Great Lakes Conference

AFC Ann Arbor

Ann Arbor are without a doubt a powerhouse club in the Midwest, one that nearly achieved an undefeated regular season withstanding their 2-0 loss to Grand Rapids in the 10th round of play. Their 9-2-1 record and goal count of 31 show they’re not to be messed with, but it’s probably the four goals allowed in 14 games that leaves most adversaries unsure of what they can do against the back-to-back conference champions. Ann Arbor do have one issue, one doubled in 2018. That problem is losing two regional finals in a row, one against conference rivals Detroit City and the other against Duluth FC. The 2018 final loss to Duluth, which occurred in a PK shootout that saw Duluth’s Alberto Ciroi save two penalties, provided a negative ending to an otherwise outstanding season for Ann Arbor.

AFC Ann Arbor now find themselves in a position somewhat rare in the NPSL, where it is becoming normal to win the conference. That means that the club has no shortage of silverware, but also that it has unsatisfied aims to achieve more, aims fueled even further by the club’s back to back regional final losses.

Ann Arbor received some post-season attention after defender Joseph Okumu, who played for the club, found himself signed by Real Monarchs of the USL Championship where he has since made three appearances. Okumu has also made international appearances with the Kenyan National Team and featured for Free State Stars in the South African first division before arriving in Michigan.

Ann Arbor should be favorites for a playoff spot this season, but unless they shockingly miss that mark, the real question will be if they can finally reach the next level and win the region, earning them an appearance in the national semi-finals. The loss of a key defender from a defense whose impenetrable nature helped get the club as far as they went will also leave questions in the air until we see the new squad get back to work on the pitch.

Grand Rapids FC

2018 saw Grand Rapids FC improve upon their third-place finish in 2017 and earn the second playoff spot from the Great Lakes Conference after reaching the regional final in 2016, which they lost to the now-defunct AFC Cleveland, who won the league that year.

Their playoff run ended early with a loss to Duluth FC in the first round but their comeback in said match from 2-0 to 2-2 (the match was decided by penalty shootout) did show why the club deserved its playoff spot and teased future success. Grand Rapids did, however, barely reach the playoffs. Having played their final match in the second-to-last week of the conference, Grand Rapids had to watch and see if FC Columbus could beat the Milwaukee Torrent and take their playoff spot. Columbus lost the match 1-0 and allowed Grand Rapids a short burst of postseason glory.

The club’s fifteen goal differential is the lowest of the second-place clubs in the Midwest, as is their count of 29 goals scored. The club was, of course, able to prosper despite this and would go on to win seven of its twelve games.

Grand Rapids will be one of the clubs to watch in 2019 but a huge factor in their next season will be how the clubs around them adjust to 2019. Will Ann Arbor continue to be a dominant club? How will the Founders Cup clubs, Detroit City and the Milwaukee Torrent, compete in the regular season? A strong NPSL season from either could quickly find Grand Rapids back in the middle of the table, far from where their supporters group, the Grand Army, would like them to be.

Another positive season, perhaps with more playoff action, could be what Grand Rapids needs to reintroduce itself in the conversation of great Midwest NPSL clubs, a conversation currently crowded by its rivals in Ann Arbor and Detroit.

FC Columbus

FC Columbus were one win away from earning a spot in the NPSL playoffs when they walked out on to the pitch in Milwaukee the last week of the 2018 regular season. The loss which followed would prevent them from their first ever playoff appearance, having only been officially founded in February of the same year. The young club ended the season with fewer goals conceded and better goal difference than Grand Rapids but was not able to convert this into a playoff appearance against Duluth FC.

With their very-recent founding in mind, FC Columbus have shown they have the potential to compete in an-already tough conference full of some of the NPSL’s most renowned clubs. The club’s biggest hiccup, excluding their loss to the Torrent, came in the form of a highly publicized confrontation with a small group of supporters over what the club considered appropriate for their stadium. We are not mentioning this incident in an effort to take a side but rather to show that the club was able to quite quickly get past it and ignore the social media rumblings that followed. The club’s ability to make things work on and off the pitch so quickly is a rare pairing at this level of the beautiful game.

As is very much the case for Grand Rapids, Columbus’ season will be greatly affected by forces around them. One of these forces is whether other big conference clubs like Detroit City will step up in 2019 and challenge for playoff spots again. Another question mark comes in the form of the ever-changing attitudes and stability of their near neighbor, the Columbus Crew. The state of the MLS club will of course affect how FCCLB does in regard to filling the stands. With that in mind, keep an eye on FC Columbus in 2019, we may very well see them in the playoffs this year.

