The women's and men's soccer teams were picked to finish first and second this year, respectively, in the MVC preseason poll.

Women's soccer starts tomorrow with UMass-Lowell coming into Loyola Soccer Park, and on Sunday they face #14 Notre Dame in South Bend.

The men's soccer team has had two 1-0 losses in exhibition, with another exhibition game in Ann Arbor on Saturday. They open the regular season next Friday at #14 Western Michigan in Kalamazoo.

Women's volleyball was picked to finish 8th out of 10 under new head coach Amanda Berkley, even though six starters return from last year. I hope we can get women's volleyball going-- we've only made the conference tournament (top six teams) twice in the five years we've been in the conference, and both times we did it just barely, as the last team in.

Women's soccer wins their home opener, 4-2 over UMass-Lowell (the UMass-Lowell men's soccer team is often ranked in the Top 25). From the highlights video, it looks like the Ramblers had some great shots. Big test comes Sunday at Notre Dame.

Forgot to mention in the last post that the women's cross country team got a 2nd place ranking in the preseason poll, and the men's cross country team was voted 4th.

Women's soccer lost at Notre Dame, but they played well. Just had a bad 5 minute stretch that cost them the game. We went up 1-0 72 minutes in, but then gave up 2 goals 3 and 6 minutes later, resulting in a 2-1 loss. I think that 1st place pick wasn't a fluke. It's a good team with a legitimate shot at the Valley title and an NCAA tournament bid!

Hopefully the men play just as well or better on Friday.