC soccer began long before 1971. Sorry folks, but this is more like a 25th Anniversary list and not a 50th Anniversary list.

Sorry, but this list is bogus. I do not mean to take away from the men who did get selected, especialy since I am a reporter who has covered Maryland soccer for a long time and I knew and respected all the Maryland guys who made the list. Furthermore, I did postgame interviews with more than half of the others from other schools who made it (have spoken with Dorrance on several occassions) and I have been around long enough to see every single member of this list play while they still had college eligibility.

However, I find it blatantly disrespectful to the pioneers of the sport who made ACC Men's Soccer the strongest conference in the country for most of the last 50 years, to exclude them from the ranks of this team.

This list is the work of lazy voters who did not do their research and/or do not have any buddies that go back that far and therefor, didn't have any butts to kiss.

The ACC was formed on May 8, 1953. Maryland won the league title in it's first year of competition and won 16 consecutive league titles from '53-'68 and again in '71.

Maryland was National Runner-Up twice in the early 60's: both times to St. Louis in 1960 and '62; was co-national champion with Michigan State in 1968 and was a Final Four participant in '63 and '69. Their coach was Doyle Royal whose career began in 1946 and ran until 1975.

There were other good coaches whose careers began before 1971: I.M. Ibrahim's career at Clemson began in 1967 and Marvin Allen was coach at North Carolina from 1947 to 1974.

I am a Maryland guy, but I also cannot believe that the great players from other league schools were ignored. ALL the great old-timers of yore from the 50's and 60's from any ACC school got dissed! Furthest back they went was Anson Dorrance whose playing days at UNC began in 1971 and he obviously made it more because of his record as a women's coach. He also had a long run as UNC's men's coach but not nearly as successful.

There are just three other guys from the 70's: Clyde Watson and Clyde Brown, both of Clemson and then Nambi Nwokocha of Clemson went from '79-81.

Sorry, but anybody who cares about the history of ACC soccer and who is able to do even the most rudimentary computer research using the Internet can find out very quickly that there is so much more to the history of ACC soccer than that which is reflected by these selections. Again, this list obviously was thrown together with no thought whatsoever. It is a hastily made list meant to meet a deadline and no more.

Shame on whoever put it together.

Mike Fekula
Terrapin Times
Univ. of Maryland

 

Re: The List Is A Piece Of Crap

 

Re: The List Is A Piece Of Crap

Random responses...

Yes..this list feels like crap...

Tarantini? Huh? Are we talking about the odd pick of a future superstar, or building a steady program of player development and program building.

Also, (stirring the hornet's nest), lets exclude products of some school's temporary insanity when they simply recruited other country's national teams.

And no, Tarantini didn't cut me...I'm way too old for that.

Regardless, go Pack!

 

Re: The List Is A Piece Of Crap

not everyday you see a 6 year old thread bumped. confused the hell out of me until i saw the dates.

 

Are these based on their performances in college or how they did afterward? (Because I'm sure Onyewu wasn't an amazing college soccer power while he was at Clemson and he's just one example)

 

It's based on what they did in college. A lot of these guys didn't do much after college. Neil Covone went straight to law school, for instance and Mike Fisher to med school.

Wojtek Krakowiak and Chris Carrieri, to pick 2, had pretty modest pro careers.

And Gooch was a very dominant player at Clemson in his 2 seasons. He's a worthy pick on this list.

And yes, btw, this is a very odd thread to be resurrected.