Air Force Hosts Houston Baptist in Regular Season Finale

GAME 09: AIR FORCE (3-4-1, 3-4-1 WAC) vs. HOUSTON BAPTIST (0-8-2, 0-8-1 WAC)
The Falcons close the regular season campaign at the Academy as the Falcons host Houston Baptist for Senior Day, Friday, April 9, at 6 p.m. MT.

THE SERIES
The match marks the 17th meeting between the teams. Last season, Air Force and HBU met for the first-ever in conference playoff action, where Air Force won, 3-2, at USAFA. The Falcons lead the 16-match series, 10-4-2. Air Force has won the last five meetings, holding the Huskies scoreless in three-of-five of those matches. The Falcons are 5-2-1 against HBU when playing at USAFA.

TICKET PUNCHED
Air Force's win over California Baptist, earlier this week, secured the sixth seed in the 2021 Western Athletic Conference tournament. The conference tournament selection marks the fifth-straight season of Air Force competing in the WAC tournament.

For the remainder of the seeding process, the following formula is used to determine seeding:
Adjusted Winning Percentage (Wins + (ties/3)/Games Played) multiplied by Games Played Percentage (Games Played/Games Scheduled). For soccer, this follows total points directly.

Here is what we know thus far:
-UNLV will be the fourth seed as both UTRGV and SJSU hold tiebreakers over them.
-Seattle U will be the fifth seed and will play UNLV on Tuesday at 11 a.m. PT.
-Air Force will be the sixth seed and will play the third seed at 2:30 p.m. PT on Tuesday.

The UTRGV-UIW match on Friday afternoon has a potential to finish the bracket; here are those scenarios and what they mean:

-If UTRGV wins, then SJSU is the third seed and we have to wait to see what happens with the GCU-UNLV match on Saturday to determine one and two. If UTRGV and GCU both win, GCU is number one seed. If UTRGV wins and GCU ties or loses, UTRGV is the number one seed.
-If UTRGV ties, GCU is the top seed (by virtue of tiebreaker over SJSU), UTRGV is second seed and SJSU is third seed.
-If UTRGV loses, GCU is the top seed, SJSU is the second seed (tiebreaker against CBU), and UTRGV is the third seed.

SENIOR SO LONGS
Air Force will be saying its goodbyes to four seniors for Senior Night, prior to Friday's match. Ryan Clary, Reece Cooke, Garrett Miyaoka and Max Sole will be playing the final match as Falcons at Cadet Soccer Stadium. The Class of 2021 has helped Air Force to two WAC regular season titles, visited four-straight WAC tournaments, two NCAA tournament appearances, including a visit to the Sweet 16, and helped the Falcons to a program-record 17 win season in 2018.

SCORE FIRST
Air Force is 3-0 when scoring first; each Falcon win this season started with Air Force scoring first.

NEXT UP
Air Force will play the three-seed, yet to be determined, in the second match of the first round of the WAC Tournament, hosted at Peter Johann Memorial Field, on the campus of UNLV. Match two is slated for a 2:30 p.m. PT kick-off on Tuesday, April 13.

LAST TIME THEY MET
A goal in the 88th minute lifted Air Force to a dramatic 3-2 victory over Houston Baptist in the first round of the WAC Tournament, Wednesday evening (Nov. 13, 2019) at Cadet Soccer Stadium. Elijah Bussey connected with Giuliano Daniel who scored the game-winner in thrilling tournament opener.

Air Force Hosts Houston Baptist in Regular Season Finale

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Players Mentioned

Elijah Bussey

Ryan Clary

Reece Cooke

Giuliano Daniel

Garrett Miyaoka

Max Sole

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