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MSoc @ the college cup - BostonCard - 12-11-2015

Game against Akron starts at 5:30.  Go Stanford!

BC

Re: MSoc @ the college cup - Spiny_Norman - 12-11-2015

Earlier semifinal going to OT so Stanford-Akron will probably start late.  On ESPNU for those with access.

Re: MSoc @ the college cup - fullmetal - 12-11-2015

Live stats here: http://www.ncaa.com/game/soccer-men/d1/2015/12/11/stanford-akron

51:20 into the game and the score is 0-0.  Stanford looks like they've been more successful: 3 shots on goal out of 5 shots taken, 4 corners, 2 offsides (and 8 fouls).  Akron has had zero shots taken, 3 saves, and 5 fouls.

Sure hope I'm reading the game flow correctly (no access to the game right now).  Go Stanford!

Re: MSoc @ the college cup - fullmetal - 12-11-2015

8:20 into OT, and no one's scored!

Stanford with five shots on goal out of ten taken, and Akron with two shots on goal out of five taken.  Looks like Akron got excited in the second half, but it wasn't enough.  No red cards, two yellow cards for each team.  C'mon Stanford!

Re: MSoc @ the college cup - Viking_Guy - 12-11-2015

Going to PKs.

VG

Re: MSoc @ the college cup - Viking_Guy - 12-11-2015

Stanford wins 8-7 in the 10th round of PKs!

More in a second,

VG


Re: MSoc @ the college cup - BostonCard - 12-11-2015

We win 8-7 on PK's, if I read things right.

BC

Re: MSoc @ the college cup - washingtonismoney - 12-11-2015

whewwww that was a stressful one.

Re: MSoc @ the college cup - cardfan77 - 12-11-2015

Holy crap!  I soiled my pants. WoW

Re: MSoc @ the college cup - cardfan77 - 12-11-2015

I can breathe now.  My heart still pounding like crazy.

So happy for the team.  Very deserving win.  One win away to complete this magical season.  Clemson will be tough but beatable. 

Re: MSoc @ the college cup - BostonCard - 12-11-2015

We missed the first PK and were down one going into the fourth, which we converted and Akron missed.  We then missed the first sudden death PK, byt they missed too, thrn we made the ensuing three, and they missed their 10th PK of the night to clinch.

I can say this now because we won, but deciding a game as important as this on penalty kicks is the dumbest thing in sports.  A coin toss would only be marginally worse.

Really PK's are stupid.

BC

Re: MSoc @ the college cup - 81alum - 12-11-2015

Not a single goal scored in either semifinal.  Two entire games and four golden goal extra periods and not one goal.  Not exactly a spectacle to tempt  a neophyte soccer watcher to become a fan.  That and an absolutely cavernous empty stadium. 

All that said, I am pleased for the good guys.  We made two silly mistakes during PKs, missing one wide and our goalie letting one in through his hands, and we won anyway.  On to Clemson.

Re: MSoc @ the college cup - BostonCard - 12-11-2015

Would be nice to extend the streak early and not stress about it into winter and spring.

BC

Re: MSoc @ the college cup - Hansenjohn - 12-11-2015

Casual observations from an admitted soccer non-fan:

- very excited Stanford advances to the final, because they are Stanford.

- penalty kicks are exciting, and stupid at the same time

- reasonably interesting overtime periods since the teams seemed to try to score

- boring regulation time.  As seems to often happen in soccer, teams seemed to bat the ball around midfield with no desire to take chances.  Maybe there were exceptions, but I can't say I was riveted to the game. 

- At least college soccer has a game clock that counts down, with time stopped for injuries.  Much better transparency to help minimize manipulation by ref.



Re: MSoc @ the college cup - BostonCard - 12-11-2015

Here's the final stop.

https://twitter.com/thecauldron/status/675547451609112578

I feel for the Akron kid a little bit, but not too much.

