Seldon

If you do not have speed on defense, Bearden can destroy you. Herbstrit and Upshaw are both very fast; Herbstrit is shifty and quick; Upshaw is stronger, but is only effective when going to his left; overplay him in that direction. Midfield headed by Derrick Radcliffe, not overly fast but tremendous ball skills. If you try to give him a cushion, he will beat you every time; play him tight and don't give him room to operate. Defense is very solid but not near as tough as last year's. Nick Spahr can cover a lot of ground; Vinsant is strong and skilled and Elam in goal is smart and very athletic. Colquit is very dangerous on throw-ins, but he will attempt to find Herbstrit 9 out of 10 times. Don't let Herbstrit get open on throw-ins or corner kicks. Bearden prefers the long ball to Upshaw and Herbstrit as opposed to building an attack. They hustle continuously and Coach Turner is effective at adapting to changes in the game. Overall, they are not quite as complete a team as last year but still capable of going all the way.

I think it is a good thing. What it means is that soccer is growing. More schools are fielding better teams. It can do nothing but enhance the sport in Tennessee.

I think with Hendersonville out, Bearden waltzes to the finals without being challenged.

Hey Neanderthal (retiredcoach), the year is 2003. I especially like the "mentally capable" part, especially considering all the obvious grammar and spelling mistakes in your post. Nice job.

bhsdefense, what kind of classless comment is that? About what one would expect from a Bearden fan/player, I guess. It was 2-0 when the rain started, so why would an FHS fan blame the rain? Funny how you guys talk about it being a "well-played game" when you win but blame the refs or your poor defense when you lose. Personally, I thought the first two were well-played and the Farragut goals were due to their good offense, not the refs or your poor defense. Bearden played well last night; Farragut didn't, thus the result. Game 4 still a possibility...

Go Catholic!

I am not sure that it would take a large complex to accomodate all the extra teams. As it is, there will only be 6 fields being used at one time (and then, only on the first day) and there is no reason for all to be located at a single location. My gripe is with the scheduling and with Memphis in general. No offense to those of you in Memphis, I used to live in Memphis and Memphis is a good place to be from...the key word being "from".

Hoya75, As a complex, Rose is the best in the State. But as for the fields (other than the stadium) they're no better than many others (unless they have done something drastic in the past year). Regardless, this is a bad decision and brings into question the reasoning of the TSSAA decision-makers.

Paddlefoot, Sorry, my friend, it was 6-1. You must have been checking out that cute girl in the front row and missed the last two goals.

mphsRouge, Put down the crack pipe. You have obviously destroyed too many brain cells.

This is not the same schedule because there were only 4 teams last year, not 8. As for the Rose complex, it is a nice complex but the actual fields are no better than in Chattanooga and other sites. Memphis is farther away from more parts of the state than any other metropolitan area. Memphis to Chattanooga is considerably closer than the Tri Cities to Memphis. Nashville makes more sense than either one.

This is ridiculous. It is bad enough that Spring Fling was moved to Memphis, but the scheduling of games is ridiculous. Any team from East Tennessee has it particularly difficult. If a team from East Tennessee makes the finals in AAA, they will have to spend 5 nights in Memphis, costing their parents $200-300 dollars more than it should. The first round games are early on Wednesday, meaning they have to come into Memphis on Tuesday. Instead of scheduling the finals on Friday, they schedule them for 5:00 on Saturday, meaning they have to stay in Memphis an extra day because it is too far to drive that late at night, plus they have to find something to occupy their time all day Friday. Apparently the TSSAA is more concerned about bringing revenue into the city of Memphis than they are the wellfare of the athletes and their families.

Ask yourself this, which is more demeaning to a team, having a team score several goals or having a team that COULD score several goals intentionally NOT scoring? A poor team KNOWS when they are being toyed with (e.g playing keep-away or being wide open for a shot and pulling it back out). THAT is humiliating. If a very good team plays a very bad team, plays mostly subs and places restrictions on them as to how they can score (e.g. headers only or no shots within the box) that is showing good sportsmanship and is all that should be expected regardless of the final score. If people do not want to have these lopsided scores, they should lobby the TSSAA to implement a Mercy Rule or group schools by quality of team as opposed to number of students.

Nicely stated, keeperfan.

