I recommend an article about Ally Sentnor's ongoing recovery from her ACL tear. In addition to a nice printed article, with words words about her own rehab process and seeking to make it count for helping others, there is also a video including Ally, her parents, Dorrance, teammates, etc., and an additional 4:43 minute audio news report. https://mediahub.unc.edu/a-victory-off-the-field-unc-womens-soccer-stars-campaign-for-recovery/
Interesting news today in NCAA Women's Soccer. No more OT during the regular season. No more golden goal in playoffs. The trend here is to more closely align the NCAA with FIFA and professional standards. While I like the sentiment of making the product on the field more in line with those standards, I wish they would also make the off field aspects more in line with the "FIFA and professional" standard. I do *NOT* want them to move to a more FIFA aligned clock and substitution pattern while maintaining a 20-30 game schedule played out in a roughly 4 month span. In comparison, the NWSL will expect their teams to play anywhere between 28 and 33 games in a 7 month span. Very few DIV 1 teams, never mind DIV 2 and below, field the necessary depth and quality of players to survive that kind of grueling schedule if you suddenly make them play for 90 minutes twice a week multiple weeks a in row. UNC, FSU, and other "blue blood" WoSo teams are a very small fraction of the NCAA that could handle that and still be OK. Most other teams would be ground into the dirt and put most of their players at major risk for injury if they are serious about winning and not just surviving the season.
Allowing no re-entry in the 2nd half was on the table, but obviously got voted down. It got voted down for the same reason I think no OT passed. It is better for the health of the players. Unlike the dummies on the men’s side, I think most coaches recognize that college soccer is different from FIFA and that is a good thing. It isn’t perfect, but we don’t need to change to “develop” pro players. If we can extend the season a couple of weeks to space out the games, I think the women’s college game will be in a decent spot. I say this realizing that the looming changes in college sports means over 300 teams competing at the same level is not sustainable and a split is coming. If the men go year round, that may hasten the split. I live in the northeast and the COVID spring taught many of the smaller D1 schools how unrealistic year round soccer is for programs without a dome. For some schools that play on grass in the northeast, it will be an immediate bill in the millions of dollar to go to turf or they will need to find a temporary field for the beginning of the spring.
So does this mean the regular season games will just be a tie after 90 minutes? Does this mean that NCAA tournament games will immediately go to penalty kick kick off?
Regular season games already go to a tie, they just did so after OT ended with no more goals. Now it's just a tie after 90 minutes like professional games. Playoff games will still have OT, but they will no longer be "golden goal" ... a goal will not end the game, but means the team that scores has to hold that lead until the end of the two 10 minute OT periods.
Noting all of the talk about the transfer portal reaching record heights, and mixing this in with the 5th year eligible players, makes be wonder... Has Anson ever brought in a one year transfer who significantly contributed*? My feeble mind only recalls a very few transfers into UNC who got any significant playing time, and all of these played for at least two if not three years. The transfers in the last 20 years or so that I can recall are Allie Long (junior and senior years), Jess McDonald (3 years after one year jr college), Adelaide Gay (junior and senior years after transferring in from Yale), and Alexa Newfield (who came in as a junior and played 2 years with a redshirt in between.) So in these times with lots of graduates getting a 5th year, I don't see Anson taking advantage of player's from the portal for one year if he holds to tradition even though it might be real tempting. ****************** *Marina Nesic was a graduate student whose PT was maybe 30 minutes for the whole season, and this past season saw a senior transfer in who never saw the game field as far as I know.
Another 2-year transfer who contributed significantly: Kalli Kamholz https://goheels.com/sports/womens-soccer/roster/kalli-kamholz/1727
I don't think we're going to see any transfers *to* UNC any time soon. It's far more likely we're going to hear about a couple names leaving UNC that will be painful before the Spring starts. The Tar Heels are so insanely deep going into Fall 2022 that they can probably field two separate teams that would be top 10 in the nation. I did a little mock up of two starting 11's with UNC's current roster, and I'm curious which team people think would win. These are Tar Heels with playing time, so no incoming freshman or Ally Sentnor. Team One: Allen; Dorsey, Allen, Tolentino; Pierce, Wrigley, Meza, Gambone; Sember, Cox, Jones Team Two: Josephson; Moxley, Bell, Elgin; Hansen, Grant, Moore, Dellaperuta; Patterson, Murphy, Colton
I certainly take your point about having a very deep roster. UNC has had deep rosters for a long time and the history is that relatively few players have transferred out. (Over the decades the average is less than one per year.) But times are changing, and the rate of transferring among DI schools is increasing by leaps and bounds in the last three years. And for the second time ever, three UNC players (all freshmen) have transferred out this spring. Two of the transfers were likely walk-ons and it was clear that they would not likely see much playing time this year or in future years at UNC. I was sad, however, to see that recruited Molly Baker left, as she was starting to come around and show her significant potential near the end of the fall season. But she will do very well at LSU.