BC

MSoc: #8 Stanford 0 #4 Akron 0 (8-7 in 10 PKs) - Viking_Guy - 12-11-2015

Whew.  I thought it was going to end like the women, especially when Drew Skundrich hooked the first PK wide.  But Epstein (and the post) came up brobdingnagian, and Stanford survived.  After Skundrich missed, everyone converted until a key Epstein save in the 4th round leveled it at 3.  Then in the 7th round, Slater Meehan hit a saveable ball that put Stanford on the brink of elimination.  The Zips' player stepped into and hammered a ball to the left past a diving Epstein... but hit the very inside of the post and ricocheted back across the face of goal and out.

How close was it?  The ball went BEHIND Epstein; it could easily have ricocheted off his heel and in, and never got more than 2 yards off the line in its journey clear of the goal mouth.

How clutch were certain players?  Mark Verso and Adam Mosharrafa, who hadn't played all game, converted PKs.  Sam Werner, who had played a bit, buried his in the ninth round to put Stanford ahead.    Then Corey Baird in the tenth.

Taylor Twellman, the commentator, was having issues with some of the Zips' PK technique - they employed a short run-up.  One key thing about a PK is to get the keeper leaning the wrong way, and he argued that a short run-up didn't allow it.  All I know is that two of the saves made by Epstein were off short run-ups, including the game-winner in round 10.

A couple of asides:
(1) I'm not sure the men's college cup is big enough yet to be played in MLS stadiums, especially MLS stadiums where the closest participant is more than 700 miles away.  The stadium was just dead; what fans there were cheered, but the few thousand were lost in the stadium.  I think for both semi-finals, it really affected the energy.

(2) Both games were very similar.  In the first semi, Syracuse had very much the better of the play - more chances, more quality chances.  Both sides had a couple of really quality chances.  However, in that game, Syracuse was done in by Clemson's keeper, Andrew Tarbell, who has been absolutely on fire in this tourney.  Stanford will have to get a really good shot in to beat him.

GAME REPORT

It was really a tale of two games - apart from the first 5-7 minutes, Stanford really dominated the first 60 minutes of play.  Then seemed to run out of gas, and retreat into almost a purely counter-attacking mode, which is really counter to our normal style.  Akron had none of the play up to that point, and the vast majority of the play after.

In the first half, Stanford had two quality chances to the Zips' none.  Morris sprang Langsdorf through and in alone against the keeper on the right side, but Akron keeper Jake Fenlason, sporting an awesome 70s stache, got down well to block a low liner that Foster took as the defense closed him down about 10 yards out and about 7 yards outside the right post.  It was a tough angle, but Foster struck it well.  A few minutes later, a high bounding ball at the edge of the area on the left was won by Morris, who sent the ball into Langsdorf, who took a back-to-goal deflection attempt with a man on his back that forced Fenlason to sprawl across the cage to cover his far post.

Akron, meanwhile, was dominating the center of the pitch in their 4-2-3-1 formation against Stanford's 4-4-2.  None of Stanford's midfielders were contributing much; almost all of the outside offense was coming from Vincent and Skundrich overlapping up the wings.  The Zips really didn't have a dangerous chance in the half.

SECOND HALF

Stanford was on the front foot early in the second half, but starting around minute 55, Akron started to tilt the field and the Cardinal went back into a much more counter-attacking mode.  However, the Stanford backline swallowed up most of the Zips' attacks, which were often only one or two players deep.  However, the situation was always tense, because Akron was in possession probably 75% of the time, and seemed at points very close to having a ball fall to their feet in dangerous spots.  And as it got closer and closer to 90 minutes, more and more of the offensive chances were 4 players running against 6 or 8 defenders going each way.

The best chance of the second half was probably a handball that wasn't called, as Ty Thompson blocked a shot just outside the top of the area that deflected off his head/shoulder and hit his right hand. 

For the most part, the run of play was not nearly as chippy as some of the games I've seen.  There were several yellow cards, mostly for "professional" fouls to deny breakaways. In fact, Thompson probably should've been booked for one midway through the half, which became important at the very end of the game.

Mostly, it was a game that was contested in the midfield.  Stanford consistently tried to go over the top, trying to bypass the crowd and get the ball to Morris, and he had several very close off-side calls.  Meanwhile, Akron would work the ball around the back, then eventually push the ball into the middle - where Thompson or Meehan would touch it away.

