courtside

Yes. But it is not yet complete, as transfers, other possible new players also count in that year’s recruiting class. SLU has been a school that likes to announce its recruiting class in the Spring.

Fall signing period began yesterday. The above are the current 2026 SLU Soccer commits.

Sophie Ahrens is the 9th STL area player to receive a USYNT call up in recent years. She was a U17 November camp call up to Atlanta. Sophie is a 2027 Center Back for SLSG 09. She is a Clemson commit, and she attends Lindbergh High School.

SLU’s RPI is 23.

Katie doesn’t use the term P4. She uses the term “football four” to describe those programs because some of those programs aren’t powers. I have embraced the term. I can confirm that Katie is not going anywhere. She is committed to winning national championships at SLU. She has turned down several football four opportunities. I can confirm that the A10 is not a great Women’s Soccer league. Unlike Men’s soccer, there are 30 leagues. You can’t join a different league just to play Women’s soccer. if that were the case SLU would want the ACC or SEC etc…Other A10 programs need to step up their programs. Every A10 program needs to have a goal to be a top 100 program or better. This year that was SLU, Dayton, Rhode Island, Duquesne, Loyola. The RPI 200 programs or worse were Saint Joseph’s, Bonnies, George Mason, George Washington, Richmond. I am hopeful for the latter two to get inside the top 200 next season. The A10 has too many teams. The Big East is a better Women’s Soccer league than the A10. They only have 11 teams which helps. Georgetown has had a top 50 RPI 18 of the past 20 seasons. More than half have been top 25. Small budget program too. Xavier has been strong 6 out of the past 7 seasons. 8 of 11 teams were sub 200 RPI. Last year all 11 were sub 200. 10 of 11 were sub 200 in 2023. And so on. They have a couple of high level teams. A couple of bubble teams. And they have few bottom tier teams. Big East is not a strong budget Women’s Soccer league. But fewer teams, stronger at the bottom, and the middle. All of these other things have nothing to do with this thread. Start a different thread.

A10 Semifinal SLU 1 Davidson 0 Special thanks to Josh Oswald, and the Blackburn Men and Women’s Soccer teams that made the trip to see the game and support the Billikens. Good group of people. 4-2-3-1 for Davidson 4-4-2 for SLU. Available: Fournier, limited. Easton, full 90. Playoff Soccer. Good start, front foot for SLU. Had a few chances early to take the lead. Davidson as expected pressed high. And they pushed their outside backs up to defend wings at midfield. Lots of balls into open space to forwards for SLU v Clarke and Maadir. It’s effective because if nothing comes of it, it forces Davidson to build from the back. They would rather press. Force turnovers. Short interior combination play for scoring opportunities in the offensive third. So you can take a few chances. SLU was able to force a turnover at midfield and, get Clarke and Maadir out of position. Nice tackle from Barnett. Tanner played s good ball for Delkus 1v1 with Brown. He played O’Neil on the overlap for the cut back shot and goal. Offside for Xavi. Very close. He looked onside when the ball was played. Tough call. No goal. Davidson frequently defended high with 6 players to try to take away SLU’s build from the back. That dares the other team to play the ball over the top in space. If they give you that you take it. A few minutes later, Cortez, did just that up to Franca in space 1v1 with Clarke. Franca used his strength to win the ball. He was fouled by Clarke as he cut back inside the 18. Then Clarke also fouled Heckenlaible on the ensuing play. Clarke is their best player but he was all alone defending there. No help defense because Davidson was playing its defensive midfielders and outside backs high. PK Blair. 1-0. The recognition from Cortez. The ability to win the ball and make the play from Franca. Blair always hammers his PK attempts. Maadir saved a goal moments later as Heckenlaible beat Ward 1v1 edge of the 18. last second sliding save by Maadir or Franca taps it in SLU’s 2nd goal. Good work from Pare as well. Cortez to Heckenlaible. He had Franca but the pass was behind him. Franca still gathered an open look inside the 18, but he put it over the bar. Some SLU chances to have a multi goal half time lead. ………………. Clarke had a good chance on a back post header set piece, but Abonnel was there. O’Neil give and go with Franca, drew Maadir, who squares to Delkus in behind Wilkens, but Jackson decided to cut it back left foot than take it to his right near the 6. Save Beltran. Davidson began playing more long balls in space, trying to draw fouls and set pieces. SLU was unable to tack on a 2nd or 3rd goal, which kept Davidson in the game, and allowed Davidson to keep playing their style of play. SLU transition, Cortez to Xavi wide again, give and go with DiMaria, to the end line, beat Brown again. Last second diving save from Beltran or Franca taps in a goal. 3 more additional opportunities from O’Neil wide. Give and go Xavi and Tanner. Xavi played a nice diagonal ball for Pare all alone in space behind the defense. Pare stopped playing because he thought he was going to get an offside call. It was an easy goal for 2-0. Have to finish there. Never stop playing. Easily could have been w 3-0 type of game for SLU. Physical, hard fought, playoff soccer.

