Tidbits from around the country, teed up just for you every Thursday.

For virtually every conference with a postseason tournament, only two weekends remain in the regular season. For the always-packed BIG EAST, this weekend's the final one before tourney play begins on Wednesday. Keep an eye on action this weekend, especially in the Red Division, where nobody's secured a postseason berth yet, with five teams within seven points of each other.

Akron's Teal Bunbury scored two more goals on Wednesday night, as the top-ranked Zips rolled over Penn State, 3-0. The sophomore has now scored a goal in nine of his last 11 games and has put up four multi-goal games this year. Akron is very, very good. And in the second installment of the Akron Watch, the Zips' defense has allowed just three goals in 1,440:00 of play for a team goals-against-average of 0.19, which out-paces Evansville's NCAA single-season record of 0.24, set in 1990. Also, because we missed it earlier in the week, Darlington Nagbe was named MAC Player of the Week after notching a seven-point day against Michigan last week.

In another Story We Wish We Wrote, Santa Barbara News-Press senior writer Mark Patton takes a look at two stories of perseverance on the fourth-ranked Gauchos, where Waid Ibrahim is playing with a pacemaker that revived his soccer career and David Walker just got the rods removed from his broken wrist. Neither of the forwards, Patton writes, has missed a game this year.

Photo Courtesy of Ohio State

In another Photo Gallery Of Current Varsity Soccer Players In Their Childhood Halloween Costumes And Telling Traumatizing Childhood Stories, Ohio State ran a feature this week called 'Trick-or-Treating with Ohio State Men's Soccer.' The first story? From senior defender Doug Verhoff: "My dad use to always take the chain off his chain saw and then run the chain saw across his chest.  Everyone would always freak out. He's a wild one so I'm sure this does not surprise many people."

UMBC once again features the No. 1 and 2 scorers in the country, after Levi Houapeu was named America East Player of the Week following his second hat trick of the year. The goals came as the Retrievers clinched a spot in the America East Tournament with a win over Albany on Saturday. Houapeu sits just below teammate Andrew Bulls and his 2.67 goals per game with a ledger of 2.60 a contest. UMBC, who's gone through a few rough patches this year after starting the season undefeated at 9-0-0 (the Retrievers are only 3-4-0 since then, with all but one of those games conference clashes) can finish no lower than fifth in the conference.

Michigan State, which had taken a mid-season tumble, downed Notre Dame on Wednesday for the Spartans' fourth straight win. The Spartans' notched their 10th win of the year, given them 10 wins for the ninth time this decade, while Cyrus Sadee scored the game-winner for the second straight MSU game.

Louisville tied the school record for wins on Wednesday, downing Cincinnati to improve to 12-2-2. The Big East Red Division leaders wrap up the regular season at Villanova on Saturday, Oct. 31 at 1:00 p.m.