SLU Women's Soccer Thread

[courtside]

26

SLU’s RPI heading into Tuesday is 26.

BYU advanced over TCU, but they needed PL’s after a 2-2 draw. Colorado roared back for a 3-2 win after being down by 2 att eh half vs UCF. 
…………….

Bubble Watch RPI Watch Tuesday.

Results that would help SLU:

Vanderbilt over Alabama. Georgia over Kentucky, Arkansas over Mississippi State, Tennessee over LSU. 

Missouri State over Middle Tennessee State

[courtside]

Rhode Island Rams part 2.

Rhody Probables:

4-1-4-1

Eden

Penny, Camacho, Gilbert, Name

Poon or Carstensen

Jacobs, Poon or Carstensen, Rice, MacDonald

Sylvester

……………

MaCdonald is a pace left wing, high volume shot taker from distance. Sylvester is big target forward central, top of box and good on set pieces. Carstensen is a passing playmaker in the central midfield. That’s the bull of their offense. 

Jacobs (more offensive wing) and Poon (undersized skilled central defender) add some pace in the midfield. 

Yee will play some right back. Steinbach will be an undersized pace wing sub. 

They try to make it difficult to build centrally through with their first stack of four up top. And they try to keep the game within the 18’s. They are a good set piece team and wide service team off of the flanks. Undisciplined defensively at times. They are not big or physical on the back line inside the 18. 2nd and 3rd chances within the 18.

SLU will match their 4-1-4-1 with their own. 

Rhode Island is a capable, similar level team to Loyola and Duquesne. They will enter with a very respectable RPI of 59 or close to it. 

[courtside]

On 10/28/2025 at 5:44 PM, courtside said:

27

This week’s predicted end of season RPI for SLU is 27. 

SLU is predicted as finishing with the best RPI of any bubble team out of a list of 31 bubble teams. RPI 27 through 57. 

If SLU can win all 3 games, and be the A10 AQ, they can improve their RPI closer to 20.

25

This week’s predicted end of season RPI for SLU is 25. 

This has SLU and Dayton playing to a draw in the A10 Conference Tourney title game, but Dayton advancing on PK’s. 

25 means SLU would be safely in the field, as an at large team, playing a first round road NCAA Tourney road game. 

A loss in OT or regulation would put SLU still in the field, but as an large bubble team. A win would project SLU to a seeded home team in the NCA First Round. 

All of these weekly predictions are 100% based on past NCAA Tourney historical data, combined, with current weekly results, combined with predictive results. 
…………….

A different but also respected RPI Bracketologist is not as high on SLU. And 100% of that is based on RPI Top 50 wins. First example thinks overall RPI quality supersedes the lack of RPI Top 59 wins, when the RPI reaches a certain number or level. 2nd outlet does not. That one thinks SLU has zero chance of an at large bid at all regardless of a 20 something RPI. They believe SLU must win the conference tourney to get into the NCAA Tourney. He values multiple high level top 50 draws over 4 top 75 wins for example. SLU would have the latter. 
…………….

Next Monday is selection day. I will pass along any new projections when I receive them. Both outlets have had very high levels of accuracy. But they disagree about SLU. 

It is subject to change with each week’s projections but new this week:

Both have Illinois and Ohio State as in the NCAA Tourney. The one I use every week does not have Kentucky and does not have Georgia. They play against one another today.  He instead has SLU and California in the NCAA Tourney. 

They agree on all other bubble situations. They disagree more often regarding seeding, home/road games etc…

[courtside]

26

SLU’s RPI for Wednesday is 26. They had a chance at 24 but the night games in the SEC went another way. Games today of note:

A10 Semifinals today:

SLU vs Rhode Island

Dayton vs Fordham

………….

WCC League Games:

Pepperdine vs Portland

Oregon State vs St. Mary’s

………….

A SLU win would move them to the low RPI 20’s. 
…………..

Also of note, the weather in both STL and Dayton will be 20 degrees warmer on Saturday than Sunday thus weekend, not including the expected windy conditions on top of that. And it is expected to be worse for a few days after that. Fri/Tues/Sat would have produced better playing conditions. 60’s to 40’s. and wind. If SLU wins on Wed, SLU will need its best cold/windy weather effort for 90-110 minutes plus on Sunday. 
…………..

