Since last Saturday’s agonizing home loss to Rochester, a lot of people have noted that the team’s 0-4-3 record is the same as last year’s team, after seven games. The positive implication being that the team can still right the ship and find themselves in a playoff position at season’s end. Certainly, the playoffs are still on the table, but how similar are the 2013 and 2014 seasons, after their respective seventh games? We go to the math lab!
Because it’s still, relatively, young in the season, we decided to look at both the Hounds’ production and the production of the teams the Hounds have faced, thus far.
First, the basic stats on the Hounds, from last year to this, over the first seven games. Nothing makes you appreciate seven goals in seven games quite like three goals in seven games.
Basically, the team has scored, and been scored upon, more, from last year. Nothing that should be too surprising to anyone.
What is kinda surprising, however, is how similar the the quality of opponent (based on measurable stats) are between the seasons. Keep in mind the teams we’ve faced in the first seven games, the last two seasons;
2013: Richmond, Harrisburg, Dayton, Charlotte, Charleston, Phoenix, LA Blues
2014: Orlando (twice), Richmond (twice), Wilmington, Charleston, Rochester
Since game eight is when the 2013 Riverhounds turned their season around, it becomes important to look at the next four games, which is where the forecast looks a little more grim. At this point of the season, last year, the Hounds were preparing to get MUCH softer competition, especially with an Antigua game thrown in there. The production of the next four opponents, this season, is a drop off from the first seven games, but nothing like what Justin Evans Niko Katic and his squad had to get healthy off of in 2013.
The next four opponents in each year;
2013: Phoenix, Dayton, Antigua, Rochester
2014: Wilmington, Charleston, Harrisburg, Rochester
Clearly, if the Hounds want to have a repeat of 2013 and start their upswing starting with the eight league game, it’s going to be a toughed road to hoe. There isn’t an Antigua squad to kick around anymore. The next four games will tell a bigger story about this squad than the first seven. Throw is a juicy subplot of a player-coach penning his first professional lineup, and the intrigue level goes through the roof. Let’s all just hope it’s a story we would all like to read.
#UNLEASH
