Roots fans we get at least one more game day and today is that at least one more! Roots travel to Colorado Springs to face two-seed Switchbacks at 5:30 p.m. on Saturday, November 2. Roots had a bumpy trip into the playoffs, with only one win in essentially as long as anyone can remember, including a thumping at home the last week of the season. Conversely, Switchbacks were pretty good all season and improved towards the end. Cool!
The official watch party is at Oakland Athletic Club, and I expected to be there but all of us got sick at the same time. Struggled to find the right song for the moment, and realized there’s really only one.
Around the League
The match-ups are set, and some or all of these will be wrapped by the time the Roots kick off.
Western Conference
#4. Las Vegas Lights vs. #5 Sacramento Republic – Following 120 scoreless minutes, Lights prevailed on penalty kicks (a shocking five penalties in a row saved to start the shootout) and will face the winner of New Mexico-Phoenix.
#3 Memphis 901 vs. #6 Orange County – County haven’t lost since August 31, although they played relatively few big clubs in that run. They also beat Memphis home and away during the regular season. Memphis are also in pretty good form, with losses to only Switchbacks and Lou City since August 10.
#1 New Mexico United vs. #8 Phoenix Rising – Sorta fun that we get a rivalry match in the first round of the playoffs. New Mexico have been very consistent all season, but somehow won the Western Conference with only a +2 goal differential. They are much better at home then away, but oddly, both teams won the away fixtures during the regular season.
Eastern Conference
#2 Charleston Battery vs. #7 Pittsburgh Riverhounds – a black-and-yellow rivalry match. Battery are led by USL single-season record goalscorer Nick Markanich, so is seeing how far he can take Battery before the season ends and he moves to La Liga Segunda Division side CD Castellon. Pittsburgh were 3-6-9 on July 13 when they hammered Roots 5-0. Since then they are 8-6-1, including a four-game win streak to end the season including a 2-0 win over Charleston. Spicy.
#3 Detroit City vs. #6 Tampa Bay Rowdies – Detroit fought for their playoff home game, going 8-7-1 since July 31. They don’t have a win over a playoff team since back-to-back home wins over New Mexico and Louisville in mid-September. Detroit beat Tampa Bay once and drew them once in the regular season. Rowdies are having their worst season in a while, losing eight of their last twelve matches to stumble into the playoffs. Rowdies’ offense is led by Manuel Arteaga and Cal Jennings, both of whom Roots fans will remember unfondly from the Western Conference.
#1 Louisville City vs. #8 North Carolina F.C. – Louisville have a higher goal differential than Roots have total goals scored. They have some oddball losses, including one in Hayward, but have mostly bossed the league all season, and will expect to do so against North Carolina, who they beat twice. The last match-up between the two was 6-4 and we deserve a similar result this time.
#4 Indy Eleven vs. #5 Rhode Island F.C. – Is anyone even still reading these at this point? Idk, ask John Morrissey.
Roots Form
Its a new season, baby, let’s go! One game at a time! Anything can happen!1
Switchbacks’ Form
Its a new season, baby, let’s go! One game at a time! Anything can happen!2
Lineup and Score Predictions
Bloom
I think Aaron has the lineup correct below. Baca has to start. Johnny is our talisman and Sinisterra has looked like our most creative player in the last month. Riley and Gomez are our other best two midfielders without question, even if they largely do the same job. I have felt for several weeks that Rasmussen and Diaz have been the most consistent performers on the Roots and really have to start. Gagi has had some bad games, but is our best centerback on his day. That leaves the other CB position and LW. I like Reid over Njie, but they both make some really frustrating decisions at times. Hackshaw has looked really slow recently, but I think he adds more in possession and more on set pieces than Logue, and that is probably worth the risk that he gets caught out. Hopefully he has internalized the lessons from the Birmingham game.
I think the Roots can do to Switchbacks what they did to Lights. Force Lights to come at you and take advantage of having a lot of guys in the squad who can put in a great tackle and trigger a counterattack. My prediction on the podcast of 0-0 and a penalty shootout win for the good guys looks sillier after the first match of the playoffs already went the distance 0-0. I guess I have to stand by it, though, and I certainly don’t want to tell anyone my backup prediction.
Anyway:
Jon
Listen, I said I didn’t think Hackshaw would start on the recent podcast based on Gavin’s last interview, but call him starting at CB another hunch. This would be the same lineup as what featured in Las Vegas, so refilling the same squad makes sense. I’m curious about the left wing spot where I have Njie. Trayvone Reid continues to show he can put himself in good position and I think he provides more going forward than Njie, but Baboucarr gives a bit more defensive stability and a tick better passing.
1-0 Roots.
Aaron
For once, this is a mostly serious lineup prediction. It reflects roughly how I think this coaching staff views the team, and what lineup it believes gives it the best chance of success. There’s an obvious issue, of course, in that there are basically no creative players, and definitely no creative midfielders. The creativity here is going to come from Sinisterra, Diaz, and Rasmussen. Maybe that’s enough. Certainly there’s enough defensive firepower to hold the middle of the pitch. One would think the entire point of signing Dom Dwyer is to fill the creative void, but it does not seem like the coaching staff really sees that as plausible. Anyway, no chance the Roots run away and hide here, but a gritty performance could be on the cards. If Oakland can gum up the midfield, they need just one moment of magic. 1-0 Roots.
- The Roots showed signs of life against Las Vegas, but utterly crapped the bed against Birmingham to close the book on their Pioneer Stadium era. It was a bad performance across the board, but exacerbated by Glinton’s decision to sorta rest players, with Justin Rasmussen, Paul Blanchette, and Rafa Baca all getting a breather, and Memo Diaz suspended on yellow card accumulation. So a lot of likely starters ate a bunch of minutes and the game spiraled out of control after the Roots failed to put away some chances (including a heartbreaking miss by Reid on a clean breakaway). The spiral really happened when Syrel got caught in no-man’s land and lobbed from extreme distance for the 2-0 Birmingham lead, and unfortunately the academy graduate lost his cool and conceded some pretty egregious ones after that. ↩︎
- It’s pretty good. They’re 6-2-2 in their last ten, and while the losses and draws are not to the best teams, in that run they have some really quality wins. They spread the goals around and don’t concede a ton. ↩︎