Hampstead versus Pittsburgh (or Cincinnati, or Charlotte...)

For over a decade, the Phantoms of New Hampshire roamed the state, playing professional soccer games at every high school from Keene to the coast with practically no fanfare. I myself have been saying for years, "I'd like to see them play some time this summer," but since no one even knows where their games are, nevermind when, actually seeing them was something of a pipe dream. Past internet time wasting sessions have shown that twice the Pantoms called real stadiums home, only for be evicted from Nashua's Holman Stadium and the recently razed Singer Family Park in Manchester, in favor of minor league baseball clubs. All this movement gave me the distinct impression that this team would be history when the United Soccer Leagues announced they were culling their weak franchises to make a slimmer, stronger, more marketable league. I was wrong.

Apparently, earlier this month, the Phantoms collected their belongings in Manchester (population 108,398) and decended upon tiny Hampstead (population 8,297... yes, that's over 100K less), with bags of money (I'm assuming we're talking about 7-digits worth here), bought the brand spanking new All-Around Sports Complex and it's 3 indoor soccer fields, not to mention it's other amenities, renamed it the PhanZone, and announced it was going to build a soccer-specific stadium on the site. This, ladies and gentlemen, is absolutely insane. Hampstead now has a professional sports franchise in the same league as franchises in the major cities listed in the title, and will compete in the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup, which is a knockout tournament which includes all of the MLS clubs. With the shrinking of the USL, there are thirty professional soccer franchises left in the country, meaning, even assuming the MLS teams getting byes, and the Phantoms not advancing every year, it's a pretty good bet that the New England Revolution, DC United, MetroStars, or someone else, will be playing a big game in Hampstead in the next five years.

The craziest part? I'm relatively sure no one in the area even knows about it. This all happened 2 weeks ago, and I learned about it on a message board. My family lives in Sandown (population 5,143), one town to the north of Hampstead, and they haven't said anything to me, and I'm pretty sure if my mom had read about it in the paper, she would have called me immediately, knowing my enjoyment of all sports local and obscure. My girlfriend actually lives in Hampstead, and asks me almost daily about my SIMULATED soccer team (yes, I am that sick), yet she too, has said nothing about this.

More strangeness? The fact that the town north of Sandown, Fremont (population 3,510), is already building the largest (area-wise) soccer specific complex in the COUNTRY, to serve as the new home of Seacoast United, also a USL soccer club, but on the amateur level (think Cape Cod league). They too, will participate in the U.S. Open Cup. Once again, people in the area have hardly any awareness of this.

Let me explain what just happened, two infinitesimal New Hampshire towns just got franchises with apparently unlimited funds, brand new facilities, leagues with 'major-league caliber' city opponents, a mechanism to compete for the national championship, and thus be invited to play in regional competitions against the best teams in Mexico, Central America, the Carribean and beyond. These two teams will be situated a mere 10-15 minutes apart (think Liverpool-Arsenal, Rangers-Celtic, Chivas-Galaxy... or am I getting ahead of myself?). Yet the region is clueless as to even the fact that this money (millions) and entertainment is arriving. Unbelievable.

NCAA cheats UNH

Well, that time of year is upon us, college sports fans, the 16 team bracket to determine the NCAA Division I-AA National Champion in football has been announced. (NOTE: The 11 rogue conferences who choose to play in 30-odd bowl games like the CapitalOne Bowl, GMAC Bowl, and Continental Tire Bowl do not compete for an NCAA championship, they have chosen to sell themselves for sponsorship dollars and for a non-NCAA title which is voted upon rather than played for.)

As signified in the note above, I feel that a 4-week tournament is a far superior way to determine the true national champion. Unfortuneately, because the NCAA gets shafted on the Bowl money, they have decided to tweak the I-AA field to make it more profitable. What they do for the 8 first week games, is give 4 home games to the top 4 ranked teams, and 4 home games to the 4 most profitable teams. Enter the victim: the University of New Hampshire Wildcats. The Wildcats, in the top 4 in many of the computer rankings, boasting a 9-2 record, 7-0 on the road, an Atlantic-10 North divisional championship, wins over defending national champion Delaware and I-A member Rutgers, were conspicuously absent from the top 4. At that point, remaining home games go to traditional powers who believe they deserve annual home games (including the Delaware team that UNH themselves crushed on the road). Because road teams are determined in the name of reducing travel and avoiding 1st round conference matchups, UNH can pack its bags for Statesboro, Georgia, to play #4 Georgia Southern University. This means that in the name of a cash grab, the NCAA is pitting 2 of the top 5 schools against each other in round 1. The saddest part, this format is still more legitimate than the NCAA I-A Bowl Championship Series format.