[courtside]

31

SLU’s RPI is 31. 

SKU now has a top 50 RPI win over Rhode Island, as Rhody’s win over SLU moved them to 48. 

I will have game, bubble chances, and season recap when I get a chance. 

[courtside]

On 11/4/2025 at 8:50 AM, courtside said:

Rhode Island Rams part 2.

Rhody Probables:

4-1-4-1

Eden

Penny, Camacho, Gilbert, Name

Poon or Carstensen

Jacobs, Poon or Carstensen, Rice, MacDonald

Sylvester

……………

MaCdonald is a pace left wing, high volume shot taker from distance. Sylvester is big target forward central, top of box and good on set pieces. Carstensen is a passing playmaker in the central midfield. That’s the bull of their offense. 

Jacobs (more offensive wing) and Poon (undersized skilled central defender) add some pace in the midfield. 

Yee will play some right back. Steinbach will be an undersized pace wing sub. 

They try to make it difficult to build centrally through with their first stack of four up top. And they try to keep the game within the 18’s. They are a good set piece team and wide service team off of the flanks. Undisciplined defensively at times. They are not big or physical on the back line inside the 18. 2nd and 3rd chances within the 18.

SLU will match their 4-1-4-1 with their own. 

Rhode Island is a capable, similar level team to Loyola and Duquesne. They will enter with a very respectable RPI of 59 or close to it. 

Rhode Island 4 SLU 2

It’s always interesting to see how pregame scouts match the games themselves 

……………..

It was good to have Gaebe, Lawler, Stram, Miller, Puricelli at the game. I don’t believe there is a bugger SLU fan than Emily’s dad. he is at almost every game.

…………….

Credit to Rhode Island, they are a good team, that played well. Tough one for SLU. many respected Rhode Island’s level. I tried to tell some others that they can play with SLU, Dayton etc…

…………….

4-1-4-1 for both teams as expected.

Available: Chier who had a minor injury. But she was ineffective much of the game and she sat the final 29 minutes. 
……………..

Two different halves. SLU failed to tack on a few chances to get up 2-0, or 3-0 in the first half. 
…………….

Early goal for SLU. Simon forced a turnover, she took the space off of the dribble and she slotted a pass for Larson who beat Eden at close range. 1-0  11th minute.

SLU could have had another 2 minutes later. Hope Kim was in alone inside the 6, for her own goal or tap in pass but she lost the ball at the last second. 

Larson had a high level chance and shot. And she almost slotted Smith in alone for another.

Later Stanciak had a couple of high level chances. One was in from the right side, another was a pass over the top from Hockett inside the 18. She fanned on the first shot but she hit the 2nd and Eden just fot a piece to save a goal 

…………..

Rhode Island’s goal was late first half, subs for both teams Courtney Poon who had a terrific game for Rhody, won a ball v Preusser, played it wide for Rosenfield. She turned inside and she hit one from a bad angle from 30 yards out, that landed upper 90 back post. A once in a lifetime shot. Emma was caught off of her line and her first two steps were forward and not backwards. It was just over her fingertips. 

SLU struggled in the central midfield withiut Larson and Simon in the game. Smith sometimes drops to there but she also was out of the game. SLU didn’t have enough pace in the central midfield, close out on the shot wasn’t there from Gary, and most of all, that save has to be made. 1-1 at half time in a game that was mostly one sided for SLU until that point. 

Poon is undersized but fast, skilled, and poised on the ball. Makes good decisions. Carstensen also played well there.
……………..

2nd half

……………..

Rhode Island did well to pressure SLU’s back line and defense. They were quick to use their speed and pace transition.

Early 2nd half goal was a Rhody clear, volleyed back in by Welker. Hesded back out by Name to Carstensen. She turned on Welker and she curled a ball in space for MacDonald at midfield. She took it the length of the field for a goal. Bad angle and positioning from Schreiber. No help defense. Hockett covered Sylvester in the middle and was late to get over and force a pass. Miller was unable to get back. Everyone was caught forward. 

Emma needed to come out to cut the angle. She stayed back which makes the goal bigger. You stay back on the long distance shots so that they ball doesn’t over your head.

Mentioned pregame twice that Donald is a good, pace winger on the left side. She is their most dangerous attacking player. 2-1 

……………

SLU wasn’t good enough at times winning aerial duels and 50/50 balls in the middle of the field. SLU gave up way too much transition.