Babs... Your two UNC teams are interesting to think about... one with a stronger front line and one with a stronger back line. Kinda looks like scrimmage pairs. Are you convinced that AD will be staying with three backs this season? It seemed to me that in the last 18 months he accepted that the four back alignment was "in" to deal with increasingly good offenses of opponents. So (as in recent scrimmages) is he going to go back to his decades-used three back system? (either as a 3-1-3-3 or 3-2-3-2 or even a 3-2-4-1 if he plays Sentnor as a play-maker up top with a plethora of slashing runners coming from all angles.)
There was no real motivation using 3 backs, I didn't put too much thought in it beyond making two competitive teams. You can easily make both formations into a 4 back by moving Pierce and Hansen back from midfield and turning them both into 4 3 3. They both played there in swapping roles during the Spring. There's also Dellaperuta and Moxley I've put in midfield but who have both been used at outside back by Anson in recent memory.
Nice story Tar Heel fans may appreciate about Tori DellaPeruta who will be training along side her older sister in August with the Heels. But first... 8 months in Italy with a division A team and the Italian U19s. (Born and raised in the US, Her family has dual citizenship.) https://www.forsythnews.com/sports/...laperuta-signs-italian-serie-club-pomigliano/ This story is dated (January 2022)
Meanwhile Pomigliano ended the league at 8th place, just safe from relegation (not trivial, since they were a newly promoted team and, unlike most teams in Serie A Femminile, they had no men's club supporting them), Tori Dellaperuta scored 4 goals in the half of the league that she played and she was recently nominated to the roster of U-19 Italy NT that will play the final phase (8 qualified teams) of European Championship in Czech Republic between 27th of June and 9th of July.
Don't know when the Heels will announce the 2022 schedule, I do no that our first game will be at home with BYU on Saturday 8/13. A great opener for both teams! ... and I note that Virginia will be at UNC on 9/17. (I had assumed that we would be at Charlottesville this year!)
Last year's game in Chapel Hill was actually a re-do from four years ago when your park was being renovated and the Cary field was unavailable and the game was played in C'ville. Now we're back on track.
So based on the recent call up for the U20 national team, it appears that UNC will be missing 4 of its better players (2 sophomores and 2 juniors) for the month of August. (The U20 World Cup will be in Costa Rica with the championship game on the 28th.) While the schedule isn't out, there are potentially 6 games in this time period with non conference opponents. It will be interesting to see what line-ups will be in store and how strong the team will be... and then to see how the integration will be accomplish starting in September. ....But before the cup in Costa Rica, there is an interesting warm up in France later this month with three games with the Netherlands, French, and Mexican U20 teams!
Where can one find a list of Div. 1 schedules? Anybody know? There was a site that listed them all but I can't remember the URL. Thanks.
Thanks for the alert, Bosco. It looks like a great schedule with lots of the non-conference games against quality opposition-- with UCLA, Tennessee, Texas, and Baylor all expecting to have strong squads this fall. ..and the two exhibition games will be interesting too with VCU and especially BYU providing real tests. As I mentioned above, it will be interesting to follow the coaching and lineup machinations to, as usual, integrate new and veteran players for the first 7 games (2 exhibition and 5 non-conference) with 4 key players missing to the U20 Women's World Cup ...and then getting those players integrated back into the team for the rest of the season. If history is any guide, Anson will be experimenting right into the NCAA tournament.
Speaking of U20's, the current group has 4 Tar Heels and 2 2023 Tar Heel commits on the roster. They played in France today. It's unfortunately not being streamed and a box score was nearly impossible to find. Had trouble finding a box score for todays @USYNT U20 3-1 win vs France. I think Emily Colton started & played 45. UNC's DellaPeruta, Patterson, & Sentnor did not play. UNC 2023 commit Evelyn Shores (D) started and was then replaced at HT by fellow UNC commit Jaedyn Shaw (MF).— babs (@babranski) June 24, 2022
Group stage game #2 late this morning, with the U20's getting a nervy 3-0 win over Mexico. It was 1-0 most of the game but the US scored 2 goals in the last 10 minutes to seal it. I believe this is the first game back for Ally Sentnor, who started and got a solid ~65 minutes. Talia DellaPeruta started and got 45. Avery Patterson started and got about 85 before being replaced by 2023 commit Jaedyn Shaw ... who promptly scored the third goal after she came on. Emily Colton and 2023 commit Evelyn Shores did not play. Final group stage game of this exhibition tournament is Tuesday. It's a busy day for the USWNT as the U20's, U23's, and the full team will all play.
The USWNT U20's defeat NED on PK's to win the tournament. 2-2 after regulation with a 65th minute equalizer from Shaw after NED had scored two straight to take a 2-1 lead. All six Tar Heels, present and future, participated in an extended shootout, with Talia DellaPeruta scoring hers to win it in the 7th round. in other matches, the U23's defeated India 4-1 in game one and then Sweden 3-0 in game two that was today. Meza started in game 1, Pinto started in game two.
I can't believe how poor the offense is every year. How does team with Murphy, Cox, Jones, Colton, Meza, Dellaperuta struggle to score? It's because we play outdated system that no longer works. High pressure, play a lot people is not doing anything. Yet he doesn't change anything every year.