INDIANAPOLIS – The finish line is in sight for the regular season as Great Midwest Athletic Conference Men’s Soccer Players of the Week honors were announced on Monday afternoon by the league.
Six teams will make the postseason in the newly-formatted conference championship bracket.
Cedarville and Tiffin are at the top of the Great Midwest standings and have earned the right to a first-round bye in the conference tournament. No. 6 Ohio Valley is also in the bracket, but the Fighting Scots were handed back-to-back losses for the first time in a very long time over the past week.
That leaves three playoff spots left for grabs and the middle of the standings is certainly muddled.
Most teams have one game left on the docket for the chance to get 3 more conference points in the standings and a handful of scenarios are still in play for hosting or qualifying.
If the season ended today, the final three teams in would be Trevecca, Alderson Broaddus and Ohio Dominican (ODU holds head-to-head tiebreaker over Malone). Trevecca faces Kentucky Wesleyan, Alderson Broaddus has no more regular season games and Ohio Dominican travels to first-place Cedarville.
Cedarville and Tiffin both could potentially host the conference tournament going down the list of tiebreakers listed in the sport operating codes.
Offensive Player of the Week
Gino Finelli
Malone
Midfielder
Junior
Aurora, OH (CVCA)
Credit first-year head coach Eric Reed for a very quick turnaround to a program that struggled to 1-10-1 in 2016 and was 1-13-0 in 2017.
With 19 points in the standings, the Pioneers were very much a playoff contender this year and if the postseason field were eight teams instead of six, Malone would have been looking at its first conference tournament appearance.
Finelli represents Malone’s first men’s soccer student-athlete for conference offensive accolades in almost three seasons after he scored three goals and accumulated six points in two games.
He scored both game-winning goals versus Lake Erie and Walsh in 2-1 overtime finals as Malone improved to 6-7-1 in league play.
Finelli scored twice - the game-tying goal against Lake Erie and the golden goal in overtime in the 93rd minute – to help key the Pioneers to victory.
His next game produced the same overtime heroics, the golden goal this time scored past regulation at the 91:16 mark. He now has five goals on the season to lead the team.
Defensive Player of the Week
Joel Daly
Tiffin
Defender
Freshman
Brighton, U.K. (Dorothy Stringer HS)
Daly kept the Dragons red hot going into a cold time of the year as Tiffin beat Davis & Elkins and No. 6 Ohio Valley at home.
The Dragons defense limited Davis & Elkins to just 10 shots in a defensive struggle against the Senators while both teams were pretty evenly matched across the board in the box score.
Daly did come through with the game-winning goal when he put away a cross on a header towards the end of the first half as Tiffin would eventually win 3-1.
Tiffin then handed OVU an uncharacteristic second defeat of the week in a 1-0 shutout with Daly once again playing a key role as a reserve in helping the Dragons pitch a shutout.
The two teams combined for just 19 shots and the keepers made a combined six saves while Malik Suleman’s goal in the second half was the decisive blow.