Detroit City FC

Detroit City’s 2018 season was a hugely memorable one for both the club and the NPSL as a whole, but one whose best moments arguably took place outside of league play and often despite the negative results in said league play. Detroit played three hugely discussed international friendlies in 2018 against St. Pauli (2. Bundesliga), Necaxa (Liga MX), and Frosinone Calcio (promoted from Serie B to Serie A prior to friendly). Despite losing all three matches, the friendlies brought the club new waves of attention and helped earn further respect from soccer communities state-side and abroad. If the story ended there it’d be easy to say it was one of the best NPSL seasons a club could ever have, but it didn’t quite end.

Detroit finished second in 2017 and reached the national semi-finals, a strong season by any measure. 2018, however, brought a tougher time for the club. Detroit finished fourth in their conference with a 5-3-4 record and 18 points, eleven points away from Ann Arbor in first place. The season was a far from the picture painted by the clubs big named friendlies and overall reputation for huge crowds, which they continued to have despite the losses and draws, great atmosphere, and great play.

Detroit City will face two major needs for upgrading from 2018. One will be the fact that their previous season didn’t live up to expectations, a straight forward desire for redemption you’ll find in any major NPSL after a less-than-satisfactory year. The other reason is a little something we like to call the NPSL Founders Cup, a gateway to an eventual NPSL professional soccer league. Detroit City are set to participate in both, meaning the club with an already professional feeling network will now need to insure there are constant professional performances on the pitch. I see Detroit doing well in both competitions as their poor league performance is likely due to the density of games they had to play once the friendlies were added, not as a reflection of them being bad at playing soccer.

The incoming pressure of truly professional soccer and the continued support of the Northern Guard could be exactly what the club needs to push themselves to new heights.

Kalamazoo FC

Kalamazoo FC’s season started quite well, stringing together a win and two draws, one against Ann Arbor. However, the midseason brought stronger challenges and the club eventually found itself in its final position, fifth place. The club has finished in fifth or lower for all of its three NPSL seasons. That didn’t stop the club from ending 2018 with a string of good results, including an away draw and home victory over Detroit City, who finished three points ahead of Kalamazoo.

Kalamazoo don’t receive the same attention as many of their conference-mates, but that doesn’t mean they lack something to play for. The club has a social media following as strong as many major NPSL club can ask for and a sizable supporters group known as “The Fleet FC Kzoo” or just “The Fleet”.

The club itself is a major proponent of the fact that it does its own thing and holds its pride close regardless of the media focus on others in the conference. Their badge itself reads “My town. My team.” This also touches on the smaller footprint of Kalamazoo in comparison to the likes of Ann Arbor, Detroit, or even Lansing, who had a NPSL then PDL team until recently. That comparison may affect the opportunities available to each club but certainly hasn’t stopped the club from making its mark in the NPSL.

While a title race may seem slightly out of reach given past performances, it wouldn’t outrageous to see Kalamazoo take advantage of a big club having a slow season, as Detroit did in 2018, and leap into the upper half of the table. Again, this is a conference slowly filling with professional outfits and the nature of how those clubs treat the NPSL proper could hugely change the look of this conference, one of the few in the nation that holds two NPSL professional clubs.

FC Indiana

FC Indiana find themselves as one of the most struggling clubs in the NPSL when it comes to what happens on the pitch. The club finished seventh without a single point and only four goals to their name. That in itself may not seem so horrible when you consider the records of LC Aris or Greater Binghamton FC, but FC Indiana hold the unfortunate record of most goals conceded in the 2018 regular season, that number being 75. Losing 11-0 and 8-0 to Detroit despite the club’s struggles that summer. The club had one reasonably close fixture, a 2-3 loss to the Milwaukee Torrent.

Almost every conference in the NPSL has a club that struggles to get more than a few points, one of the more common patterns across all the regions of the league. FC Indiana, whose previous NPSL records are similar to 2018’s, find themselves deep in that struggle. It is worth mentioning that the club has a strong structure to build upon, having found success in both the WPSL with its women’s side and in the PASL with its indoor men’s soccer side. The club have won the WPSL twice and won the Women’s Cup twice.

