Sometimes you’ve just got to get away as the kids say, so in the time since I last talked Loudoun, the family and a took in a quick beach trip, and celebrated a family birthday. That led me to be partly, but not completely out of pocket for Loudoun’s game with San Antonio and their road one to Phoenix, but I was able to finally throw all the opened gift wrap away and vacuum out the sand to see Loudoun’s game with Tampa Bay Sunday, where Tampa’s Bill Hamid (IT FEELS WEIRD TO SAY THAT) played his first DMV game as an out-of-towner. I’ll try to keep thoughts on the Western Conference games brief, but here’s the highlights to all three games:

On taking your foot off the gas. Going back to the Phoenix game for a second, check out Loudoun’s second goal:

For my money this is (or was!) the best goal Loudoun have scored this season. Consider the game state when the goal was scored: a dialed in Loudoun side, jumping on a sleepy Phoenix one, Kwame Awuah running his tail off to get to a position to feed Ben Mines with an assist on the goal to close the first half with Loudoun going into the room with a 2-0 halftime lead. Should have been easy right?

On looking, and staying, dialed in. In the three games I’ve missed, Loudoun’s goal differential in the 90th minute and beyond is -3, which wouldn’t be so bad if you didn’t know they scored twice on Sunday! Admittedly two of the goals were in garbage time (when Loudoun had been down to 10 for the second half), but if you extend the window out to the last 15 minutes of a game (75th onward), Loudoun’s allowed six goals, scored two, and dropped 4 September points. The could be a point away from clinching a playoff spot right now if their recent form hadn’t led to crumbles but alas.

On good and bad on defense. Keegan Tingey was out to injury against Tampa so Ben Mines has filled in and played well; he had a Team of the Week performance against Phoenix the prior week with a goal and assist to go with 7 of 9 duels won, and was center stage of most any ground battle in the first half of the Tampa game as well, keeping his strong duel percentage up too with eight of 11 won. Garrison Tubbs was loaned back down to Loudoun from DC and has helped at center back next to Yanis Leerman, scoring the second goal and provided help with distribution in the Phoenix and Tampa games as well, and holding their own against the Manuel Arteagas of the world over that time.

However, with Tingey out, Bolu Akinyode going from starting against San Antonio, to a late second half sub to Phoenix, to not getting any time at all Sunday, I’ll presume this slide was a part of need and now some acclimation time, because Bolu’s nearly 300 USL games implies otherwise.

Nevertheless, if someone wants to photoshop Jacob Erlandson, Cole Turner and Tingey’s faces onto that last scene in Return of the Jedi, I wouldn’t say no.

The return of the Bouch? Abdellatif Aboukoura’s dealt with a couple of things over the last three months; injury, form and working with new players like Quimi Ordonez and Omari Glasgow. But past the boxcar stats of his stoppage time goal and assist in a half hour’s work as a second half sub, he had four created chances which led the team and playing a tiny bit deeper, was able to take defenders on a little more and exhibit the range and vision in his passes that hadn’t been that evident since his first third of the season. If he and Ordonez can play together Loudoun will be cooking with gas, but if Aboukoura builds on his effort Sunday Loudoun can be a dangerous side once again.

Random Stat of the Day: 12/13/12 (number of goals Abdellatif Aboukoura has scored this year, putting him into a tie for most goals by a U-21 player in the USL), with 13 being the single-season Loudoun record, and the second 12 would be the new single season record for wins by Loudoun, which they can do with their next win, nudge nudge!

Your Moment of Zen: IT DOESN’T FEEL RIGHT!!!!

So, where does this leave us? Loudoun saw a bit of a bipolar weekend in the table, starting in third before dropping to fifth, and ending Sunday night in fourth. That said, things are officially tight now for Loudoun:

Past this graphic which shows Loudoun holding onto the last home playoff spot with all ten fingers, the USL’s desire to be different has tiebreakers as follows:

• Head-to-Head points earned
• Head-toHead Goal Differential
• Points-per-game versus in Conference Opponents
• Total Wins

I won’t get into the others, but presently Loudoun have the tiebreaker over NCFC and Pittsburgh, but do NOT have it over Hartford. Loudoun can clinch a playoff spot with a win Saturday combined with an NCFC loss at Detroit.

Even with a win and help Loudoun’s game with Birmingham is one they sneakily kind of need if they want to clinch a home playoff game; Birmingham has allowed the third worst goals in the USL (tied with Loudoun!) while being in the bottom third of goals scored, and they travel after Wednesday’s game. Loudoun go on the road to Detroit and Indy (two teams fighting to stay above the red line) before hosting NCFC in a finale that could be more stressful than expected for said spot.

Loudoun stand at 94% to make the playoffs so while a collapse *could* happen, a win this weekend against a markedly inferior opponent, will almost certainly stem that.