July 31, 2007

SAN DIEGO - Jeremy Jessup, a redshirt junior goalkeeper for the George Mason men's soccer team, led the Queen City Football Club of Buffalo into the championship match of the National Premier Soccer League (NPSL) this past weekend in San Diego, Calif., making a crucial save of the final penalty kick to end the team's semifinal match with the Sonoma County Sol on Friday.

With the score tied at four, the match went into penalty kicks to decide who would advance to the NPSL Championship match. Leading 4-3 on penalty kicks, Queen City only had to make one final stop for the win. Jessup came up big, ranging to his right to block midfielder Majell Aterado's shot to send the Blues to the final match. The Blues played the next night in the NPSL finals, falling just short of the championship, losing to the San Diego Fusion 1-0.

Despite the loss in the finals, Queen City had a monumental 2007 season, becoming the first soccer team from the Buffalo/Niagara region to win a conference championship in a national league at any level when they won the Northeast Conference Championship, defeating the Atlantic City Diablos in the conference championship match to capture the title. The Blues wrapped up the regular season as the No. 1 seed, entering the playoffs with a 7-2-1 record. Jessup finished the regular season with 1.5 shutouts and one goal against and was part of the league's top defense, which allowed only three goals during the regular season.

The NPSL is comprised of 22 teams in four different conferences - the Northeast Conference, the Midwest Conference, the Northwest Conference and the Southwest Conference. The league is the successor of the Men's Premier Soccer League (MPSL). The MPSL was a regional men's soccer league that was made up from teams in the western states of California, Arizona, Nevada, Utah and Idaho, that formed in 2002 and was designed to provide men with a highly competitive league. The league was recreated into an expanded national league to accommodate teams from all over the nation beginning with the 2005 season. This highly competitive league helps all the teams gain access to elite players to fill their team roster, including but not limited to National Team, former and current University and College, foreign, amateur, former professional and youth players.

The NPSL is sanctioned by the United States Adult Soccer Association (USASA) as an affiliate of the United States Soccer Federation (USSF), the ruling body for soccer in the United States and FIFA, the world's ruling body for soccer.