Offensively, the final third pass was a little too quick and ambitious bs higher percentage short interior passing.

At times this year SLU’s center backs didn’t do well enough to step through big target passes, and allowed too easy turns.

……………

63rd minute

Luebbert played  a nice ball to Larson up the line. Hannah beat Penny 1v1 wide of the box. She played  a perfect ground pass to Simon as the trailer who one times a finisher for 2-2. This has been a point of emphasis the past few games .Better wide service ground passes top and middle of the box, and finishing them. 
……………

2 minutes later, Rhode Island throw in, Kim deflects it but to the middle, then Schreiber mishit the clear high inside SLU’s own 18. Rice 1v1 off of a bounce, she turned and overpowered Hockett. 3-2. Schreiber needed to clear with her left foot not her right. Perfect shot low corner. No chance for Parker. Poor outside back clear, poor center back defending. 

……………..

More quick combination play from Rhode Island, Poon forced turnover, up to Carstensen to Rice who took another long shot from 25 yards that Parker needed to make a nice save to force the corner. Sloppy middle of the field turnover, quick transition. 
…………….

Sustained Rhode Island pressure, failed clear. MacDonald intercepted and she cut it back away from the goal from 25 yards out .Upper 90 far post. Emma was off of her line again. Can’t happen. No close out from Howard who was there. Failed clear by Schreiber. Great shot. 4-2 

…………….

SLU switched to a 3-5-2 formation and they applied a lot of pressure in the final 10 plus minutes but they couldn’t score. 

Hockett was stopped point blank from 10 yards out, barely. off of a Luebbert cross. Hope Kim missed over the bar from Simon. Broesder to Larson great save near post from 15.

…………….

2 goals from poor back line play. 2 goals that needed to be saved by the keeper. 
……………

Rhode Island played with great energy all game. And they were sharp, their passing, their shots. They won their share of aerial duels, 50/50 balls. Nice quick combination plays, and they were a step quicker at times too. It was one of their best games. You have to give them credit.

Rhode Island had more speed on defense than many teams SLU plays. 

It’s likely a different game if SLU was able to tack on a 2nd or 3rd goal earlier in the game when they had the chance. 

SLU also needed to be stronger on the ball in the final 3rd, and wait a little longer if needed, holding the ball until more support arrives or until a play develops. A little too ambitious at times. 

The season recap, bubble, etc are different posts. 

[slu92]

Great season again by Coach Shields and the team. Tough loss against RI, but nonetheless very good season. Never know, maybe we get lucky and get at large bid. Fingers crossed! 

[courtside]

NCAA Bubble.

The first thing I will point out is that Janet Oberle is back on the NCAA Committee this year. She has been on it in the past. She of course has to leave the room when SLU is discussed. There are 10 people on the committee.

SLU is at RPI 31 for now. They have an RPI Top 50 win for now. SLU needs to root for Rhode Island on Sunday to solidify that Top 50 win. 

Other teams are still playing that can leapfrog SLU in the RPI, up to a half a dozen of them. It depends. 

Teams that win their regular season conference title hold weight with the committee. This helps Dayton. Dayton is expected to receive an at large bid even if they don’t win Sunday. They have an RPI Top 50 win over SLU. 

Rhode Island is on the bubble. It is a soft bubble this year. 

SLU chose their non conference schedule on purpose. The reasoning behind it is because SLU had a lot of new players playing new positions for SLU. 

SLU owed Iowa a return game from several years ago. And they hosted Penn State last year. Tough early season road games with lots of new moving parts. SLU prefers to host power teams when they are stacked, and when SLU thinks they are the better or more experienced  team. We have seen this in recent years with many higher profile teams visiting SLU. 

SLU instead hosted Missouri and Indiana, two teams that are more too 100 types of teams with bigger brand names Missouri was a return game. IU was a new series. 

The results went as expected. SLU played Penn State even. A handful of sloppy mistakes and Penn State pounced. SLU was a no show for the Iowa game. SLU took care of business in every other non conference game except Illinois State. 0-0 draw in a game that should have been a lopsided win. Almost every team has one of those games every year including some of SLU’s strongest teams. 

