The NCAA News - News and Features

November 10, 1997

Division III Men's Soccer

Crusaders look to forget past playoff defeats, advance to No. 1 spot

Event: 1997 Division III Men's Soccer Championship.

Overview: Wheaton (Illinois) has spent most of the past two years ranked atop the coaches' poll, but it spent most of last year's playoffs at home. The Crusaders look to rectify that this year. After losing a penalty-kick tiebreaker to Chicago in last year's first round, the Crusaders have returned to their winning ways, capturing 15 matches thus far with one tie. Sophomore forwards Rob Mouw and Eric Brown have combined for 27 goals and eight assists, and goalkeeper Steve Morad is the best of four Wheaton stoppers with a 0.56 goals-against average. Coach Joe Bean, who guided Wheaton to a crown in 1984, is now 452-144-42 in 36 years as a college coach and recently became only the second skipper to win at least 400 games at one school .... Kenyon lost last year's title game with six seconds left in the fourth overtime period, but that hasn't kept the Lords from piling up a 13-2 slate this season. Junior forward Kelsey Olds has scored 14 goals in 15 games and freshman midfielder Tim Davey has added six goals, including game-winners against North Coast Athletic Conference foes Ohio Wesleyan and Denison. The Lords, ranked second nationally, are 7-0 in NCAC play with one game left .... Rochester hasn't advanced to the tournament since 1993 but appears ready to emerge this season behind Jim Rietz and Bojan Zoric, who have combined for 13 goals and 10 assists and have three game-winning goals apiece. The Yellow Jackets completed an unbeaten and untied University Athletic Association campaign, the first team to do so in the league's 11-year history. Senior goalkeeper Brett Polow needs one more shutout to tie school season and career records .... Other contenders include Kean, Macalester, Messiah, Wheaton (Massachusetts), Greensboro, Rowan and Trinity (Texas).

Field: Forty teams from eight regions.

Dates and sites: All games will be played at on-campus sites. First- and second-round games will be played November 14-15 or November 15-16. Third-round games will be completed by November 23. The semifinals and final will be November 28-29 or November 29-30.

Results: The fax-on-demand telephone number is 770/399-3060 (passcode 1915); request numbers are 1768 for bracket/schedule, 5147 for semifinal results and 5148 for championship game results. Results also will be available on the World Wide Web at www.ncaa.org. Championship results will appear in the December 8 issue of The NCAA News.