Quail City Soccer Western Conference Power Rankings: Week 9
Welcome to Week 9 of Quail City Soccer’s Western Conference Power Rankings! Admittedly, it’s been a bit since our last power rankings—chock it up to a combination of multiple USL Cup weeks, a bye week, and this little thing called “life” that (unfortunately) gets in the way of doing nothing but following the USL. That being said, things in the Western Conference are as chaotic as ever—made no easier to predict by multiple teams playing fewer games than the 2 teams leading the pack. Take Colorado for example, who at first glance appear to be out of playoff position… but have only played 8 games. Should they win their next 2 league matches, they’d find themselves tied for 2nd. In fact, the only thing we know for certain is that Lexington, Las Vegas, and Monterey are in the basement.
So we’re left with some stats, recent performances, and yes, the eye test. Keep in mind that we’re only looking at the league here—the USL Cup isn’t a factor. Given that, where does each team land this week? Let’s take a look!
1: Sacramento Republic FC (3-4-1) ➡️-
Last Week: Bye
Sacramento come off a come-from-behind win over 2nd place Orange County and then a bye week—and they have only 1 loss in their last 5 league matches. Republic may be 5th in the standings but, with only 8 games played, are the team best positioned to take control of the West. Should they take 6 points in their next two matches, they’ll be 2 points clear of the top of the table. Standing in their way are games on the road in San Antonio and Phoenix—both are good teams this season, but Republic has already beaten Phoenix, and San Antonio hasn’t played to expectations.
2: Oakland Roots SC (4-4-1) ⬆️3
Last Week: 2-1 win vs El Paso
A 2-1 win over a good (but sliding) El Paso team gave Oakland their 2nd win in a row. This Oakland team is interesting—outside of the aforementioned El Paso, no other team is so singularly offensively minded. A win in Orange County this weekend would put them in a tie at the top of the table—the only question will be if their defense can show up to match their offensive talent.
3: Phoenix Rising FC (3-4-2) ➡️-
Last Week: 1-1 draw vs San Antonio
Phoenix have won 3 of their last 4 league matches, including big wins over Pittsburgh and New Mexico. After a slow start, this looks like a team that is starting to heat up almost as quickly as the Phoenix weather—will they be the first team to beat Tampa Bay? I’m not sure they’re quite at that level yet, but it’s going to be fun to watch them try.
4: FC Tulsa (3-3-2) ➡️-
Last Week: 2-1 win at Monterey
A 4-1 win over El Paso 2 weeks ago turned a lot of heads around the league, and then they followed through by matching expectations with a win over Monterey. Tulsa is another team that had a slow start—after being USL-C runners up last season, they sold their best striker to an MLS side before winning just 1 of their first 5 matches. Back-to-back wins gives them confidence to work with before hosting Hartford over the weekend.
5: New Mexico United (3-1-4) ⬆️3
Last Week: 1-0 loss vs Tampa Bay
New Mexico is a team of fine margins. The result of 8 of their 12 games this season (all competitions) has been decided by just a single goal—and they’ve only drawn one game total. More often than not they’ve been on the winning side of those 1 goal games, but the goal difference is still negative. What’s worse, they’re the only team with that distinction outside of the bottom 3 in the West. A good showing against a historic Tampa Bay team is promising, and they have 2 games in hand, but the goals need to start coming from somewhere.
6: San Antonio FC (4-5-1) ➡️-
Last Week: 1-1 draw at Phoenix
The draw champions of USL are still holding on to first, but that’s more a virtue of them having played 2 more games than most of the rest of the field. San Antonio started hot, but has struggled to see out games, picking up draws against teams like Colorado, Miami, and even Monterey. They feel like a team that plays to the level of their opposition—they can beat El Paso one week, and then struggle to score against Monterey in another. A game against Sacramento looms next, where San Antonio will hope to right the ship before a 3-match road trip.
7: Orange County SC (4-4-2) ⬇️5
Last Week: 2-2 draw at Colorado Springs
Despite holding on to 2nd, Orange County hasn’t won a league game in over a month. To be fair to them, they’ve had byes and cup matches in the time, but even so, they’re winless in 3. Much like San Antonio, their 2nd place holding is partly them playing 10 games already—and they’ll need to get back to winning ways quickly before they slide too far down the table. A bye week in 2 weeks could come at an opportune time for them to reset.
8: Colorado Springs Switchbacks (2-4-2) ⬆️1
Last Week: 2-2 draw vs Orange County
Despite being this far down in the rankings, Colorado hasn’t actually been playing that poorly. They have the current Golden Boot leader (Bennett) and have scored 9 goals in their last 3 matches. The issue is that defense, which keeps leading them into drawing games instead of winning them. This next match against a Vegas team that is also terrible defensively should make for a fun watch.
9: El Paso Locomotive (4-2-3) ⬇️2
Last Week: 2-1 loss at Oakland
“Even though football is life, football is also death. And sometimes football is football too.” Look, if you’re going to sign a Ted Lasso star, I’m going to use Ted Lasso quotes. And frankly, the football has been death for El Paso, who are now winless in 4 with only 1 point to show from it. But sometimes football IS football, and they’ll need it to be better football after their upcoming bye to turn things around.
10: Las Vegas Lights (2-2-5) ➡️-
Last Week: 3-1 loss at New Mexico
Well, on the bright side… Vegas hasn’t failed to score in a league game since October of last year. Every other side of things has been negative for the Lights, from allowing 12 goals in their last 5 matches to losing to not one but 2 USL-1 sides. And things don’t look great off the pitch either—an average attendance of under 3k and the potential for Vancouver to be relocated to Vegas leaves the Light’s future very much in doubt.
11: Lexington SC (2-3-4) ⬆️1
Last Week: Bye
This is more than a slow start—this is a full on crisis. Despite having 1 of the most lauded offseasons in USL history, Lexington just cannot get it together. Their 2 wins on the season are against Monterey and Brooklyn, 2 of only 3 teams in the league in a worse situation. There’s little upside here—either the team starts clicking soon, or that lauded offseason may be one of historic failure.
12: Monterey Bay FC (0-2-7) ⬇️1
Last Week: 3-1 loss at Lexington
There is a secret weekly battle between Monterey Bay and Sporting Jax to see which club can be the historic worst team in USL history. Neither team has won a game—and neither team has seemed particularly close. There is a very real possibility that neither team wins a game this season. USL’s promotion/relegation system can’t come soon enough.
The Western Conference is starting to solidify a bit—we’re starting to see less drastic movements and more regular placements week to week. Still, there is a lot of available movement in the table—accounting for games played, nearly every team outside the bottom 3 are just 6 or 7 points off the top. And my apologies to the teachers and/or parents who cringe every time they read those numbers together.
This coming week has 2 really fun match ups to look out for; Phoenix flies out to Tampa to see if they can be the first to hand Tampa Bay a defeat, and Sacramento heads to San Antonio in a heavy weight showdown that could define the top of the table.