It’s much tougher for SLU Women’s Soccer because they are unable to schedule tough non conference games later in the season. The Men can do this. So there is pressure to either get early season non-conference RPI results, or to be almost perfect in the league and conference tourney. 

Where. I think SLU could have helped itself is by scheduling a few games against teams in the 30’s or 40’s RPi or so. Now, you have to predict who you think those teams will be. And try to secure 1 or 2 RPI top 50 wins. 

Janet has insisted that it’s a new committee, and RPI Top 50 wins/draws are not the be all end all as they have seem to have been in recent years. Others say they will believe it when they see it. 

The football four leagues can schedule cupcakes non conference, and then as their team gets better, they can maybe get a few Top 50 results in league play because they get chances every week. Some of the best programs schedule powers non conference. But the bubble types do not or do it less often. 

SLU plays in the 10th best league. When people ask what would be the best thing for SLU, my response would be to join the ACC or SEC etc…for Women’s Soccer. People can laugh at that and it is said in jest, but there is also some truth to it. The league hurts SLU a lot and the Big East while better isn’t great. They have The Big East has less “bad” RPI teams.

The A10 does do a good job of having its better or best teams play the better or best teams in the league .SLU for example doesn’t play the Bonnies and they won’t be playing them any time soon. SLU added Rhode Island and Fordham. Those were good additions. 

Last year Xavier was snubbed with a 29 RPI. SLU is in a similar situation this season. Unlike last year, Xavier has a blowout win over RPI 12 Michigan State. Besides that win Xavier has a 1-1 draw with RPI 44 UConn. That’s it. They dominated bad teams and they rans up the score on many of them. But that 1 win is huge for them. So keep your eye on Xavier, if they get in (they likely will), and where they land. 

Last year Xavier when Xavier was snubbed with a 29 RPI, they had a 2-2 draw with RPI 14 Michigan State. They had a win over RPI 52 Dayton. They had two RPI top 80 wins. 

This year SLU has 3 RPI top 80 wins, including 1 RPI top 50 win. SLU is 31 for now, Xavier was 29.

Many people were upset about the Xavier snub and it was a hot topic last year. 

Unfortunately, non football four schools have very small margins of error compared to football four schools that get chance after chance with good RPI games. 

SLU is likely going to be a wrong side of the bubble team. Something to watch is where SLU’s final RPI ends up Sunday night. The closer to 30 it is the better it is for SLU. Rhode Island winning Sunday would help the RPI top 50 win situation. 

Dayton beefed up its non conference schedule this year with a veteran team.They lost all of those games. But it was worth it for them, both with RPI and with preparedness for later season. Dayton plays a very defensive style, few mistakes. And they found a few more offensive contributors to take care of business in many 2-0 types of games that were closer than the score. Similar level teams with different styles. 

SLU is respected as a good program in a not so good league. 

Random example. Take a look at bubble team Kentucky. They scheduled FIVE non conference games against RPI 285 or worse. Ridiculous. They lost both RPI top 50 games to bubble Big Ten  teams in the 40’s. But they then had SEVEN more chances at RPI top 50 games in their league. They won 3 of them. One of those may fall out of the top 50. And only 1 may end uo being a too 30 win. UK’s RPI is 49. I would value a 20 something RPI team over that. Some only see those few quality wins and hold that to higher regard. 

Another topic is pre-season. Soccer only gets 2 weeks of preseason which is weeks short of being enough. It’s especially challenging for teams who get better later in the season. And it is very difficult for lesser league teams too. 

SLU set up its schedule so that its final 5 league games were against the 5 best league opponents. It’s tough to be 5 for 5. SLU went 3-1-1.

Even in SLU’s best years, rarely do they have a perfect league record. That is a once in a while thing, difficult to do. 

Missouri State, Illinois State and Kansas City are still playing. That would be 3 more wins over NCAA Tourney teams if they win their tourneys. All 3 of those teams are underdogs but are capable. RPI bump would be minimal but it would be helpful.

Rooting against the following teams still playing:: BYU, Mississippi State, Xavier, Fairfield, St. Mary’s, Western Michigan, Washington, South Carolina. Utah Valley, Georgia, UConn, Liberty. Dayton. 

SLU will wait and see their fate Monday. 

[Tonka]

4 hours ago, courtside said:

NCAA Bubble.

