Preseason Conference Polls

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. - The first official ranking has been released for the 2012 Men's Soccer season and the Panthers have been picked sixth by league coaches. Davenport, who finished in a three-way tie for second in the fall of 2011, are under the guidance of first year head coach Chris Hughes and will open their regular season on Friday, August 24 at Faulkner University in Alabama.

The Davenport University Men's Soccer program has been one of the top ones in the conference since its inception in the fall of 2005, but a down year in 2011 has the Panthers looking up in the first poll released on Monday by the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA).

League coaches in the Wolverine Hoosier Athletic Conference (WHAC) have voted Davenport sixth in the preseason poll.  Defending tournament champion Madonna has been picked as the favorite followed by defending runner-up Aquinas.  Last year's regular season champion, Cornerstone University, is third followed by Siena Heights and Indiana Tech.

Newcomers to the league, Lawrence Tech and Marygrove were picked seventh and eighth while two other first year programs UM-Dearborn and Northwestern Ohio were 10th and 11th with Concordia sandwiched in between at ninth.

Davenport opens their regular season with a two game trip to Montgomery, Ala next weekend where they will take on Faulkner University on Friday afternoon and follow it against Auburn Montgomery on Saturday. Auburn Montgomery, traditionally a Top-25 program, was picked second in the Southern States Athletic Conference.


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