Rutgers Olympic Sports: Soccer rules!

What are you doing on Black Friday?

On the Virginia website: @RUWSoccer at No. 1-ranked Virginia in the Elite Eight set for 2 p.m. on Friday in Charlottesville, Va.

— Tom Luicci (@TomLuicci) November 23, 2015

Yeah, Rutgers is a soccer school.  The women are in the Elite Eight of the NCAA Tournament for the first time in program history.  The details of the women's dominating performance over the AAC Champion UConn Huskies can be found here.  The Rutgers-Virgina winner will face the winner of the West Virginia-Penn State game in the Final Four of the Women's College Cup on Dec. 4.

Oh, and so we don't forget the details....

#RFutbol moves up to No. 6 in the TopDrawerSoccer Top 25, the highest ranking in program history.

— RutgersWomensSoccer (@RUWSoccer) November 23, 2015

Wrestling

Too much good to talk about in this multi-sport summary.  Full coverage of the weekend on the west coast, plus ranking news, tomorrow.  Very. Good. Stuff.  Spoiler alert: the team is 7-1.

Men's Soccer

Men's soccer was appearing in its 17th NCAA tourney.  After a thrilling penalty kick win over LIU-Brooklyn last Friday, the run in the tournament came to a sudden halt as RU ran into a buzzsaw against No. 5 Akron on Sunday.  The blitz was sudden and in a flurry as the Zips scored five goals in the first 18 minutes on their way to a 6-1 win.

"It was unfortunate we ended the season that way, but I'm still very proud of this team. Our (NCAA First Round) match on Thursday took a little bit out of our guys and it was evident because we've never played this way all year long," said head coach Dan Donigan. "It was unfortunate for that to be our last performance of the season because these guys deserve a lot better. I'm still incredibly proud of the overall season, the success these guys have achieved and what they've done for Rutgers University. Overall we've had a great season. There were only 32 teams playing today and we were one of them."

Rutgers finished the season at 12-7-3 in a season that the Big Ten coaches' poll had the squad in 8th (of nine) place in the conference.

Swimming & Diving

The Frank Elm Invitational was hosted at the Aquatics Center in the Sonny Werblin Recreation Center.  The Knights finished second to Navy in the ten-team field.  RU produced seven NCAA ‘B' qualifying standard times, six meet records and a school record in the 1-meter dive during the three-day event.

"I'm extremely excited about where we are right now at this point in the season," said head coach Petra Martin "For us, things came together both in the pool and off the boards. You could really see the results of all of the different training techniques we have implemented with the team. It's great to see things coming together and people buying in."

In the 200 back event, freshman Vera Koprivova finished first with a NCAA ‘B' qualifying standard time of 1:55.97.  Senior Joanna Wu also produced a ‘B' qualifying standard time in the event with a mark of 1:58.93.

Senior Rachel Stoddard collected her second ‘B' cut in as many days in the 200 breast with a time of 2:12.70, good for first place. Stoddard also had a NCAA qualifying time in the 100 breast during weekend action.

Senior Morgan Pfaff registered a first-place time in the 200 fly with a time of 2:00.12.  Junior Meghan Kiely produced a season best in the 100 free with a total time of 51.78, while junior Chantal Asselin secured a season-best time of 16:57.20 in the 1650 free.

In relay action, Wu, Kiely, Koprivova and freshman Cynthia Wu secured a time of 3:25.68, the fastest a Scarlet Knight quartet has finished in the race during the Frank Elm invite.

Off the boards, RU competed in the platform diving event, as sophomore Addison Walkowiak led all divers with a score of 260.25. Junior Alyssa Black finished second with a score of 213.95, while freshman teammate Rachel Byrne added a third-place total of 209.35.

Men's Cross Country

The Rutgers men's cross country team produced a second-place finish Saturday at the IC4A Championships at Van Cortlandt Park in the Bronx. The team time of 2:12.16 marked the best result for the Scarlet Knights at the event in more than 15 years.  This was the last meet of the season.

"Our guys competed very well today," said head coach Mike Mulqueen "To place second, and to have all eight runners run their personal best on that course is a great accomplishment. It was great for our two seniors to finish this way. I was very proud of the whole team."

Volleyball

It has been another tough season for volleyball.  The Big Ten, as we have said often, is the premier volleyball conference in the nation.  We haven't run a lot of stories on the team because there was not a lot of good to report.  And that it unfair to the players.  For that, I'll apologize.

Currently the squad is 4-26 (1-17 B1G).  Its lone Big Ten win is against Maryland.  It has concluded its home schedule.

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