The first thing I will point out is that Janet Oberle is back on the NCAA Committee this year. She has been on it in the past. She of course has to leave the room when SLU is discussed. There are 10 people on the committee.

SLU is at RPI 31 for now. They have an RPI Top 50 win for now. SLU needs to root for Rhode Island on Sunday to solidify that Top 50 win. 

Other teams are still playing that can leapfrog SLU in the RPI, up to a half a dozen of them. It depends. 

Teams that win their regular season conference title hold weight with the committee. This helps Dayton. Dayton is expected to receive an at large bid even if they don’t win Sunday. They have an RPI Top 50 win over SLU. 

Rhode Island is on the bubble. It is a soft bubble this year. 

SLU chose their non conference schedule on purpose. The reasoning behind it is because SLU had a lot of new players playing new positions for SLU. 

SLU owed Iowa a return game from several years ago. And they hosted Penn State last year. Tough early season road games with lots of new moving parts. SLU prefers to host power teams when they are stacked, and when SLU thinks they are the better or more experienced  team. We have seen this in recent years with many higher profile teams visiting SLU. 

SLU instead hosted Missouri and Indiana, two teams that are more too 100 types of teams with bigger brand names Missouri was a return game. IU was a new series. 

The results went as expected. SLU played Penn State even. A handful of sloppy mistakes and Penn State pounced. SLU was a no show for the Iowa game. SLU took care of business in every other non conference game except Illinois State. 0-0 draw in a game that should have been a lopsided win. Almost every team has one of those games every year including some of SLU’s strongest teams. 

It’s much tougher for SLU Women’s Soccer because they are unable to schedule tough non conference games later in the season. The Men can do this. So there is pressure to either get early season non-conference RPI results, or to be almost perfect in the league and conference tourney. 

Where. I think SLU could have helped itself is by scheduling a few games against teams in the 30’s or 40’s RPi or so. Now, you have to predict who you think those teams will be. And try to secure 1 or 2 RPI top 50 wins. 

Janet has insisted that it’s a new committee, and RPI Top 50 wins/draws are not the be all end all as they have seem to have been in recent years. Others say they will believe it when they see it. 

The football four leagues can schedule cupcakes non conference, and then as their team gets better, they can maybe get a few Top 50 results in league play because they get chances every week. Some of the best programs schedule powers non conference. But the bubble types do not or do it less often. 

SLU plays in the 10th best league. When people ask what would be the best thing for SLU, my response would be to join the ACC or SEC etc…for Women’s Soccer. People can laugh at that and it is said in jest, but there is also some truth to it. The league hurts SLU a lot and the Big East while better isn’t great. They have The Big East has less “bad” RPI teams.

The A10 does do a good job of having its better or best teams play the better or best teams in the league .SLU for example doesn’t play the Bonnies and they won’t be playing them any time soon. SLU added Rhode Island and Fordham. Those were good additions. 

Last year Xavier was snubbed with a 29 RPI. SLU is in a similar situation this season. Unlike last year, Xavier has a blowout win over RPI 12 Michigan State. Besides that win Xavier has a 1-1 draw with RPI 44 UConn. That’s it. They dominated bad teams and they rans up the score on many of them. But that 1 win is huge for them. So keep your eye on Xavier, if they get in (they likely will), and where they land. 

Last year Xavier when Xavier was snubbed with a 29 RPI, they had a 2-2 draw with RPI 14 Michigan State. They had a win over RPI 52 Dayton. They had two RPI top 80 wins. 

This year SLU has 3 RPI top 80 wins, including 1 RPI top 50 win. SLU is 31 for now, Xavier was 29.

Many people were upset about the Xavier snub and it was a hot topic last year. 

Unfortunately, non football four schools have very small margins of error compared to football four schools that get chance after chance with good RPI games. 

SLU is likely going to be a wrong side of the bubble team. Something to watch is where SLU’s final RPI ends up Sunday night. The closer to 30 it is the better it is for SLU. Rhode Island winning Sunday would help the RPI top 50 win situation. 

Dayton beefed up its non conference schedule this year with a veteran team.They lost all of those games. But it was worth it for them, both with RPI and with preparedness for later season. Dayton plays a very defensive style, few mistakes. And they found a few more offensive contributors to take care of business in many 2-0 types of games that were closer than the score. Similar level teams with different styles. 

SLU is respected as a good program in a not so good league. 