To put it simply, the club needs to score more but perhaps more so needs to reinforce its defense. The work ahead is both intense and straight forward for the club if it hopes to earn more points and lower its goal differential this season. With the entire conference seeming to be on the move toward more professionalism and better play, Indiana certainly need to be mindful if they want to keep up.

Every year is another chance to change your path, we’ll have to wait and see if FC Indiana find themselves on that road in 2019.

Michigan Stars FC

Image from a Dec 9 friendly, courtesy of Michigan Stars FC.

The Michigan Stars are an interesting case for this preview. They did not play in 2018 after going into a year hiatus in order to rebuild. They did so after playing five consecutive seasons in the NPSL, during which they failed to qualify for playoffs or take part in the U.S. Open Cup. The club’s history actually dates back far before the NPSL, as they were founded in 1982 as the Windsor FC Spartans and then as FC Sparta Michigan. The club and the NPSL site itself all indicate that the club is set to maintain its place in the NPSL and return this year. Protagonist contacted the club and confirmed that they are taking part in the 2019 NPSL season. However, the club will be returning to a conference that has changed dramatically since their last involvement.

Detroit City was not hosting major European clubs in 2017, AFC Ann Arbor weren’t back to back regional final partakers in 2017, and FC Columbus didn’t even exist in 2017. If the signs are to be believed and the Michigan Stars, who posted tryout notices in November and stated “we will resume practice and training on January 7th, 2019 at Total Soccer, Washington” on December 28th, will need to step up their game to compete with the ever growing and ever improving conference around them.

The addition of Michigan Stars would also return the conference to eight members and prompt the return of a fourteen-game season for the Great Lakes conference, which instead played twelve in 2018.

With that in mind, the chaotic growth of the conference could provide the Stars with a unique chance to impress and rocket to the top half of the table. Only time will tell. In the end it’s hard to know where the Stars will land this season, which perhaps gives them a power and freedom no other Great Lakes club has.

Toledo Villa FC

With the Milwaukee Torrent taking the regular season off, space opened up in the Great Lakes for a new club to take on one of the NPSL’s top conferences. Toledo Villa are that club. Based out of Toledo, Ohio, the club will join the NPSL this year as an expansion club from the UPSL, where they had a hugely successful 2018. The club finished 2018 at the top of their conference with a 6-3-1 record, having conquered the likes of Oakland County and Carpathia FC along the way. They will be an unknown element in the NPSL in just about every way, but they bring an entertaining new face to a conference full of interesting clubs.

As with many of the other Great Lakes clubs that struggle to pass the middle of the table, Toledo’s fate will also rely on how the big names, your Detroit’s, Ann Arbor’s, and Grand Rapids’, perform this season. Big years for those three will mean less points to work with for the likes of Toledo. Struggles like those Detroit had last year would provide Toledo with a chance at creating a decent record.

The club has a massive leap ahead of them, going from a UPSL conference lacking the league’s top dogs to one of the NPSL’s toughest regions, full of top-level Michigan clubs. How Toledo Villa deal with that mountain climb will be a big telling of their character on and off the pitch but will also throw a wrench into what we know about the conference. Even if Toledo struggle to get past a few wins and draws, they’ll be changing the geography of the conference in a major way and leave all its clubs with a brand-new challenge.

Photos courtesy of club social media and Protagonist Soccer, unless otherwise mentioned. Custom art designed by Laura Mills. Previews written by Dominic Bisogno with input from David Baker, Joshua Duder and Dan Vaughn.

East Conference

Erie Commodores FC

Image courtesy of Erie Commodores FC.

With two regional titles and five conference titles to their name, the Erie Commodores are no stranger to success. Their near-perfect season, which ended in a 8-3-1 record, won them the Midwest East conference by three points and gave them another appearance in the Midwest playoffs. That playoff appearance would end in a loss to their conference rivals, Cleveland SC, but would not stop the club from adding to its near-decade long history of success in the NPSL.

Founded in 2009 and named in dedication to the War of 1812, the club holds as much personality as it does silverware. Their naval badge and catch phrase of “Don’t Give Up the Ship” have been just the beginning of a club that captures the eye.

The Commodores will go into 2019, which marks a decade of existence, expecting to challenge for title as they have virtually every year of their existence. This year, however, will be about playoff runs. The club was knocked out in the first round two years straight, preventing them from coming even close to adding to their already prominent regional title collection. As is the case at any level of the game, success breeds the need for more success. The Commodores will of course fight a tough battle for the top two playoff spots, but the club will likely have bigger goals in mind.

