Men's Soccer October 22nd vs. Notre Dame

What: Men's Soccer vs. Notre Dame (Senior Night)

When: October 22nd, 2010, 8:00 PM

Result: 0-0 draw, 2OT

Summary: Goal Patrol meeting before, as usual. And it was Senior Night. Senior ceremony was brief, and I swiped a copy of the PA Notes from the customer marketing booth when nobody was looking. That's good because I couldn't really hear most of the ceremony. Oh, and somewhere between my dorm (in East) and Gampel, the hood fell off my coat. So if anyone finds a dark blue hood from a winter coat on the path (possibly near the construction site, but definitely either on the bath between Whitney and the circle, or between the circle and Gampel) let me know. Anyway, it was COLD. Temperature was posted as 41 degrees, and it felt colder. I had a sweatshirt (fortunately one with a hood) on and a winter coat (sans hood) and I was still freezing. And there were 20 extra minutes, which didn't help either. As for the game itself, not much to report. Both teams had a few chances, and we had a few good ones late, but nobody could convert. So now we need to beat Georgetown on the road (tough, they're #1 in the division) and Pitt on the road (pretty easy, but if we beat GU could be a potential "trap" game) to get the #1 seed (we would be tied with the Hoyas, but I believe we would own the tiebreaker by virtue of having beaten them.) This would be the case even if we had beaten the Irish, but now the Irish could pass us by winning out. But keep in mind, the Irish face GU at home in the final game. Assuming Georgetown beats Marquette at home (they should) they will be 3 points ahead of us and 4 ahead of ND. With a win against Georgetown, we would be tied for first and Notre Dame would be one back. We would then win the division for the regular season with a win vs. Pitt, and would get a bye with anything other than a loss and a draw in ND-GU (this assumes both teams win their next game). If we draw to Georgetown, we would be 3 points behind GU, and 1 behind Notre Dame. We could not win the division, but with a win vs. Pitt we would get the bye regardless of the result in GU-ND. A loss vs. GU would put us 6 points behind GU and 3 behind ND. With a draw or ND win, we would not get a bye no matter what, but with a GU win it would come down to the next tiebreak, and I'm not sure what that is. Bottom line, we need to beat or draw GU (preferably beat) then not get trapped vs. Pitt. We'll see how that goes. Now for the ratings.

 

Ratings:

Atmosphere rating:

Fan Friendliness: Decent crowd. Some interesting language, but not much obscenity. It's a bunch of college students, so you can't expect much better. Rating: 7/10

Fan Enthusiasm: As always, amazing. Rowdy crowd, though many left after regulation due to the weather. The ones that stayed were very enthusiastic, however. Rating: 14/15

Event Atmosphere: Senior Night, truly spectacular. Giveaways, though I didn't win. Rating: 14/15

Atmosphere total: 35/40

On-field:

Quality of Play: Both teams struggled to get going, and in this case it wasn't due to good defense. Just bad missed plays. Rating: 14/20

Excitement: Not very exciting. Only a few breakaways, and those failed. Bad reffing too. Rating: 6/10

Quality of UConn Play: We did not play the greatest. We were lucky they didn't either. Rating: 6/10

result: Draw 5/10

On-field total: 31/50

Other:

Clarity of Fan Communication: No issues. Rating: 5/5

Magnitude of Event: Senior Night, big regular season game. Rating: 12/15

Size of Crowd: Near sell-out Rating: 15/15

Other total: 32/35

Rating total: 98/125