Soccer Notes.
Eddie Johnson’s two-goal game against Antigua & Barbuda was his first multi-goal game for the U.S. MNT since he had three on Oct. 13, 2004 against Panama in another WC qualifier in Washingotn, D.C. His appearnce against A&B was his first for the U.S. since 2010, and his two goals tied him with Brian McBride for second on the all-time U.S. World Cup Qualifying goals list……U.S. captain Carlos Bocanegra’s appearance in the CONCACAF qualifier against Guatemala in Kansas City earned his 109th cap, leaving him one behind sixth-place Paul Caligiuri’s 110 on the USA’s all-time list…..Notre Dame men’s soccer coach Bobby Clark picked up his 300th career coaching victory with a 6-1 win over Seton Hall. Clark, in his 12th season with the Irish, has a 147-67-34 record at Notre Dame….The defection of Cuban athletes continues. It was reported that three members of Cuba’s men’s national soccer team left the team in Toronto, before a CONCACAF World Cup qualifying match with Canada, and that they tried to cross into the United States at the Niagara Falls border point Cuba only had 11 players available for the game and lost 3-0. The latest defections come nine months after two players with the Cuba women’s soccer team fled to the U.S. following a match against Canada in Vancouver …..American goalkeeper Brad Friedel’s unprecedented run of 310 consecutive Premier League starts came to an end Oct. 7 after Tottenham Hotspur manager Andre Villas-Boas sat him and inserted French national keeper Hugo Lloris into a 2-0 victory over Aston Villa….Things had been going pretty well for United States striker Jozy Altidore, leading AZ Alkmaar of the Netherlands with eight goals in the young 2012-13 season. The past few days weren’t too pleasant, however, with him earning a red card with AZ and not being called in for the U.S.’s two critical upcoming World Cup qualifiers…..Fans of ACC men’s soccer will remember Dane Richards, the Jamaica native who played two seasons at Clemson before beginning a professional career in Major League Soccer. Richards scored a pair of late goals to give Jamaica a 4-1 victory over Antigua & Barbuda in the Reggae Boyzz’s last CONCACAF semifinal game, which advanced his team to the Hexagonal home-and-home series finish for a berth in the 2014 FIFA World Cup……Akron University has announced that associate head coach and recruiting coordinator Jared Embick, will become the Zips’ new head coach at the end of the season. Embick was the 2010 National Assistant Coach of the Year. He will replace Caleb Porter, who will become the head coach of Major League Soccer’s Portland Timbers on December 15…..Former Wake Forest University defender Ike Opara has returned to San Jose Earthquakes training after being sidelined with concussion syndrome for a month. Wearing a protective head gear, Opara will not be rushed back into games as the Major League Soccer season winds down. Injured in a game against Portland, Opara tried to return to action in a week, but symptons of the injury quickly returned. The Earthquakes are headed to postseason play as the regular season champion….In England a player was assaulted by a fan in a 1-1 draw between Sheffield Wednesday and Leeds. After Sheffield Wednesday goalkeeper Chris Kirkland allowed a goal in the 77th minute of play to tie the game, a man ran onto the field from the Leeds’ section and struck the former England goalkeeper in the face, sending him to the ground….U.S. MNT defender Oguchi Onyewu has yet to play this season for Champions League team Malaga CF in Spain. Talk about being a little fish in a big pond — Malaga CF’s nichname is the Anchovies!……Carlos Bocanegra returned from the USA’s semifinal World Cup qualifier in Kansas City to help Spain’s Racing Santander keep a 0-0 shutout with Lugo. Bocanegra played all 90 minutes, anchoring the home team’s defense…..San Jose’s Chris Wondolowski hit the post twice before hitting the net in 2-2 tie with the Los Angeles that gives this season’s leading scorer 26 goals — just one shy of the MLS regular season record set by Roy Lassiter in MLS’s inaugural 1996 MLS season.