Random example. Take a look at bubble team Kentucky. They scheduled FIVE non conference games against RPI 285 or worse. Ridiculous. They lost both RPI top 50 games to bubble Big Ten  teams in the 40’s. But they then had SEVEN more chances at RPI top 50 games in their league. They won 3 of them. One of those may fall out of the top 50. And only 1 may end uo being a too 30 win. UK’s RPI is 49. I would value a 20 something RPI team over that. Some only see those few quality wins and hold that to higher regard. 

Another topic is pre-season. Soccer only gets 2 weeks of preseason which is weeks short of being enough. It’s especially challenging for teams who get better later in the season. And it is very difficult for lesser league teams too. 

SLU set up its schedule so that its final 5 league games were against the 5 best league opponents. It’s tough to be 5 for 5. SLU went 3-1-1.

Even in SLU’s best years, rarely do they have a perfect league record. That is a once in a while thing, difficult to do. 

Missouri State, Illinois State and Kansas City are still playing. That would be 3 more wins over NCAA Tourney teams if they win their tourneys. All 3 of those teams are underdogs but are capable. RPI bump would be minimal but it would be helpful.

Rooting against the following teams still playing:: BYU, Mississippi State, Xavier, Fairfield, St. Mary’s, Western Michigan, Washington, South Carolina. Utah Valley, Georgia, UConn, Liberty. Dayton. 

SLU will wait and see their fate Monday. 

Thank you!

[JettFlight5]

9 hours ago, courtside said:

NCAA Bubble.

The first thing I will point out is that Janet Oberle is back on the NCAA Committee this year. She has been on it in the past. She of course has to leave the room when SLU is discussed. There are 10 people on the committee.

SLU is at RPI 31 for now. They have an RPI Top 50 win for now. SLU needs to root for Rhode Island on Sunday to solidify that Top 50 win. 

Other teams are still playing that can leapfrog SLU in the RPI, up to a half a dozen of them. It depends. 

Teams that win their regular season conference title hold weight with the committee. This helps Dayton. Dayton is expected to receive an at large bid even if they don’t win Sunday. They have an RPI Top 50 win over SLU. 

Rhode Island is on the bubble. It is a soft bubble this year. 

SLU chose their non conference schedule on purpose. The reasoning behind it is because SLU had a lot of new players playing new positions for SLU. 

SLU owed Iowa a return game from several years ago. And they hosted Penn State last year. Tough early season road games with lots of new moving parts. SLU prefers to host power teams when they are stacked, and when SLU thinks they are the better or more experienced  team. We have seen this in recent years with many higher profile teams visiting SLU. 

SLU instead hosted Missouri and Indiana, two teams that are more too 100 types of teams with bigger brand names Missouri was a return game. IU was a new series. 

The results went as expected. SLU played Penn State even. A handful of sloppy mistakes and Penn State pounced. SLU was a no show for the Iowa game. SLU took care of business in every other non conference game except Illinois State. 0-0 draw in a game that should have been a lopsided win. Almost every team has one of those games every year including some of SLU’s strongest teams. 

It’s much tougher for SLU Women’s Soccer because they are unable to schedule tough non conference games later in the season. The Men can do this. So there is pressure to either get early season non-conference RPI results, or to be almost perfect in the league and conference tourney. 

Where. I think SLU could have helped itself is by scheduling a few games against teams in the 30’s or 40’s RPi or so. Now, you have to predict who you think those teams will be. And try to secure 1 or 2 RPI top 50 wins. 

Janet has insisted that it’s a new committee, and RPI Top 50 wins/draws are not the be all end all as they have seem to have been in recent years. Others say they will believe it when they see it. 

The football four leagues can schedule cupcakes non conference, and then as their team gets better, they can maybe get a few Top 50 results in league play because they get chances every week. Some of the best programs schedule powers non conference. But the bubble types do not or do it less often. 

SLU plays in the 10th best league. When people ask what would be the best thing for SLU, my response would be to join the ACC or SEC etc…for Women’s Soccer. People can laugh at that and it is said in jest, but there is also some truth to it. The league hurts SLU a lot and the Big East while better isn’t great. They have The Big East has less “bad” RPI teams.