@RollBills82 I expect Gracie to explore all of her options, including Florida. For those that don’t know, 2026 Gracie Milam is one of the best center backs in the country. She plays for the Lou Fuaz 08 team. That team won the U16 Girls Academy National Championship. They have been to 5 straight GA Final Fours. She has 2 teammates that are 2027 SLU commits, Maren Gansner and Sofia Scego. Gracie has been a frequent USYNT call up at the U16 and U17 age groups the last two years. San Diego, Atlanta twice, Concacaf Qualifying, Japan friendlies etc…She attends Francis Howell High school but she does not play high school soccer. SLU recruited Gracie heavily in last year’s recruiting cycle, and SLU finished as a runner up.

The Gators started fading the last few years under Becky before she retired. She had a great long run prior to that in a different era. Then they had Tony Amato for just a year. Then they had a slow start with Bohon. I would expect their budget to increase with their next hire. It’s still a desirable place for coaches and players. Their league, the academics, type of school, weather/location etc… SLU and others competed with them for players. Milam attended some SLU games this Fall even after committing to Florida.

It’s that time of year. Coaching Carousel season. Florida has parted ways with Head Coach Samantha Bohon after 4 seasons. She had 3 years remaining on her contract. Bohon was a long time D2 HC who inherited a difficult situation at Florida. This will be Florida’s 4th Head Coach in the past 7 seasons, after having the same one for 26 seasons. Florida has been in the bottom tier of SEC budgets. However recruiting was going pretty well the past few cycles, even if it hadn’t yet shown on the field with results and NCAA Tourneys. Florida landed a few studs including former Missouri High School Player of the Year Megan Hinnenkamp. They have a 2026 from St. Louisan and USYNT player, Gracie Milam, who was heavily recruited by SLU. https://x.com/gatorssoccer/status/1988677657819505060?s=46

SLU from 2022-2025. …………………. In 2022 SLU had an RPI of 10. SLU was a 2 seed. SLU was 4-1 against the RPI Top 50. It had wins over RPI 11, 23, 43, 44. It also had wins over RPI 60 and 65. The one loss was to RPI 6. Three were non conference RPI Top 50. A fourth was RPI 60 non conference. The rest were league. Same quadrant: 1 seed Florida State hosted RPI 67 FGCU 2 seed Saint Louis hosted RPI 35 Memphis 3 seed Arkansas hosted RPI 145 Missouri State 4 seed Pittsburgh hosted RPI 38 Buffalo 5 seed Georgetown hosted RPI 92 Hofstra 6 seed Ohio State hosted RPI 129 Bucknell 7 seed Mississippi State hosted RPI 79 NM State 8 seed LSU hosted RPI 41 Lamar SLU had the toughest first round game of any of the 8 seeds even though it was a 2 seed. Arkansas getting to host MSU instead of SLU was absurd. …………………………….. In 2023 SLU had an RPI of 10. SLU was given a 6 seed. SLU was well under seeded. SLU was 2-2-1 vs RPI Top 50. All 5 of those games were non conference. wins over RPI 43, 20. Draw with RPI 16. losses were RPI 2 and 27. Same quadrant: 1 seed Clemson hosted RPI 136 Radford 2 seed Penn State hosted RPI 132 C CT State 3 seed Georgetown hosted RPI 35 ODU 4 seed Georgia hosted RPI 47 lLiberty 5 seed Iowa hosted RPI 59 Bucknell 6 seed Saint Louis hosted RPI 38 Indiana 7 seed Santa Clara RPI 52 ASU 8 seed Columbia hosted RPI 42 Rutgers Considering SLU was under seeded, they once again had the toughest first round game of any of the 8 seeds. …………………………. In 2024 SLU had an RPI of 22. They received an 8 seed. They were again under seeded. SLU was 3-1-1 vs RPI Top 50. 4 were non conference. Wins were RPI 29, 42, 42. Draw was RPI 34. Loss was RPI 7. Additional RPI 52 draws 1 seed USC hosted RPI 236 Sacramento St 2 seed WF hosted RPI 233 Morehead St 3 seed Ohio State hosted RPI 45 JMU 4 seed Virginia hosted RPI 18 Princeton 5 seed Wisconsin hosted RPI 85 Maine 6 seed Auburn hosted RPI 213 FIU 7 seed Georgia RPI 60 Colorado 8 seed Saint louis hosted RPI 33 Kansas SLU had the 2nd toughest first round game of the 8 seeds. ……………………….. In 2025, SLU had an RPI of 31. SLU was 1-4 vs RPI Top 50. Only two were non conference games. RPI win was 48. losses were RPI 21, 26, 34, 48. No NCAA invite. Dayton had an RPI of 26. They had 2 RPI Top 50 wins and 1 RPI Top 50 draw. Rhey were expected to host as a seeded team. They instead were sent on the road to play at 6 seed Xavier. ………………………… Non Conference RPI Top 50 games: 2022 3 2023 5 2024 4 2025 2 ……………………….. All previous years RPI Top 50 non conference games during the Katie Shields era: 2, 2, 3, 2, 2, 2, 1, 0, 4 …………………….. Number of A10 RPI Top 50 teams not including SLU: 2, 1, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 1, 1, 0 Some years had some Top 60-75 teams. Also keep in mind you sometimes get to play the RPI Top 50 teams twice when you include the conference tourney. …………………….. Try to schedule 4-5 RPI Top 50 non conference games every year. Make at least 2 of them elite level RPI teams. Make 2-3 more additional Top 50. Have 3 more easily winnable games out of the 8. Mix home and road. Mix team quality. Avoid non conference games vs teams with an RPI of greater than 200. SLU only had one of those this season. ……………………….. The A10 is the 10th best RPI league. That isn’t good. But it doesn’t mean there aren’t some pretty good teams in it. 5 A10 teams including SLU were RPI 81 or better. 3 were RPI Top 50. And each year SLU gets to avoid 2 bad teams with scheduling. A good annual long term league goal would be to have zero teams above RPI 200, and to increase the RPI Top 50 by a few. It's very challenging, and that is why non conference scheduling is important.