(HEY I-A! How's being forced to put a 2 loss Michigan, and a schedule strength weak and 2 loss Boston College in 'Championship Series' Bowls looking? How's this one, what if Iowa State beats Oklahoma? You'll be forced to take them too! Wow, that means shafting undefeated Utah! What a public relations killer! That's OK though, since you've already decided to shaft undefeated Boise State! How is this format supposed to be better at picking a champion than the past, when you have all but assured that there will be 2 or 3 or 4 undefeated teams when the bowls are over?)

Playoffs at Nickerson Field

Tonight, the Boston University Terriers host the Big Green of Dartmouth College in the first round of the NCAA men's soccer championship tournament. It's not that I'm a big college soccer fan, it's that I'm astounded that an America East Conference team was good enough to get a national tournament home game in any sport. This is a rare day for AEC and BU fans... hopefully they'll take advantage of it and pull out a win.

In other New England collegiate sports news:
- #15 BU, first place in Hockey East, visits UMass-Lowell tonight, a school still searching for its first league win of the year. At the beginning of the season, if you had told me that their situations would be reversed at this point in the year, I wouldn't have been in the least surprised.
- Northeastern is the last undefeated team in Hockey East. Granted, they've played the fewest games so far, but it took them 9 games last year to get their first win, so it's pretty impressive for them. They visit #6 UNH tonight.

The Pride of Chestnut Hill

There's something magical about being in Cleveland when William Green (Boston College, Class of 2002) decides to throw a haymaker at the Pittsburgh Steelers' Joey Porter, nearly an hour before gametime, and completely misses. Every channel on the dial keeps showing clips again, and again, and again. I can't decide which shot is my favorite, the one where Green misses, or the one where a bloody Green is walking away from the field, because Porter certainly didn't miss. I hope Green was able to clean himself up in time to watch the kickoff from the locker room, because it would be a shame to think he missed a single second of his team losing without him. Of course, he's watched the Browns play without him before, since he, along with fellow Chestnut Hill College alumni Bill Romanowski and Mike Cloud, has had the honor of serving a four game suspension for violating the league's substance abuse policy in the past. Maybe it's something they pick up on the streets of Newton. In any case, Green certainly didn't learn how to fight in college, because Bill Romanowski has certainly never swung his fist at someone and missed. Sadly, Bill is prone to put up his dukes against teammates in the locker room, with career-ending force.

In other news, the Patriots finished dismantling the Bills 29-6 on Sunday Night Football mere moments ago. Poor Drew.

Veteran's Day

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/columns/story?columnist=frei_terry&id=1920697

This is in honor of Dave Mears, hero of Sugar Loaf Hill, lineman for Boston University. Great story by ESPN.

R.I.P. - Worcester IceCats 1994-2005

http://www.worcestericecats.com/news/html/story978.html

Lots of issues here. Most of them unrelated to each other, but related to the story:

#1) Bettman was an idiot for trying to make the AHL into IHL2... the original folded for a reason. Even baseball doesn't fly cross country for AAA level games. Was it necessary for Manchester to fly to Utah this month? Unbelieveable.

#2) This team will get to the midwest just in time for new rivals Cleveland and Milwaukee to fold. Awesome! I can't wait to see what Cincinnati does when Disney finishes purging their sports holdings. But you can play intrastate rival, Chicago, 20 times a season until fans stop showing up... but not before they stop going to see you visit Chicago... since you're freaking Peoria.

#3) It's really sad to see the team that paved the way for the Lock Monsters and Monarchs (certainly more than the other 3 older franchises in New England) move away.

#4) Is there a more troubled non-sunbelt team, other than Pittsburgh, than the the Saint Louis Blues? Aren't they busy enough there running their own franchise into the ground?

#5) Not to totally blame the Blues and the NHL for this, this move says alot about the City of Worcester. Worcester was once New England's #3 city (and #2 if you don't count Connecticut, an issue I waver back and forth on). Now what are they? 4th? 5th? They should be embarrassed by how far their city has fallen while Providence and Manchester have risen. Look in your rearview Worcester... that's Portland and Lowell... and that's sad.