Little Flower girls' soccer coach upbeat

Markos Pittaoulis has never been accused of sugarcoating anything.

The Little Flower girls' soccer coach doesn't make many excuses when his team is struggling. Nor does Pittaoulis downplay his team's accomplishments.

With that in mind, he was asked this question yesterday: How good is this season's squad?

"I've got a good team," he said. "So far, we look very good."

The Sentinels, ranked 10th in Southeastern Pennsylvania by The Inquirer, are 3-1 overall and 3-0 in the new Philadelphia Catholic League Red Division. Little Flower has only surrendered one goal against a division foe.

One of the Sentinels' most impressive victories was Friday's 3-0 drubbing of defending PCL champion Archbishop Ryan.

"I got eight starters back from last season," Pittaoulis said of the team that finished 17-4-3 despite dealing with injuries to nine players.

Now healthy, Little Flower expects to contend for the division title.

PIAA rule change. In what is serving as an experiment, the PIAA is modifying the National Federation of State High School Association Rule 12-8-1 this season.

For those that don't have a rule book near by, the rule governs the enforcement of misconduct penalties on the soccer field.

Under the modification, any player receiving a yellow card this season must sit out for five minutes. The athlete can be replaced by a substitute. In past seasons, players that received yellow cards were allowed to return during the next stoppage in play.

The PIAA may change the rule permanently as a way to reduce the number of player ejections during a season. There were around 2,550 red cards - or ejections - during the last six seasons. The organization wants to see if the five-minute penalty will lower the high ejection rate.

A new look. Just as in boys' soccer, the Catholic League has realigned into the Red and Blue divisions. But unlike boys' soccer, team aren't grouped based solely by classification.

And that makes sense, considering 13 of the league's 15 teams are Class AAA squads.

With that, all eight teams that made the playoffs last season are in the Red. The remaining teams, and league newcomer Lansdale Catholic, make up the Blue.

The teams making up the Red are Archbishop Wood, Archbishop Carroll, Archbishop Ryan, Cardinal O'Hara, Little Flower, St. Hubert, Archbishop Prendergast and Conwell-Egan.

Bishop McDevitt, Cardinal Dougherty, Hallahan, Neumann-Goretti, West Catholic and Kennedy-Kenrick join Lansdale Catholic in the Blue.

Unlike other sports in involving District 12 teams, girls' soccer will not havea city championship game. That's because the Public League plays girls' soccer in the spring.

Game of the week. Strath Haven entertains Downingtown West in Friday's 3:45 p.m. nonleague match in Wallingford.

The third-ranked Whippets are 4-0 and have outscored their opponents by a combined 15-2 score. The fourth-ranked Panthers were 3-0-1 heading into yesterday's contest at Harriton. Strath Haven went into that game trying to post its fourth consecutive shutout.

The Whippets won 3 of 5 series meetings with the Panthers.

National recognition: Downingtown East and Conestoga are both ranked in the National Soccer Coaches Association of American/Adidas national poll that was released yesterday.

The Cougars are ranked eighth nationally, while the Pioneers are tied for 14th with St. Anthony (N.Y.) and Eastlake (Wash.).

Despite being ranked lower than Downingtown West in the national poll, defending Class AAA state champion Conestoga is the area's top team, according to The Inquirer. The Cougars are second.

The teams will get a chance to prove which has the area's best team in an eagerly awaited nonleague game Sept. 29.