What are you talking about? First you state "all the players in knoxville go to only 2 schools", then you compare Nashville and Knoxville by using a bunch of schools that aren't even in Nashville. You mention 10 schools and only 3 of them are even IN Nashville. There are plenty of good players in other Knoxville and surrounding area schools. Catholic, CAK, Oak Ridge, Lenoir City, McMinn Co., all field some pretty decent players. And your "stacking" accusation is ridiculous. Bearden and Farragut are both public schools. The kids that go to those schools live in those districts. How is that "stacking"? I believe the private schools you mentioned could more likely be accused of stacking than Bearden and Farragut. Since you apparently don't have one, let me give you a clue; there are more people in Nashville so naturally there should be more good soccer players spread out over more schools. Just like there are more good soccer players spread out over more schools in the Atlanta area than around Nashville. Besides, your whole argument sounds like a child whining when he doesn't get his way. The reason Bearden and Farragut are good is because they have good players and good coaches...period. No recruiting, no stacking, no paying out the nose for coaches, training or facilities, nothing mysterious or questionable. Just a few years of excellent talent concentrated in a relatively small area. Live with it. [Edited by Seldon on 5-2-03 8:31A] [Edited by Seldon on 5-2-03 9:14A]

Local papers with a small market usually do a good job. The Oak Ridger and the Kingsport paper, for instance, provide detailed reports and pictures of most of the local teams' soccer. But then, there's not a lot else to report ans they know that a large section of there readers are interested in the "local guys and gals".

mrfun, you're a funny guy. The only team you mention that you actually have a case for is CBHS. When you look at the others and compare common opponents and results, there is no comparison. Keep telling yourself that Farragut and Bearden haven't played anybody and are really not that strong. See ya in Memphis.

Great post! The Tennessean probably has better coverage than the Knoxville News Sentinel. Knoxville has the #1 and #2 teams in the state and the #2 and #12 teams nationally (Farragut and Bearden) and coverage is almost non-existent. Sure the Farragut-Bearden game was covered, but that's about it. Other games may merit a line or two on occasion, but it's rare. Unless a parent or coach calls in the results to a game, they don't even print box scores.

You're partially correct in that Morrow and Britcher didn't score against Bearden but to say they get most of their goals against weaker teams is not exactly correct (even though EVERYBODY gets most of their goals against weaker teams). You may want to check out how they did against BGA, Blackman, Huntsville, Centennial (GA) and Chattahoochi, all of which are pretty decent teams.

whorundis, either you weren't at the game or you left at halftime. Farragut's bench played for 15 minutes in the first half and 20 minutes in the second. And we're not talking subs here and there, we're talking the entire midfield and forwards, parts of the defense off and on and using keepers as field players. The score could easily have been much worse, but Coach Culbreth doesn't work that way.

mrfun: OK, now I'm confused. You accepted my apology which was offered if I misinterpretted your allegation that Farragut ran up the score on Cleveland. Then you say that your post was coherent, thus admitting that you WERE accusing Farragut of running up the score. That being the case, my apology should NOT have been accepted because my original assertion would have been correct and the apology not applicable. There is a difference in running up a score and beating a team badly. Running up a score is done on purpose to either prove a point or humiliate an opponent. Sometimes, when there is a significant gap in the quality of the teams, there will be a significant gap in the score. Sometimes the only way for a good team to NOT put goals on the board is to intentionally not try and score. This goes contrary to the spirit of the game. Farragut beat Cleveland by 8 goals because, on that day, they were eight goals better, NOT because they ran up the score.

mrfun, you seem to be implying that someone (Farragut?) DID run the score up. Really? Were you there? Did you notice that the backups played about a third of the first half and half of the second? There was no "running up the score, Farragut was just that much better. If you were not implying that Farragut ran up the score, then I apologize and suggest you structure your sentences more coherently.

I disagree. If it were a 50/50 proposition then the number of made PKs would be closer to 50/50. Assuming a decent kick, the keeper not only has to guess the right direction but also the right height (upper, lower, middle) and have the strength and eye-hand coordination to stop the kick. If you are good enough to stop 50% of the PKs coming your way, I WANNA SEE YOU PLAY!

The winner of the final Farragut-Bearden game.

Actually, either is acceptable. Inclusion of the preface "ONE of the" properly allows for the dual comparative. "The better" is correct if only comparing two; "the best" is proper if comparing more than two. The phrase "one of the" implies a comparison of a particular rivalry against any other single rivalry. Graduate English lesson for the day. [Edited by Seldon on 4-29-03 1:04P]