StrangeVol
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Okay, so how good is Stanford? They're damn good. Defending national champs good. Playing on their home pitch good.
So, there's no chance then. Heck no...we've got a good chance and there's plenty of reason for optimism.
First, while statistics argue in favor of Stanford, it's not by a lot. For instance, they only allow. .44 goals per match. But hey, we only allow .60. Pretty close. They score 2.68 goals per game but we score (without Bunny for several games) 2.10, so again not all that far apart. They don't foul any more than we do, have a similar number of yellow cards and like us have no red cards.
They have great depth. Us, not so much with the injuries to Bialczak and Gilroy but we've gotten quality help from our bench at critical moments. They have one of the best midfielders in the NCAA in Jordan DiBiasi but then, so do we with Katie Cousins. Stanford has three players on the ALL PAC 12 roster, which is impressive. We match that with our own trio of All SEC talent.
So how competitive is SEC soccer versus PAC12 soccer? Out of the top twenty NCAA teams in RPI, the PAC12 boasts of 3. We, on the other hand, can brag about our 4 top 20 RPI teams. While that's good as far as it goes, if you look at the top 10 in the NCAA RPI rankings you'll find those same 3 PAC12 teams, but only two SEC teams, with us at 9th and TA&M at 10th. So what does this say? Simply put, Stanford plays in a tougher league than we play in, but again, not by a huge margin.
Another aspect I find interesting is that we have three first-team All-SEC players in Bunny Shaw, forward, Katie Cousins, midfield, and Maya Neal our speedy defender. They likewise have three All PAC12 team members in forward Catarina Macario, a midfielder in Jordan DiBiasi, and a stellar defender in Alana Cook.
Kind of spooky isn't it. These teams are just so very, very similar.
All things considered, imo, this match likely will be decided in the midfield. The team that can frustrate the other in the midfield can take the other side out of their game plan. We are capable of doing that as we did in the second half against A&M Sunday evening.
Bottom line: Can we win this? I think so!
But it won't be easy.
So, there's no chance then. Heck no...we've got a good chance and there's plenty of reason for optimism.
First, while statistics argue in favor of Stanford, it's not by a lot. For instance, they only allow. .44 goals per match. But hey, we only allow .60. Pretty close. They score 2.68 goals per game but we score (without Bunny for several games) 2.10, so again not all that far apart. They don't foul any more than we do, have a similar number of yellow cards and like us have no red cards.
They have great depth. Us, not so much with the injuries to Bialczak and Gilroy but we've gotten quality help from our bench at critical moments. They have one of the best midfielders in the NCAA in Jordan DiBiasi but then, so do we with Katie Cousins. Stanford has three players on the ALL PAC 12 roster, which is impressive. We match that with our own trio of All SEC talent.
So how competitive is SEC soccer versus PAC12 soccer? Out of the top twenty NCAA teams in RPI, the PAC12 boasts of 3. We, on the other hand, can brag about our 4 top 20 RPI teams. While that's good as far as it goes, if you look at the top 10 in the NCAA RPI rankings you'll find those same 3 PAC12 teams, but only two SEC teams, with us at 9th and TA&M at 10th. So what does this say? Simply put, Stanford plays in a tougher league than we play in, but again, not by a huge margin.
Another aspect I find interesting is that we have three first-team All-SEC players in Bunny Shaw, forward, Katie Cousins, midfield, and Maya Neal our speedy defender. They likewise have three All PAC12 team members in forward Catarina Macario, a midfielder in Jordan DiBiasi, and a stellar defender in Alana Cook.
Kind of spooky isn't it. These teams are just so very, very similar.
All things considered, imo, this match likely will be decided in the midfield. The team that can frustrate the other in the midfield can take the other side out of their game plan. We are capable of doing that as we did in the second half against A&M Sunday evening.
Bottom line: Can we win this? I think so!
But it won't be easy.
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