Photo by ISIPhotos.com
The Maryland Terrapins rode goals from freshmen Dakota Edwards and Schillo Tshuma to a 2-1 victory in the ACC Final on Sunday in front of a crowd of almost 10,000 fans in Germantown, Md.
The North Carolina Tar Heels fell behind early when Edwards finished off a Dan Metzgar corner kick in the 11th minute. The Tar Heels never could equalize and the Terrapins added a goal in the 62nd minute off a beautiful strike to put the match out of reach. North Carolina pulled one back in the 86th minute courtesy of a Robbie Lovejoy finish, but that’s as close as the Tar Heels got.
The Big East Final had a fair amount more drama, with Notre Dame pulling off a last-minute comeback against Georgetown to force overtime before Fighting Irish striker Ryan Finley delivered his second goal of the day in the final minute of overtime to give Notre Dame a 3-2 victory and Big East Championship.
Nick Besler headed a Dillon Powers corner kick toward Finley, who finished it off in the final minute of double overtime to clinch Notre Dame’s first Big East championship since 2003, and third overall.
Georgetown’s Andy Reimer scored both goals for the Hoyas, delivering a score near the end of each half, including an 82nd minute strike that looked to be the game-winning goal before Nick Besler delivered a 90th minute equalizer to keep the Fighting Irish alive.
There were also some upsets on championship Sunday, with Winthrop scoring two late goals to shock Coastal Carolina in the Big South Final, and Air Force beating New Mexico in penalty kicks in the MPSF champioship final.
Maryland, Notre Dame, Winthrop and Air Force are just some of the teams to secure automatic berths in the NCAA Tournament. The field for the NCAA Tournament will be revealed on Monday at 5:30pm.
Here is a rundown of the weekend’s top conference tournament finals:
ACC TOURNAMENT FINAL
Maryland 2, North Carolina. (RECAP)
BIG EAST TOURNAMENT FINAL
Notre Dame 3, Georgetown 2 (OT). (RECAP)
ATLANTIC 10 TOURNAMENT FINAL
Saint Louis 3, VCU 0. (RECAP)
BIG SOUTH TOURNAMENT FINAL
Winthrop 3, Coastal Carolina 2. (RECAP)
BIG TEN TOURNAMENT FINAL
Michigan State 2, Michigan 1. (OT) (RECAP)
MID-AMERICAN CONFERENCE TOURNAMENT FINAL
Akron 2, Northern Illinois 0. (RECAP)
MOUNTAIN PACIFIC TOURNAMENT FINAL
Air Force 1, New Mexico 1 (Air Force won in penalty kicks). (RECAP)
Quite a result for ND. I think the Big East tournament was probably the prize of college soccer this year; even though many conferences are stronger top to bottom, the Big East had such a glut of talent at the top this year…
People have been talking about “Akron, Maryland, and everyone else,” but I think ND has proven they’re in that elite group at the top. A College Cup with those three teams and an outsider mid-major like Saint Louis or Tulsa would be phenomenal. So pumped for the draw this afternoon.
I also cannot believe this talk about Coastal Carolina being excluded from the tournament field. If that happens, it’s time to start railing the NCAA about how useless and arbitrary RPI is…
But, y’know, go Terps. Hope they get the #1 overall tonight.
I think the Big East is getting props for the same reason the SEC gets props in football. They play horrendous OOC schedules (seriously, take a look at Georgetown. Princeton? Penn? Lehigh?) and go .500 against each other, meaning they only lose to highly ranked teams that are highly ranked through a circular “go 12-0 against horrific teams and then play average against the good teams” loop.
And I’m sure you have seen Georgetown play enough to be able to make that statement….but enough with the sniping.