Erie’s goals for and goals allowed numbers are typical of an upper table club, but far from as dominant as the likes of AFC Ann Arbor, who only allowed four regular season goals. Erie scored 36 and conceded 13, ending with a goal differential of 23. Improving on those numbers won’t only allow the club to earn its third straight conference title, it could be the key to them getting further into the playoffs and rediscovering their former regional and national glory

Cleveland SC

One of Cleveland’s Guardians of Transportation that inspired Cleveland SC’s crest.

Cleveland SC were founded in 2018, but this didn’t stop them from having one of the most accomplished freshman years in the entire league. The club finished second in the Midwest East with a 7-3-2 record and 24 points to their name, only three beyond the conference champions. They even ended with the same goal difference as said champions, 23.

Cleveland’s great year became all the more interesting at the end when they played the Erie Commodores in the final regular season match, a match that would decide who would win the conference. Cleveland lost that match 2-1 and surely would have hoped for a different result, but the club also took the result as a chance to fuel a very unique rematch. You see, Cleveland SC would face Erie in the first round of the playoffs. Hosted by Erie, the match would show the world a vengeful Cleveland SC, who beat the hosts 4-0, forcing their rivals to bow out of the playoffs in the first round for a second year in a row. The club would lose the next round 1-0 to AFC Ann Arbor, the regional hosts, and end their season without a trophy but with most doubters silenced.

Cleveland SC in many ways serve as a lower league replacement for AFC Cleveland, a now defunct club that represented Cleveland in the NPSL for six years. AFC cemented their popularity when they won the NPSL equivalent to a tribble, winning their conference, region, and the national titles in 2016. The club dissolved one year later. Cleveland SC were able to win over the support of AFC’s former supporter group, the 6th Street Syndicate, and has awarded their loyalty to Cleveland and lower league soccer with a strong debut season.

Cleveland SC will surely be favorites for a top two finish, with their first shot at glory already a fantastic one that almost won them the conference. Cleveland SC are a club to watch out for.

Rochester Lancers

The Rochester Lancers, formerly River Dogz, were similar to Cleveland in 2018 in the sense that they only missed the playoffs by three points. The club has played in the NPSL three years and finished in fourth and third place all three times. Rochester does deviate a little from Cleveland in age. Formed in 2011, the club is the reincarnation of a club founded in 1967.

The club’s most notable statistical difference from the likes of Erie and Cleveland is goal difference. Both clubs had 23 GD, Rochester had a goal difference of 4. This is in part because they conceded far more goals, 18 to be exact, but it is made far worse by their lack of goal scoring, finishing 2018 with 22 regular season goals. That number is 12 and 14 goals below the top two teams in the conference. With that in mind, Rochester’s future success and playoff potential is actually quite tangible. Conceding 18 goals isn’t great, but it’s far from horrible. A change in fortune or talent in the attacking third could quickly change the fortune of the New York club and end in them finding themselves in the playoffs for the first time.

The Lancers also took part in the U.S. Open Cup, playing through the qualification process and making it to the first round of the competition proper. They lost that match, played against conference-mates Erie Commodores, in a PK shootout after drawing the match 1-1.

The Rochester Lancers will be a club to keep an eye on this season, though there is much work to do if the club really wants to get past its previous midtable success and will need to find the right tools in order to pass the 30-goal mark and challenge the likes of Cleveland and Erie.

FC Buffalo

With nine NPSL seasons under their belt and one playoff run to their name, FC Buffalo are a club with big potential but almost only fifth, fourth, and third place finishes to show for it. The club ended 2018 with a 6-2-4 record and a goal difference of six, outscoring but also out-conceding the club above them on the table, the Rochester Lancers.

As one of three New York-based clubs in the conference, the club has several rivalries with both its inter-state neighbors and out of state opponents. The club is also part of a now somewhat defunct rivalry with Detroit City and AFC Cleveland, known as the Rust Belt Derby. That rivalry functioned similar to Cascadia Cup, in which the club with the best head-to-head record would win the derby. Changes in conference alignment and the dissolving of AFC Cleveland have since made the derby largely inactive.

Image courtesy of The Buffalo News.

