Casa returns to Pennypack Park with a full slate of May Day games, but before that, let’s get in the better-late-than-never recap of last week’s slate.

Primera

AC Milan remained the only undefeated team in Primera after a 2-2 tie with Cannons. The point wasn’t enough to pull Cannons out of the relegation zone; Penn United remained a point above them after coming back to tie Philly Soccer Firm 2-2. Goals from Freddy Ali and Darin Carminati weren’t enough to earn Firm their first win since week one. West Philly continued to climb the table after a 3-0 win over Drinker’s Pub. Jireh Chao, Jeremy Lane and Yusef Morant scored for West Philly and Morant won a deserved Man of the Match award. Grey Lodge sustained their first loss of the season, falling 1-0 to Real Optimus. Rob Tuttle’s goal puts Optimus in first place and they haven’t lost since giving up a goal directly off a corner kick in the first week of the year. Philly United evened up their record at 2-2-2 with a 3-1 win over Cracovia. It was Cracovia’s second loss and sets up a battle for 3rd place with West Philly this weekend at 9am.

Segunda

Skulls put five past Sporting Philly and continued to do their AC Milan impression: Remaining undefeated while sitting in the middle of the table. The rest of the Segunda games established some division between the top and bottom half of the table and gave some hints as to who we’ll see battling it out for regular season champ and who will be fighting for survival down the stretch. NewPhillyUnited and Stoney United kept up their battle at the top. Stoney seems to get better every week and a 5-0 win over Organized Chaos gives them a +16 goal differential on the year. Their 23 goals scored is a whopping 13 more than NewPhilly, yet NPU refuses to relinquish the top spot. They put three past Memphis Taproom for a 3-1 win. Memphis sits at the bottom of the Segunda table, but deserves more props than they get. Aside from a 3-0 loss to United Nations in week three, Memphis hadn’t lost by more than one goal this season. The problem? They’ve only scored more than one once.  In third and fourth place, Nittany United and Steagles did nothing to suggest they won’t make strong runs come playoff time. Steagles shut out Philadelphia Athletic 3-0 while Nittany did one better, posting a 4-0 win over United Nations FC.

Tercera

Shutouts dominated the Tercera lineup on Saturday with four of the five games featuring a goose egg on one side. Quaker City defies the trend set by Milan and Skulls by keeping a perfect record and sitting atop the table. They have given up one goal all year. Tom Nevinger – consider yourself special. You’re the only man, woman, child, or genetically engineered superhero to score on QC this season. Quaker City’s win pushed Park Towne further down the table. They won’t get relegated, but they’ll have to regroup and make a big run through the playoffs if they want to roll Segunda-style in the fall. Maybe Nevinger didn’t play, or maybe FC Spartans defense is just that good because they found a way to shut out Tremendous Tom and the Makefield men 2-0. Goals from Kevin Bloc and Marquis Ryan-Walker pushed Spartans up the table. Lot Lizards got a much-needed win over Sons of Ben Independence behind a Jeremy Samet game-winner. Lizards, Makefield, and Loose Cannons are tied for the second relegation spot above SOB-I. Loose Cannons fell 3-2 to Tri-County but get a shot at Makefield this Saturday. Lizards will have to take points off Spartans if they want to climb (leap? skitter? what do lizards do?) to safety. Mt. Laurel held onto second place with three second half goals on Revolution 76.

Abierto

An interesting scheduling note in Abierto: Apparently AOH 61 has been the home team for all but one of their games this season. That one away game? A 1-0 shutout loss to Sons of Ben Zolo. Coincindence? Yeah, probably. In their home games, AOH has scored fewer than 4 goals just once, and that trend continued Saturday with a 7-2 win over FC Kilbanes. Four goals from Matt Sosalski and two from Mike Donahue gave AOH a cushion they couldn’t lose, even after Kilbanes tried to come back with second half strikes from Bill Essuunni and Dan MacDonald. Elsewhere in Abierto, Pennypack Park Rangers made the AOH offensive output seem downright pedestrian with an 8-3 win over The Incredibles. Abinathab Bennet and Lukasz Zuzanski (Z-3PO?) were hat trick heros for PPR. Not to be outdone, Spruce Goose and SOB-Zolo put six each past Sidewinders FC and SOB-Union. Sabatino Mangini had the lone goal for Union while Claude Reifsnyder led the charge for Zolo with a brace. Sweet Lucy’s blanked Revolving United 3-0 to remain tied for second with AOH and Spruce Goose. While Lucy’s doesn’t have the firepower of the other two, they keep finding ways to win. Mysterious Number Six scored the first goal and was Man of the Watch for Lucy.

Previewing this week’s games

Only three weeks left before the playoffs, and some huge games in store for May 8th. Pennypack Park Rangers scored 8 last weekend but face the best defense in Casa as they take on AOH 61. AOH looks to win their first away game of the year. Spruce Goose will look to knock SOB-Zolo from their Abierto perch while Revs 76 will try for the same against Quaker City in Tercera. Streaking Stoney will try to hand Skulls their first loss in Segunda while Memphis Taproom takes their strong D to Nittany’s home turf. In Primera, Cracovia and West Philly do battle while Firm tries to get its first win since week one. Penn United can give themselves some breathing room above the relegation zone by taking down top dogs Real Optimus.

Full stats and scores at Phillysoccer.org