JOHNSON READY TO LAUNCH MLS CAREER

VCU’s Jason Johnson has signed an MLS Generation Adidas contract and awaits Thursday’s league draft.

Editor’s note: Jason Johnson was selected 13th overall by the Houston Dynamo at the Jan. 17 MLS SuperDraft in Indianapolis.

It wasn’t until the eighth grade that VCU’s Jason Johnson first played in an organized soccer game, years after many of his peers. But his career got off to an auspicious start – Johnson scored a goal in that contest. He hasn’t slowed down since.

Earlier this month, Johnson inked his first professional contract with Major League Soccer as part of its Generation Adidas program. Generation Adidas seeks to identify and retain the best college soccer talent in the United States. Players are offered guaranteed multi-year contracts with the league and do not count against a team’s budget or roster limits. Players in the program also receive educational stipends to finish their degrees.

On Jan. 17, Johnson is expected to be one of the top selections in the MLS SuperDraft in Indianapolis. Johnson will be the first VCU Soccer player drafted since Dominic Oduro was a second round pick of FC Dallas in 2006. Some rate Johnson as the top forward in this year’s draft. He scored 13 goals this season and a total of 28 in three seasons with the Rams.

“He’s got a unique combination of size, power, strength, speed; his technique is good,” said VCU Soccer coach Dave Giffard. “He strikes the ball well with both feet. He can play in combination. He’s good in the air. I think those qualities together are, they’re not super, super unique, but you don’t see them everywhere. There certainly aren’t many guys in college that have all those qualities.”

ACCORDING TO PLAN: THE REBIRTH OF VCU SOCCER

Coach Dave Giffard, 31-17-11 in three years at VCU, directed the Rams back to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2004 this season.

RICHMOND, Va. – There were some people who scoffed at the notion presented by Athletic Director Ed McLaughlin this summer, that VCU can win a national championship. But Men’s Soccer Coach Dave Giffard has always operated with that understanding. He talks about winning a national title so naturally in conversation that it doesn’t seem like a matter of if VCU can win one, but rather when.

Giffard was an assistant coach for Akron in 2009 when it reached the College Cup Final against Virginia, and has matter-of-factly approached his job at VCU the last three years a continuous chase for a national title.

On Sunday, he’ll get his first legitimate crack at fulfilling that goal when VCU (12-3-5), the No. 14 overall seed, takes on Syracuse in the second round of the NCAA College Cup at Sports Backers Stadium at 7 p.m. The match will mark the Rams’ first NCAA Tournament appearance since 2004, when they reached the Elite Eight.

“When it was announced, it was a little bit emotional,” Giffard said. “This group of players has never been there. They’ve never been through that. Even for our staff, our group’s been through an awful lot.”

But the team that will meet Syracuse Friday is much different one than Giffard presided over when he arrived after the 2009 season. VCU, once a nationally recognized power, sank to 5-10-2 in 2009 and finished the year 161^st in RPI. From 2005-09, VCU advanced to the conference tournament semifinals just once.

MEN’S SOCCER ROLLS ON

This is a little late, but great job by VCU Men’s Soccer Friday. The Rams (10-2-4, 6-1-1 A-10) thumped 12th-ranked Xavier 4-1 and have now vaulted into first place in the Atlantic 10 Conference. VCU will try to lock up the No. 1 seed for the A-10 Tournament Friday at Richmond. It’s not that far, come out and cheer the Rams to a win.

.

I’ve got to imagine the Rams are ranked again when the NSCAA Coaches Poll comes out later Tuesday. In addition, VCU is making a serious run at an at-large bid to NCAA Tournament. The Rams were 28th in RPI before their win over Xavier, who was 25th, so they’ll get another nice bump.  Hard as it may be to believe, VCU has not appeared in the NCAA Tournament since 2004, when it staged a dramatic run to the quarterfinals.

Here’s a quick look at the top of the A-10 race. Note that the Rams own a head-to-head win over Charlotte earlier this season.

Conference				Overall
	W	L	T	Pts.	W	L	T	Pts.
Charlotte	6	1	1	19	12	2	3	39
VCU	6	1	1	19	10	2	4	34
Saint Louis	6	2	0	18	12	4	0	36
Temple	5	1	2	17	9	5	3	30

COULD DEFEAT OF CHARLOTTE BE TURNING POINT FOR VCU?

VCU’s 4-1 win over 2011 National Runner-Up Charlotte Friday is sure to turn a few heads.

RICHMOND, Va. – Shortly after his team celebrated on the pitch in one cheering, chanting, dancing huddled mass, flanked on one side by the VCU Pep Band, horns blaring, and a crowd of students on the other, VCU Soccer Coach Dave Giffard aimed to be a voice of reason.

“It’s a good win and a good result for us,” the Rams’ third-year coach said flatly. “I think what it means to the team is we won the first game in the conference.”

Given the decisiveness VCU’s 4-1 victory Friday night over 13^th-ranked Charlotte, the National Runner-Up in 2011, and the emotion that spilled onto the field following the match, could this triumph possibly be distilled into the “just another conference win” category? Charlotte (6-2-2, 0-1 A-10) had lost just once this season and returned the bulk of its College Cup squad from 2011.

Four different players scored goals for the Rams (5-1-3, 1-0 A-10), who attacked the lower third of the field efficiently and aggressively. In the process, VCU earned its first win over a ranked team since 2006 and dealt Charlotte its worst loss in three years.

RAM TOUGH: REFOCUSED VCU RETURNS TO WIN COLUMN

Dave Giffard's Rams improved to 6-4-0 overall and 1-1-0 in the CAA Saturday night.

There were a lot of happy faces at Sports Backers Stadium Saturday night following VCU’s got-to-have-it, 1-0 victory over a streaking George Mason squad, but possibly none brighter than that of Marisa Giffard, wife of Rams’ Coach Dave Giffard.

VCU’s recent four-game losing streak was starting to wear thin over at Casa de Giffard. Dave and Marisa began dating while he was an assistant at national powerhouse Akron, and he said during that time, the Zips might’ve lost two games total. This was entirely new territory.

“My wife’s pulling her hair out,” the VCU Coach joked. “She’s like, ‘This is terrible. We’ve got to win. I hate when we lose.’ Like anybody, I’m competitive and I get a little grouchy, my staff gets a little grouchy and you know, I’d prefer not to do that again.”

While a grouchy Giffard may have been no fun at home, it appears to be just what the Rams needed to pull out of a four-game tailspin. Giffard spent that stretch questioning his team’s overall toughness, so he dropped the hammer on his young squad in practice this week. Training sessions were long, grueling challenges of intestinal fortitude.

“We were pretty tough on the guys, and they needed it and they knew they needed it,” Giffard said. “As the week went on, we functioned more and more under extreme fatigue and realized that, you know, you’re not going to die.”

His strategy, a rarity for this point during the season, worked Saturday. VCU matched George Mason’s physicality and controlled the game’s action from the outset. Even when the Patriots ramped up the intensity in the second half, which included two yellow cards, the Rams stayed on course. VCU continually won 50/50 chances it has had trouble earning of late and showed a level of toughness not seen this season.