Davidson Wildcats. Davidson plays a familiar 4-2-3-1 formation. Davidson plays a little bit like SLU. The strength of their team is their defense led by center back Alonzo Clarke. Size, physicality, tackles well, and he has the foot speed to chase down some forwards too. He’ll be joined by Atman Maadir for a solid tandem. Ward and Brown on the outside. Beltran is a solid experienced keeper. Thissell and Quanbeck distribute out of the defensive middle. Davidson has a 2nd 11. They will sub in and out a lot of attacking players, including 4 Freshman. Ramos Mora is a playmaker in the midfield, as is Alvaro Zabballos who adds size with Boudro. Ibe and Brady are capable scorers. Myles Culley is their pace winger who gets on the end of back post service. He and McGlone are their high volume shot takers. Davidson is a press, defend, force central turnovers, transition. They are less build from the back. When they do it’s often wide using the width of the field. They have set piece size. I expect SLU to continue with its 4-4-2.

SLU is ranked 22 in the United Soccer Coaches Poll this week.

How did the RPI consultants do? Same weekly outlet all season predicted SLU at 17. SLU finished 31. SLU did not in fact have to run the table in the league to do it. If they had defeated Rhode Island and Dayton in the conference tourney, they would have ended up there. That outlet’s NCAA predictions were off by 2 teams. It had St. Mary’s and California in over Kentucky and Georgia. Not only did it have St. Mary’s in, it had them hosting. …………….. 2nd outlet, Outlet B was off by 1 team. It had St. Mary’s in and Illinois out. It almost switched out Kentucky last minute but it didn’t. They disagreed about Georgia, Kentucky, Cal, St. Mary’s. Both agreed SLU was just beyond that. SLU’s good RPI of 31 helped them more than their RPI Top 50 results. And that number is off some importance, but it is of lesser importance than the RPI Top 50 results. …………….. Kentucky scheduled 2 RPI Top 50 non conference games. They lost both. Their other 6 non conference games were easy win games. 5 were RPI 278 or worse. Kentucky played 6 RPI Top 50 league games. They went 2-1-2 in those games. RPI 50 and an NCAA invite. ………………. Missouri played 7 RPI Top 50 league games. They also scheduled 3 RPI Top 50 non conference games. They had one of the toughest schedules in the country. They just didn't win and draw enough games. ……………… Illinois scheduled 1 RPI Top 50 non conference game. It was RPI 50 Kentucky. Illinois won the game. The rest of Illinois’ non conference schedule was much easier. Illinois won all of them. Do you see a trend yet? Football four programs are scheduling easier non conference games to pile up wins. Then they take their chances within their league to get a few RPI Top 50 results. illinois played 7 RPI Top 50 league games. They went 2-4-1 in those games. Their two wins? Penn State and Ohio State. If Illinois had lost their conference tourney game to Ohio State, they would have been out. 3 total RPI Top 50 wins was good enough. Illinois was RPI 41. …………… Georgia played 2 RPI Top 50 non conference games. They defeated North Carolina and they tied Clemson. The rest were easy win games. In league play Georgia played 7 RPI Top 50 games. They went 3-2-2. They were RPI 43. NCAA invite and seeded. ………………. California They played 1 RPI Top 50 non conference game and it was a draw. Their unbalanced ACC schedule gave them only 4 RPI Top 50 league games. Other teams played 7 of them. In those 4, Cal went 0-3-1. No NCAA invite. RPI of 46. ……………….. North Carolina How did UNC have an RPI of 25? Simple. Very few bottom tier opponents despite not getting strong high level results. UNC played 3 RPI Top 50 non conference games. They went 1-2. They played only 3 RPI Top 50 league games. Remember Clemson played 7 RPI Top 50 league games. UNC went 0-3 in those league games. So they were 1-5 vs RPI Top 50. So how did they have an RPI of 25? They played only 1 team with an RPI worse than 200. The rest were RPI 163 or better l. NCAA invite, but a road game. …………….. St. Mary’s did not receive an invite with an RPI of 42. They went 1-1 vs RPI Top 50. They defeated RPI 12 Georgetown.Their best win after that was RPI 60. They simply didn’t play enough RPI Top 50 games. …………….. It’s a good, tough lesson for SLU. Even with a less experienced team, you have to keep up the schedule. Soccer preseason is a very short 2 weeks. It needs to start 2 weeks earlier. Scheduling also needs to change where strong non football four programs can schedule RPI Top 50 non conference games later in the season. it’s a big advantage for football four schools. There will be once in a while off years where SLU doesn’t win either the league or league tourney. You have to have a team that can also secure an NCAA at large selection in those years. SLU isn’t joining a football four league any time soon. That would be the ideal solution. Next year SLU needs to schedule at least 4 RPI Top 50 non conference games out of 8. More than that is also fine.Two or three is not enough. Have a few of them at home. And get some mixed results.