MORE>>>

Re: MSoc @ the college cup - Hansenjohn - 12-11-2015

(12-11-2015, 10:40 PM)Boston Card link Wrote:I feel for the Akron kid a little bit, but not too much.

BC

I'm sure it's tough on the losing side no matter what, but I have to think that the goalies must expect to miss a few.  It might be tougher to miss as a kicker (striker, whatever) who misses on an open side of the goal, as players on both sides did tonight, particularly the Akron player who hit the post on the open side in round 7 or so.

Re: MSoc @ the college cup - Viking_Guy - 12-11-2015

OT
The first overtime saw two great chances - first Foster Langsdorf got on the end of a ball from Morris Vincent that he got just a toe on to deflect the ball toward on frame from about 6 yards off the near post, but Fenlason, going to ground, made a brilliant reaction save to parry the ball safely away from above his right hip.

Then Akron got their best player, Richie Laryea, free down the left side, but Epstein made a great save sliding to his left to deny a 14 yard low blast.

In the second overtime, Morris got a good shot on frame, but for some reason Amir Bashti ran into the frame, deflecting it and slowing it down from where it was heading toward the right post and leading to a clearance.

PKs described above.


Overall, not a fun match to watch for the most part.  Tense but only because of the scoreline.  A whole lot of useless possession by Akron, a whole lot of searching balls over the top for Stanford.  Not a whole lot of creativity from either side.  As I mentioned, the Cardinal midfield had a really rough go of it against the 5 Akron players - when they did get forward, Baird tried to dribble a bit too much several times and was easily dispossessed.  Verso really didn't have much impact.

Now for the bad part.  I'm really starting to dislike Amir Bashti's style of play.  Twellman did as well.  He has a pretty touch and a ton of skill, but beyond the block of Morris' shot in the second overtime, he had several plays where he tried to make the pretty move rather than the smart one.  The worst offense was one of Stanford's rare forays forward late in the game, when he was running at the Akron backline.  Morris in front of him drew the defense into the center channels, and Verso was running unmarked at the left post.  Instead of hitting a simple through ball on the ground, he tried to chip the ball over the Zips' backline to Morris, leading to an easy turnover.  Later in the game, with a clear shot from about 25, he instead tried to thread a ball through two players to Morris, and turned it over again.

But the most egregious action was trying to draw a foul or card against a Zips player.  Bashti gave him a little shoulder chuck after a foul had been called, and the Akron player swung his arm over the top and down in front of his body, maybe making a little contact with Amir's head.  Bashti clutched his face and dropped to the ground like he'd been shot.  When a player on the team you support makes you hope that soccer eventually goes to video replay and post hoc cards and suspensions for "embellishment," it's not a good feeling.

Got to give the player of the game to Epstein, with a nod to Vincent, who anchored a great Stanford defensive effort.

The other bad thing?  Short turnaround.  The championship against Clemson will be at 11 AM PT on Sunday.  I would hope they would give them a few more hours of recovery time, but at least both games went 110 minutes.  Although Clemson will have had a good 4 hours more recovery time, given ESPN's delaying the game 2 kickoff for nearly an hour after the first semifinal ended.

VG

Re: MSoc @ the college cup - washingtonismoney - 12-11-2015

(12-11-2015, 11:06 PM)Viking_Guy link Wrote:Later in the game, with a clear shot from about 25, he instead tried to thread a ball through two players to Morris, and turned it over again.

Both you and Twellman remarked on this, but I've got to disagree with both of you. A shot from 25 yards out is an awfully poor shot, no matter how clear it is. Better to attempt to get a closer shot than a speculative shot from way out there.

Re: MSoc @ the college cup - Viking_Guy - 12-11-2015

Agreed, but he also had the entire defense retreating into the box marking Morris in front of him.  He had about 7 yards of space, and could've stepped closer if he chose.  But trying to thread a ball through two center backs both with 3 yards of the passing lane you're trying to hit is probably lower-percentage than shooting from there.

VG