BYU 2 games and 2 wins

Just a short report for now, I'll post more on Monday when I have some time.

The Cougars got a big win (1-5) over the Cascade Surge last night. I was out camping with my scouts, so I didn't get to see it. It sounds like there were some injuries coming out of that game though.

Tonight, BYU took 3 more points in a 1-2 win over Spokane. Zach DeFrancis scored twice tonight, and was easily the man of the match. With three goals over two games, I wouldn't be surprised to see him show up in the PDL team of the week.

Coach Watkins didn't sound like a coach with a +5 goal differential and an undefeated team. In his post-game comments. He talked about the teams need to get better at finishing, saying that the cougars need to work on their finishing and that they should have scored 5 goals tonight. He also talked about a need to improve defensively.

I can't wait to see how BYU does if they're going to improve on this start.

MLS Scariness: 2008 Week 5

Okay, time for another look at MLS scariness. I’ve settled into the formula I hope to use for the rest of the season (I’m not going to go back and recalculate scariness for the previous weeks, but I am scaling the scores down to match the current range). The formula is as follows:

pts (game) + gd (game) + opp ppg (last 5 games) + 1 (away team)

I figure a weighted average over the last five weeks (or as many
weeks as the teams have played) to come up with the current
scariness.

Enough about math though, here’s the current table:

Team	Scariness	Ranking	Change
NY	4.9	1 (3)	+2
CLB	4.14	2 (2)	–
DAL	3.76	3 (4)	+1
KC	3.75	4 (1)	-3
TOR	3.72	5 (8)	+3
NE	3.49	6 (7)	+1
CHI	3.29	7 (5)	-2
DC	2.94	8 (12)	+4
LA	2.93	9 (14)	+5
COL	2.22	10 (6)	-4
HOU	1.98	11 (9)	-2
SAN	1.75	12 (11)	-1
SLC	0.93	13 (13)	–
CHV	0.9	14 (10)	-4

LA and DC moved way up the charts based on lopsided wins. Toronto also moved up, but I think that’s based more on a three game winning streak (man, BMO is looking like a fortress and a great place to catch a game¹.)

Chivas and Colorado were the big sinkers. Chivas isn’t playing very well in general and got clubbed by LA, while the Rapids are settling into what I think i a more realistic ranking after some surprising early wins.

My only other thought is that being an RSL fan kinda stinks … oh well, I guess I can always get my kicks watching the ‘Fire Kreis’ folks get wound up.

¹ I’ve gotta say, I really envy a young friend who just got called on an LDS mission to Toronto—he was on BYU’s reserve list last year and is going to love being in a soccer hungry area.