Your comments are one way to approach the conference debate – go with loose, ill researched logic. Or, perhaps, you could google the RPI’s for the respective leagues and get some data to support your position. To make it easier on you, Adam even posted a link to LfL (new site for me, thanks Adam) that put forward a strength of schedule component. The only problem with these sites is the data says you are wrong. Below is the data from the NCAA RPI rankings:
No. of ACC schools in RPI top 10: 2
No. of Big East schools in RPI top 10: 4
No. of ACC schools in RPI top 25: 4
No. of Big East schools in RPI top 25: 6
No. of ACC schools in RPI top 30: 4
No. of Big East schools in RPI top 30: 7
There is no doubt the ACC is an incredibly strong conference, and has the history and NCs to back that up. I expect them to be in the running for the NC again this year. My suggestion for the future is spend less time thinking of witty one liners and posting on emotion and 2 minutes researching.
The Big East definitely deserves its accolades this year. I could easily see both Notre Dame and UCONN reaching the College Cup, but I definitely believe either Maryland or UNC will take the Cup home.
The Big East has the greater number of teams ranked this season, but I would love to see how the ACC and Big East matched up head to head.
The simple fact that you used RPI to justify your argument means you probably don’t know what you’re talking about. Swing on over to BigSoccer and join the ongoing discussion about seeding/rankings etc. and you might learn a thing or two. For instance, RPI takes into account nothing other than opponent winning percentage. Beating 18-2-2 Coastal Carolina will do more to enhance your RPI than beating UNC, UCLA, ND or UConn. But hey, it’s all about the RPI right?
Also don’t worry about the fact that the Big East has SIX more teams than the ACC because it might interfere with your narrative.
Leveraging chat board input as the basis for formulating an opinion and building a knowledge base seems a sound approach. But since you asked, what the boards support is a use of RPI for tournament seeding.
As for conference size, fair point. Only trouble is the %’s tell a similar story – that trying to paint the BE as a conference that depends on the hype of pre-season rankings and soft OOC schedules as the path for post season positioning has no merit.
ACC schools in RPI top 10: 22%
Big East schools in RPI top 10: 27%
ACC schools in RPI top 25: 44%
Big East schools in RPI top 25: 40%
ACC schools in RPI top 30: 44%
Big East schools in RPI top 30: 47%
I think Notre Dame proved they were in that group when they actually played Akron and beat them.
And for Parzival, ND also has wins over Michigan, Michigan State, & Indiana out of conference. And beating Duke looked good at the time.
They certainly did. We won’t mention that it was 1-0 Akron until they had a player sent off in the 30th and played a man down for the next 60.
But seriously, that’s me being a jack ass and making excuses. ND deserved the win. ND is a good team who has beat a litany of tough opponents. They are hands down the team to beat coming out of the Big East and deserving of either a 1 or 2 seed (with UMD).
I freely admit that I missed the first 30 minutes of the game. They start early out here on the West Coast, and I was ill-prepared. So I’ll take your word for it.
What, when they were getting dominated and down a goal at home before a red card in the 33rd minute or thereabouts? Please… I thought they were toast for the season after the first 30 minutes of that match against Akron. Credit to what they’ve done, but don’t overreach like that.
That was the same game that Clark admitted ND had absolutely no clue what they were doing until the red card.
One of the best games by Maryland all season. UNC never stood a chance. If Maryland plays like that in NCAA tournament even Ives beloved Akron won’t be able to beat them!
I’m sure you’ve seen Akron play enough times to be able to make that statement with the utmost authority.
Haven’t seen a second of Akron this season, but yeah, I’m that confident in this team. Maryland was a red card away from finishing without a loss this season. While Woodberry deserved his red card for his actions, it was racially provoked by the Wake player. So kudos to them for winning the game!
While they may be behind Notre Dame and Akron in the RPI rankings, I’d say that Maryland played the toughest schedule in the country. While Duke and Virginia had down seasons by their standards, I’d put them up against anyone in the country. The same argument that you used for the Big East teams can be applied to Akron as well. By no means am I saying that Akron isn’t a great team, but I would love to see how they would perform in the ACC compared to the MAC. With the addition of Notre Dame, it isn’t going to get any easier!
As for my comment earlier, I only mentioned Akron, because Ives has had a man crush on them all season and has looked for a reason to knock Maryland from the #1 spot all season and did so before they ever lost a game.