FC Buffalo only lost to two clubs in 2018 but lost twice to both. Those clubs are the Erie Commodores and Fort Pitt Regiment. Three of those loses finished with no more than two goals separating the sides, but their final lose to Erie was a somewhat devastating 4-0 home defeat in the second to last week of play. With that in mind, it’s clear that FC Buffalo have something very real to work with and wouldn’t even have to do hugely better than they did this season to climb the table. A change of fortune or a couple good squad choices could quickly earn Buffalo a third-place finish, which they missed by one point this year, and perhaps even get them in the running for a playoff or title race.

Time will show us whether that’s in the cards, but FC Buffalo have every reason to believe that can edge themselves closer to success this season.

Syracuse FC

One look at Syracuse’s table information and the average soccer fan will quickly see one of the main issues at hand for the New York club. With a record of 3-0-9, suffering four losses by one goal, and suffering another two by two goals, Syracuse have a problem when it comes to play for the draw.

The problem is different and yet similar to the club’s seventh place finish in 2017, in which they finished with a 2-3-7 record. The club scored twice as many goals as they did in 2017 (8 to 16) but did concede one more goal for a total of 24 conceded. There are clear signs of improvement in Syracuse, but playing for the point and grabbing draws, deserved or otherwise, would have allowed the club to lose its ten-point gap with the fifth place Fort Pitt Regiment.

Three wins and an ever-growing goal count are great signs for Syracuse FC and aspects that could very well spark a better 2019 if used correctly. Continued success in the attacking third will need to be paired with better defense if Syracuse hope to escape the bottom of the table. They’ll also need the clubs above them to not improve as much as they seem they can for this season.

The good news is that Syracuse FC is still a young project, one that has the benefit of expectations to give them time to grow. Will the third season be the one that breaks the mold? Maybe. Either way it’ll be an interesting project to track. The club’s energy will be kept alive by their involvement in a four-club rivalry amongst the New York clubs in the Midwest East and the continued passion of their fans and staff.

Photos courtesy of club social media and Protagonist Soccer, unless otherwise mentioned. Custom art designed by Laura Mills. Previews written by Dominic Bisogno with input from David Baker, Joshua Duder and Dan Vaughn.

North Conference

Minneapolis City SC

City had one of the best seasons one could have imagined in 2018. An undefeated regular season run left them divisional champions with a 10-4-0 record and a devastating 46 goals scored, compared to only 14 conceded. While their season was cut short by a playoff loss to Duluth FC in the regional semi-finals, the Crows have used the post-season to continue their growth off the pitch. The club opened up an impressive shop in Minneapolis, the first from the Midwest-North to do so, which has received positive traffic and even a few guest appearances. City would then announce the creation of a U19 side to complement their already existent U23 side and announced new coach staff along with the appointment of former head coach Adam Pribyl as Athletic Director. The club also announced it would return to its home stadium at Augsburg University after spending a season playing in Osseo, Minnesota. The club’s expansion of operations has left them one of the most active off-season clubs in the Midwest as they head toward a conference defending season in which they will, likely to an unfair level, be compared with their intensely impressive 2018 season.

Will Kidd was a key part of the Crows attack in 2018. Photo courtesy of MPLS City.

Minneapolis City finds itself in a position where it has a tangible rivalry with virtually every club that realistically fights for the top two playoff spots in the division, whether that be regional rivalries with VSLT and the Minnesota TwinStars or more far away matches like those with Duluth. This means, as it has in the past, that the club’s biggest games from a table perspective will also be its biggest games at an emotional and community level. This puts the Crows in a unique position, but one they managed to thrive on in 2018. Minneapolis City are without a doubt favorites for one of the division’s two playoff spots and will be without a doubt one of the clubs fighting the good fight to win the title. If they do so, they’d be the first club to win the NPSL Midwest North two years in a row.

All eyes will be on the club’s new head coach, Matt vanBenschoten, and how his latest addition of the Crows’ roster does in their most anticipated season yet.

Duluth FC

Duluth FC’s first season under new head coach Joel Person, who replaced the division winning Kyle Bakas, seemed to be going horribly wrong until quite suddenly it wasn’t. Duluth won two games in the first half of its 14-game season and did not win either of its home games in that period, both of which were against two of the best clubs in 2018 (City and VSLT). Everything changed in the second half of the season when Duluth won five games in a row, four of which with clean sheets, and suddenly found themselves in second place. A 4-2 loss to City would prevent the BlueGreens from an ultimate comeback season, but their 1-0 win over Med City the following weekend would be enough to lock in a playoff run for the north-shore club.

