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Nationwide Indiscretions: The SLC & LSA D2

We’ve come a long way on Nationwide Indiscretions on our cross-country, multi-conference tour of Lax Nation but all good things must come to an end. First with the SLC and then wrapping up with the LSA.

Editor’s note: Check out all of the D2 conference reviews here:
| SELC | PCLL | CCLA | UMLL | GRLC | RMLC | PNCLL | WCLL | SLC | LSA |

I’d like to welcome you to the newest conference in the MCLA.

The SLC is home to quite a few well known teams at the D1 level. Chapman, USC, UCLA, ASU, and Arizona. Not so much at the D2 level with UC Irvine, Fullerton, and Biola.

Biola Eagles

2/3 vs St. Mary’s W 8-7

2/19 vs Western Oregon (Vegas Full House Tournament) L 16-9

2/20 vs Northern Arizona (Vegas Full House Tournament) L 9-12

3/7 vs Pacific

3/11 vs Fort Lewis

3/25 vs Willamette

3/29 vs Pacific Lutheran

Final Grade: A. All of their non-conference games are at home, and who could blame them? It’s one of the advantages of being a California school. Sunshine and beaches are a helluva scheduling tool.

Cal State Fullerton Titans

2/19 vs Northern Arizona (Vegas Full House Tournament) W 17-13

2/20 vs Utah Valley (Vegas Full House Tournament) L 10-16

3/7 vs Fort Lewis

3/9 vs Pacific

4/13 vs Marymount College (non-MCLA)

Final Grade: B+. 3 out of 4 OOC games are quality. Love all the homes games. Possibly the best scheduling so far.

Cal State Channel Islands Dolphins

2/20 Marymount College (non-MCLA) W 13-3

3/7 vs San Jose State

Final Grade: D. Same general statement for all the California teams that don’t have enough OOC games. Next year schedule games vs the WCLL, please.

Long Beach State 49ers

3/9 vs Fort Lewis

3/16 vs Texas (LSA D1)

3/31 @ Central Washington  CANCELLED

4/10 @ Nevada

Final Grade: C+. Aside from Fort Lewis and Texas, there’s no real OOC competition here.

Concordia Eagles

2/27 vs Marymount College POSTPONED

3/4 @ St. Mary’s

3/5 @ Pacific

3/22 vs Willamette (Location TBD)

3/30 vs Pacific Lutheran (Location TBD)

4/10 vs UC Santa Cruz

Final Grade: B. The Eagles are playing teams from the north and the farther north. I expect them to compete for for a bid to Denver.

Occidental Tigers

2/6 vs St. Mary’s L 0-19

3/6 vs San Jose State

3/24 vs Willamette

3/27 vs Cal Maritime (non-MCLA)

3/28 vs Pacific Lutheran

Final Grade: C+. The St. Mary’s loss hurts. Bad. Hopefully the can recover and pick up at least one win out of their 3 remaining MCLA OOC games. Getting the Oregon teams down to Cali always helps.

Pepperdine Waves

3/17 vs Colorado School of Mines

4/10 @ Cal Lutheran(non-MCLA)

Final Grade: D. Playing one game, but at least its against a quality opponent.

UC-Irvine Anteaters

2/4 vs St. Mary’s L 4-16

3/18 vs Colorado School of  Mines

3/21 vs Metro State

Final Grade: C+. They need to pull at least one of the two left, preferably both, to make it to Denver.

Overall Conference Grade: B-. Not as good as the WCLL scheduling, but they still prosper from being on the West Coast, which is where a lot of great D2 teams are located.

Halftime!

[fvplayer src=”https://youtube.com/watch?v=TK2WEPdbmUc” splash=”https://i.ytimg.com/vi/TK2WEPdbmUc/hqdefault.jpg” caption=”Copenhagen- Robert Earl Keen”]

Finally, we’ve come to the close of our cross country journey. We finish up in Texas, home of my least favorite conference.

Expectations are very low. The LSA champions from 05-09, Southwestern University, was an 8 seed last season and is no longer in the LSA after moving up to varsity status in the fall of 2009.  Have the leftover teams stepped up to the plate scheduling wise to get a 2nd team to the big dance? Not one bit.

Let’s finish, shall we?

Austin Roos

Final Grade: F. The Roos start a disturbing trend of LSA teams not scheduling a single OOC game.  At least this conference has an interesting group of mascots.

Centenary Gents

3/9 vs Kennesaw St

3/13 vs Tulane (non-MCLA)

4/20 @ Harding

Final Grade: C. The Gents are one of the few teams in the LSA I can respect. Props to them for being one of the few teams that schedules OOC games but so far their scheduling success hasn’t translated to the field in 2010. Either way the Gents should get props for actually trying.

Sam Houston State Bearkats

3/8 vs Kennesaw State

Final Grade: D. They only get the KSU game because of Kennesaw making a spring break trip to Texas. Currently 3-0 on the season with consequtive 10-9 wins over the Sooners and Baylor before shellacking the Gents 21-1.

St. Edwards Hilltoppers

Final Grade: F. Coming into 2010 St Edwards is the overwhelming preseason #1. No OOC games to go with that sparkling ranking and two straight in conference losses to start this season. Ouch.

Stephen F Austin Lumberjacks

2/27 vs Fort Lewis (at Texas Tech) CANCELLED

2/28 vs New Mexico (at Texas Tech) CANCELLED

Final Grade: D. Or it would have been had these games not been canceled. They did play D1 LSU early in the season so add that to these canceled games and at least they showed some effort.

UT-San Antonio Roadrunners

3/7 vs Kennesaw State

Final Grade: D. Same reason as Sam Houston State. Cue your favorite Wil-E Coyote joke.

Overall Conference Grade: D. Only one team in the entire conference has the required number of OOC games to make it to Denver. 3 have none, and 2 have one. Oh, and a team dropped out before the season started, leaving them with just 6 teams, the bare minimum for the conference to get an automatic bid to the National Championship.  With Southwestern gone the LSA has come to the precipice of even deserving a bid to nationals even with the required 6 teams.  Can the LSA be saved?

That’s it for now. We’ll check in periodically throughout the season to give our take on Denver’s 16 bids.

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About the Author: The Lax picked up his first stick when he stepped on campus at MCLA D2 school UNC Charlotte. After taking a short break, he returned to the field for independent UNCG. The Lax enjoys flowers, pictures of unicorns, long walks on the beach, and above all else, beating people with his D-Pole.

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