Middlebury Claims NESCAC Men's Soccer Title via Penalty Kicks

Courtesy Bowdoin Sports Information

Box Score

BRUNSWICK, Maine – The Middlebury College men's soccer team won their third NESCAC Championship in a thrilling shootout decision over Bowdoin on Sunday afternoon. The Panthers (13-3-1) claimed the shootout win by a 4-3 score and earn the NESCAC's automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament. Bowdoin (13-1-3) will likely receive an at-large bid when selections are announced on Monday.

After 110 minutes of scoreless soccer, Bowdoin quickly gained the upper hand in penalty kicks when Middlebury's first shooter, Harrison Watkins, hooked his kick wide left. The teams proceeded to trade goals until Panther goaltender Tim Cahill smothered Zach Danssaert's chance in the fourth round, knotting PK's at three apiece. In the fifth and final round, Jon Portman tucked a chance inside the left post and Bowdoin's Alex Marecki's kick sailed wide left to give Middlebury the 4-3 penalty kick win.

The exciting finish capped an excellent match that featured nearly flawless play by both sides through regulation and two extra sessions. Middlebury's best chance to win the contest in regular time came off a corner in the 66th minute, when Jake Edwards lofted a kick into the box where a scramble ensued, drawing Bowdoin netminder Dan Hicks out of position. The ball came to Middlebury's Tyler Macnee, who booted a shot that got past Hicks, but was kicked off the goal line by Tim Prior to keep the game deadlocked.

Bowdoin countered with perhaps their two best chances of the game, one off a through-ball pass from Eddie Jones that Cahill stole off the foot off Nick Powell. With under seven minutes remaining, Jones came loose on the left side of the box and ripped a shot that whistled over the crossbar.

The best opportunity for either side in overtime came for Bowdoin, when Daniel Chaffetz placed a 30-yard cross into the box from the right side, setting up a diving header by Jones. But Cahill was right there to collect the save and maintain the shutout.

Cahill finished with three saves in the contest while Hicks ended with four stops. Bowdoin held an 11-9 edge in shots while Middlebury racked up an 8-3 advantage in corner kicks. The NESCAC Championship win is the third for the Panthers, who had also won in 2007 amd 2000, but had lost in the finals in each of the past two seasons. Bowdoin is now 0-2 in NESCAC finals with the loss.

2010 NESCAC MEN'S SOCCER CHAMPIONSHIP
Quarterfinals - Sunday, October 31 at Higher Seeds
at No. 1 Bowdoin 5, No. 8 Bates 2
No. 7 Wesleyan 2, at No. 2 Williams 1 - OT
at No. 3 Middlebury 3, No. 6 Tufts 0
at No. 4 Amherst 3, vs. No. 5 Colby 0

Semifinals - Saturday, November 6 at Bowdoin
at No. 1 Bowdoin 2, No. 7 Wesleyan 1
No. 3 Middlebury 2, vs. No. 4 Amherst 0

Championship - Sunday, November 7
No. 3 Middlebury 0, at No. 1 Bowdoin 0 - 2OT
Middlebury earns championship on Penalty Kicks, 4-3

2010 NESCAC MEN'S SOCCER CHAMPIONSHIP

Quarterfinals - Sunday, October 31 at Higher Seeds
12:00 p.m.
No. 8 at No. 1
No. 7 at No. 2
No. 6 at No. 3
No. 5 at No. 4

Semifinals - Saturday, November 6 at Highest Remaining Seed
11:00 a.m./1:30 p.m.
  Highest Remaining Seed vs. Lowest Remaining Seed
Remaining First Round Winners

Championship - Sunday, November 7
Semifinal Winners - 12:00 p.m.

Format
The top eight teams in the conference will qualify for the NESCAC Men's Soccer Championship.  Quarterfinal games will be conducted on Sunday, October 31, 2010 with the semifinals and championship games conducted on Saturday, November 6 and Sunday, November 7, respectively.  The tournament champion will receive an automatic bid to the NCAA Division III Championship. 

Seeding
Seeding will be based on final conference standings of round robin play. Standings will be based on points (3 points for a win, 1 point for a tie).

The 8th seed will play at the 1st seed, the 7th seed will play at the 2nd seed, the 6th seed will play at the 3rd seed, and the 5th seed will play at the 4th seed.  Teams will be re-bracketed after first round games and the lowest remaining seed will face the highest remaining seed.

Pairings
Pairings will be announced Friday, October 29.

Tie Breaking Procedures
Ties will be broken as follows:

Head-to-head result (if teams play each other more than once during the regular season, the game that appears on the league schedule will be the game that is counted).

If teams tied during the regular season, or there is a 3-way or more tie, the following tie breaking procedure will be used:

• Best record among tying teams, against one another (head-to-head).
• Best conference winning percentage.
• Most conference wins (in games that are part of the conference schedule and count toward league standings).
• Comparison of results of conference games played against top 4 teams (including all teams at the 4th spot).
• Comparison of results of conference games played against top 8 teams (including all teams at the 8th spot).
• Comparison of results of conference games played against conference teams in rank order.
• Comparisons shall be made one team at a time starting with the highest ranked team.
• If the tie remains after comparing results against the highest ranked team, the results against the next team in rank order shall be used. This process is continued until a winner is determined.
• Coin flip (or similar random action involving all tied teams).

Note: In case of ties among three or more schools, the criteria above will be applied in order until a team is (or teams are) separated.  At that point, the process begins anew (returning to the first criteria) with the remaining teams.  The process is continued until the tie is eventually broken.  In cases where only a random action will break the tie of three or more teams, the random action will be applied to all teams involved in the tie.  For example, if three teams are tied and only a random action (pulling names out of a hat) will break the tie, each name will be pulled and seeded in order of being pulled.  Also, in the event that there are two (or more) groups of teams tied at different spots in the standings and the only criteria left that can be used to break those ties is a coin flip/random action, the coin flip/random action used to break the tie of one group (to put teams in rank order) will not affect the tie breaking procedures of the other group(s) of tied teams.