That playoff run would prove a magical one for Duluth FC, who would win three straight playoff games against Grand Rapids FC, Minneapolis City, and AFC Ann Arbor and therefore win the Midwest Regional title, becoming the first from the north to do so. The trophy would be Duluth FC’s second in two years in the NPSL and provide them the chance to face Miami FC 2 in the NPSL national semi-finals. Miami FC, a professional club in just about all respects, would win that game 3-0 and end the BlueGreens’ season, but not before they had the chance to make it a memorable one.

One of the oddities that emerged from Duluth in 2018 was that their lead goal scorer would be Ryan Tyrer, a center back. Tyrer scored four regular season goals and two playoff goals. Duluth would end the regular season with 16 different goal scorers.

Duluth’s positive playoffs and Open Cup participation, which saw them play Saint Louis FC of the USL Championship in a 2-0 defeat, will provide any onlooker with reason to list them amongst the favorites for a playoff spot and perhaps the title they failed to defend in 2018.

Minnesota TwinStars FC

Finishing fifth with 21 points, Minnesota TwinStars found themselves in an odd role in 2018 as the team that’s endlessly tough to play but that rarely got the points they needed. The club had the second highest goal count in the conference, 32, and the Golden Boot winner for the Midwest North, Chase Wright. Wright actually tied for second place in the NPSL’s Golden Boot race, losing out to Omar Nuno of Sonoma County Sol FC. Wright scored 14 goals in 13 games in 2018. The issues for the TwinStars arose in the defense, which leaked 25 goals this season, over twice the 12 goals conceded by Med City who sat a spot above them on the table.

Prematch shot before Twin Stars took on Med City. Photo courtesy of Twin Stars Twitter.

The TwinStars are the most historied club in the conference and sit at the top of a academic pyramid that most clubs would only dream of. This hasn’t allowed them to prosper in the NPSL North, with sixth and fifth place finishes in their two years of participation. This hasn’t stopped them from earning good results, including their draws against both Minneapolis City and Duluth FC along with their final week 2-1 victory over Viejos Son Los Trapos.

The TwinStars did receive some negative press this year after a series of strange events revolving around stadium availability left Minneapolis City unable to play them at the TwinStars home tie. While we are not here to provide further insight into the online discussions that followed, it is clear the incident left many unsure of what to think of the club off the pitch.

To say that the TwinStars are likely to finish in the top two would be a reach based on the evidence provided, but a continued presence in the middle of the table and a light chance of challenging for the upper table is not out of the question if the club can continue to find huge sparks of talent in the right moments as they have with Wright. Continuing that and solving a persistent card issue (the TwinStars earned the most red cards in the conference this year), should help the historied club continue to be a relevant name in the north.

Dakota Fusion FC

Looking at the 2018 table, one would probably not guess that the Dakota Fusion missed the 2017 conference title by one point. 2018 would bring a new version of the Fusion, one that simply didn’t seem to pick up any of the points they needed and eventually found themselves finishing sixth with only fifteen points to their name. Adding context to this drop-in position, the Fusion ended the season with the second lowest number of goals (22) and the second highest amount of goals conceded (48).

Their year began with an exciting U.S. Open Cup match against Duluth FC which ended 3-3, after which Duluth won in a PK shootout. That performance left many assuming the club would have a similar season, only for that to be the opposite of what actually occurred.

Players participate in the 2018 St. Patrick’s Day parade in Fargo. Image courtesy of Dakota Fusion.

The question of where the Dakota Fusion will find themselves in 2019 is a big one, one that’s truly difficult to answer. The fact is that this is a club with the organization and players to finish in the top four or three, the reality is that this is a club that barely managed to put together back-to-back wins. A striking reality is uncovered when you view the Fusion’s last three matches, games that were essentially only valuable emotionally as the table had long left their reach. They proceeded to lose 5-2 to Sioux Falls, the second-to-worst club point-wise in 2018, 11-0 to Med City, and 8-0 to Minneapolis City. Only one of the clubs they played in that period had any table-based goal to play for.

The Dakota Fusion have the talent to be a danger and should not be taken lightly, but the fact is deep change will be necessary for the club to compete beyond a certain point and return to its 2017 antics of top-of-the-table results and playoff runs.