SLU with a 31 RPI, had the best RPI of any team not selected to the NCAA Tourney. 10 teams with a worse RPI than SLU received at large berths. Some last teams in: Kentucky, Georgia, Illinois, Utah Valley, Ohio State. Some last teams out: SLU, St. Mary’s UConn, Cal, Rhode Island, Oklahoma. Georgia not only got in, they were given a seed. Penn State getting a seed was also a surprise. Little respect for Dayton and the A10. They were expected to be seed and to host. Kentucky scheduled 5 non conference games with teams of RPI 278 or worse. They had an RPI of 50. They had two league RPI Top 50 wins later vs Alabama and vs South Carolina. Cal didn’t get in which shows RPI Top 50 wins mean more than great RPI Top 50 draws. ……………………….. Little has changed with the selection process. It’s all about RPI Top 50 wins. Adding RPI Top 50 draws helps too. But you must have the RPI Top 50 wins. SLU needs to schedule at least 4 RPI top 50 non conference games out of 8. They don’t have to be top 10, just keep it within the RPI top 50. Make a few top level RPI games, and a few more within the RPI Top 50. Get 2 or 3 results. It needs to be a point of emphasis moving forward regardless of year. This was actually a good A10 RPI Top 50 year. Last year Xavier had an RPI of 29 and they didn’t get in either. What was their resume? RPI 52 Win RPI 14 Draw RPI 28 Draw RPI 73 Win RPI 77 Win Cal this year did not get in this year with 4 RPI Top 50 Draws, including 2 in the Top 10. They had other good top 100 wins but not top 50. Utah Valley had just 1 RPI Top 50 win, but was over RPI 14 team. 1 additional draw v RPI 46. This shows that one elite level RPI Top 50 win also carries a lot of weight. Utah Valley’s best RPI opponent in its final 12 games was 158. 10 of their final 12 opponents had an RPI worse than 200. Illinois, Georgia, and Ohio State had 3 RPI Top 50 wins. Kentucky at RPI 50 was one of those wins for Illinois and Georgia. Oklahoma who was left out had an RPI of 53 and, they had just 1 RPI top 50 win.

“Outlet B” also has SLU narrowly missing the NCAA Tourney. This outlet disagrees with two teams selected/not selected with “Outlet A” They have Kentucky and Georgia in, and they have Illinois and Cal out. Otherwise the two different outlets agree with all other at large selections. SLU was considered one of the last teams out along with Oklahoma, Illinois, Rhode Island, and Connecticut for Outlet B. This outlet has Alabama, North Carolina, Mississippi State, and Central Florida as 8 seeds. It has Dayton, Louisville, Wake Forest, Northwestern, as 7 seeds. While both outlets are very good at predicting the NCAA Tourney, neither get it 100% correct each year. They are always off by 1 or 2 teams.