Since Brandon Rosage is now doing a sports podcast locally, made me think about how I’ve been meaning to write more about local sports.
There is at least an exhibition competition between Evergreen State and Saint Martins, but there is no similar series between the local Olympia-area soccer teams. So, for the time being, I’m going to start keeping a ranking of the local college soccer teams.
The basic ranking will the point-per-game for league games between the men and women teams of both Evergreen and Saint Martins and the mens team at South Puget Sound (no womens teams). I know this is a bit late, since the college soccer schedule ended months ago, but I’m going to keep closer track next year, on a week to week basis.
Here’s this year winner of the cup to be named later, the Saint Martins women, who earned just better than a tie per league game, with the Evergreen Men coming in second.
Games Pts PPG
SMW 14 21 1.5
EM 14 14 1
SMM 10 6 0.6
EW 9 0 0
SPSCC 13 0 0
So, what should we name it?
And, if you were wondering, this is my first post about what I want to call “real sport,” which in this case isn’t the MLS Sounders, but local college soccer teams that we all should pay closer attention to. And, maybe this ranking is a way of putting a better focus on the local college scene.
Just realized I tried something like this on Olyblog a few years ago and I called the cup the “Tolmie Cup,” after a Brit who hung around here a hundred years or so ago. Maybe that’s still a good idea, but I’m willing to take suggestions.
Admittedly, I'm not a fan of local college sports. Not in the sense that I actively dislike them or am convinced they're not for me. But in the sense that they don't provide a compelling storyline for me.
Your effort is certainly to combat this, but a big part of that lack of storyline is due to the lack of coverage and accessibility. It's not on TV for when I want to spontaneously check in from the couch. And it's not in my "news feed" because there's no compelling content published about it.
So, for me, the term "real sports" doesn't fit. But I'd like for it to.
That being said, I think we've had an ass full of rivalries being marked with names historic to the region. If it's a new rivalry, I'd suggest naming it after something relevant to today's storylines.
As I said, I'm not familiar with the storylines. But if we were naming a "cup" today after the Yankees-Red Sox rivalry, you might avoid calling it "The Babe Ruth Cup" and try "The Johnny Damon Cup."