Med City FC

Med City came into last season after a 2017 that mirrored VSLT’s 2018 in many respects. The Rochester-based club found themselves top of the table and likely conference champions well into the season before suddenly losing hold and falling to fourth place. Their potential “revenge” season started off rocky, with them reaching the mid-season point with a 3-2-2 record. The second half of the season would conclude the same way and Med City would end 2018 with a 6-4-4 record, fourth place, and a total of 22 points. Despite the ups and downs of their season, Med City actually came close to earning a playoff spot as their final match against Duluth FC, won by Duluth, would have seen them tie Duluth on points and win the tie-breaker based on their record versus Duluth if they’d won. It was not in the cards for the otherwise high scoring club, who would be shut out 1-0 that night.

One of Med City’s best players is Claudio Repetto. Earning a strong range of goals and assists in his two NPSL seasons, the Italian is widely considered one of the top players in the conference despite his club’s lack of playoff appearances.

Despite the cycling of talent and the immersion of a UPSL club in their already limited market in Rochester, Med City can never be ignored as a deadly opponent and bookkeepers should be mindful of the club’s ever-present goal of finally grabbing the conference title, one that they may just achieve in 2019 if they can put together the right squad. You’d struggle to find any aware fan of an NPSL North club that didn’t see a match, home or away, against Med City as a major challenge for their club. There’s no sign that that will be changing soon.

Sioux Falls Thunder FC

When you watch the Sioux Falls Thunder play, especially in possession, you think you must be watching a midtable club with faint playoff hopes. When you check their full season of results online, you assume you must’ve looked up the wrong club. The Thunder, who ended the year seventh with 13 points, lost nine games in 2018. Four of those games were lost by one goal. Combine that with the fact that the Thunder had a better goal rate, goals conceded, and goal difference than the Fusion, who finished one spot above them, and it all starts to become quite clear that this may be a club that is better than their table position.

With that in mind, Sioux Falls didn’t have what it needed to reach the upper half and for that work is needed. That doesn’t mean they weren’t tough to play. The club opened the season, looking to be a good side, with a 2-2 draw against the eventual champions, Minneapolis City, and followed that match with a strong 6-1 win over La Crosse Aris. The magic didn’t last though, and the club would go on to lose nine straight games, a run that consists of all their losses in 2018. The squad rediscovered their form toward the end and managed to string together three good wins against the Fusion, VSLT, and La Crosse Aris. That return to form wouldn’t be enough to lift them above seventh place, where they finished the previous season, but it did remind people that the bright moments the Thunder had in their losses could bread a better result with time.

Changes and better fortune could easily lead the Thunder to a midtable finish, though more than that will require a special level of progress for the club which manages to play well but rarely earn anything for it. It would be genuinely surprising if the Thunder finish seventh again. If they do, it will certainly be with more than thirteen points under their belt.

LC Aris FC

La Crosse Aris have a history of not getting points, it’s a fact the club has never tried to shy away from. They finished last in 2017 with one point after drawing Sioux Falls. They would finish 2018 in the same place with the same single point, but this time with a new energy surrounding the club that leaves many feeling 2019 could be a very different year for La Crosse. A big part of this comes from where they got that one point, that being in their home game against Minneapolis City, the conference champions. The 0-0 draw, one earned through a dense and well-managed defensive performance, provided a major question mark in City’s title race and provided room for the likes of Duluth and VSLT to attempt a last-minute grab for the conference. This did not play out in their favor, but the fact is that a 0-0 draw in La Crosse had ever voice in the NPSL North talking for over a week. It was the game everyone wanted to better understand.

La Crosse’s second half of the season was actually full of performances that raised eyebrows as to whether the club may actually be drastically improving. They held Duluth FC goalless for a full half in Duluth before leaking four in the second half. The club nearly earned draws in its 1-2 losses to Sioux Falls and Med City and had the Dakota Fusion locked in a goalless draw until a burst of three goals final thirty minutes of play

It is safe to say La Crosse Aris are far from playoff contention as things stand, but as with Sioux Falls, it is safe to say there’s far more there than 2018’s table reflects. Depending on how the other lower half clubs adjust for 2019, we could very well see Aris grab a couple draws and perhaps even a win or two. The most exciting factor in all this for those not directly supporting the club is that they’ve shown those future results could be title-deciding ones

Photos courtesy of club social media and Protagonist Soccer. Custom art designed by Laura Mills. Previews written by Dominic Bisogno with input from David Baker, Joshua Duder and Dan Vaughn.