The A10 does do a good job of having its better or best teams play the better or best teams in the league .SLU for example doesn’t play the Bonnies and they won’t be playing them any time soon. SLU added Rhode Island and Fordham. Those were good additions. 

Last year Xavier was snubbed with a 29 RPI. SLU is in a similar situation this season. Unlike last year, Xavier has a blowout win over RPI 12 Michigan State. Besides that win Xavier has a 1-1 draw with RPI 44 UConn. That’s it. They dominated bad teams and they rans up the score on many of them. But that 1 win is huge for them. So keep your eye on Xavier, if they get in (they likely will), and where they land. 

Last year Xavier when Xavier was snubbed with a 29 RPI, they had a 2-2 draw with RPI 14 Michigan State. They had a win over RPI 52 Dayton. They had two RPI top 80 wins. 

This year SLU has 3 RPI top 80 wins, including 1 RPI top 50 win. SLU is 31 for now, Xavier was 29.

Many people were upset about the Xavier snub and it was a hot topic last year. 

Unfortunately, non football four schools have very small margins of error compared to football four schools that get chance after chance with good RPI games. 

SLU is likely going to be a wrong side of the bubble team. Something to watch is where SLU’s final RPI ends up Sunday night. The closer to 30 it is the better it is for SLU. Rhode Island winning Sunday would help the RPI top 50 win situation. 

Dayton beefed up its non conference schedule this year with a veteran team.They lost all of those games. But it was worth it for them, both with RPI and with preparedness for later season. Dayton plays a very defensive style, few mistakes. And they found a few more offensive contributors to take care of business in many 2-0 types of games that were closer than the score. Similar level teams with different styles. 

SLU is respected as a good program in a not so good league. 

Random example. Take a look at bubble team Kentucky. They scheduled FIVE non conference games against RPI 285 or worse. Ridiculous. They lost both RPI top 50 games to bubble Big Ten  teams in the 40’s. But they then had SEVEN more chances at RPI top 50 games in their league. They won 3 of them. One of those may fall out of the top 50. And only 1 may end uo being a too 30 win. UK’s RPI is 49. I would value a 20 something RPI team over that. Some only see those few quality wins and hold that to higher regard. 

Another topic is pre-season. Soccer only gets 2 weeks of preseason which is weeks short of being enough. It’s especially challenging for teams who get better later in the season. And it is very difficult for lesser league teams too. 

SLU set up its schedule so that its final 5 league games were against the 5 best league opponents. It’s tough to be 5 for 5. SLU went 3-1-1.

Even in SLU’s best years, rarely do they have a perfect league record. That is a once in a while thing, difficult to do. 

Missouri State, Illinois State and Kansas City are still playing. That would be 3 more wins over NCAA Tourney teams if they win their tourneys. All 3 of those teams are underdogs but are capable. RPI bump would be minimal but it would be helpful.

Rooting against the following teams still playing:: BYU, Mississippi State, Xavier, Fairfield, St. Mary’s, Western Michigan, Washington, South Carolina. Utah Valley, Georgia, UConn, Liberty. Dayton. 

SLU will wait and see their fate Monday. 

The program is in good long-term shape if this is a "bad" year. 

[courtside]

36 minutes ago, JettFlight5 said:

The program is in good long-term shape if this is a "bad" year. 

Yes. Correct.

SLU returns 23 of 28 players. They have 3 additional Freshmen who were injured, and didn’t play this season. SLU has strong recruiting classes for 2026 (6 players) and, 2027 (8 players) They also explore the transfer portal twice a year. On average, they have been adding 1 to 2 transfers per year. 

[courtside]

I have previously used two different respected RPI outlets to gauge SLU’s NCAA Tourney positioning and chances. 

One I have used weekly. That one has been more favorable to SLU all season. The 2nd one hasn’t. 

Going into Friday, the 2nd one, the tougher one on SLU, has SLU as the First Team Out of the NCAA Tourney. 

His prediction for last teams in:

Illinois, Ohio State, Clemson, Kentucky, Oklahoma. 

His prediction for first teams out:

Saint Louis, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Pepperdine California

His predictions are usually very accurate, but not 100%. It’s always going to be off by 1 or 2 teams. He updates his projections daily through Sunday night before selection Monday. 

The other, or first RPI outlet that I have used weekly, doesn’t update daily. If he has any updates, or a final projection before Monday, I will pass it along. He might.