{"id":9395,"date":"2017-05-11T07:15:21","date_gmt":"2017-05-11T11:15:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/?p=9395"},"modified":"2017-05-11T07:15:21","modified_gmt":"2017-05-11T11:15:21","slug":"jmu-alum-cj-sapong-is-the-top-scorer-in-mls","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/?p=9395","title":{"rendered":"JMU Alum CJ Sapong Is the Top Scorer in MLS"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img data-attachment-id=\"9396\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/?attachment_id=9396\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/jmusportsblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/uspresswire-union-cj-sapong.jpg?fit=656%2C369&amp;ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"656,369\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"sapong\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/jmusportsblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/uspresswire-union-cj-sapong.jpg?fit=300%2C169&amp;ssl=1\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/jmusportsblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/uspresswire-union-cj-sapong.jpg?fit=656%2C369&amp;ssl=1\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-9396\" src=\"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/jmusportsblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/uspresswire-union-cj-sapong.jpg?resize=591%2C332\" alt=\"sapong\" width=\"591\" height=\"332\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/jmusportsblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/uspresswire-union-cj-sapong.jpg?w=656&amp;ssl=1 656w, https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/jmusportsblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/uspresswire-union-cj-sapong.jpg?resize=300%2C169&amp;ssl=1 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 591px) 100vw, 591px\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" \/>After the Capitals and Wizards losses last night, we&#8217;re a little bit down on sports this morning. But thankfully, there&#8217;s a JMU related story to lift our spirits. Former JMU soccer player CJ Sapong is off to the best start of his career with 7 goals through 9 games. That&#8217;s good enough to have him tied for the league lead with Erick Torres, and one more than two guys you might have heard of in David Villa and Jozy Altidore.<\/p>\n<p>Sapong&#8217;s great start is all the more remarkable considering he wasn&#8217;t even starting earlier in the season. He took advantage of his opportunities and played his way into the starting 11 though. Now he&#8217;s just two goals shy of his career high for the regular season. In his mind, there&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mlssoccer.com\/post\/2017\/05\/08\/union-marvel-cj-sapong-vaults-backup-mls-golden-boot-leader?utm_source=Twitter&amp;utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_content=News&amp;utm_campaign=Unpaid\">no way he can&#8217;t score in double digits<\/a>. That would be quite an accomplishment for a player who&#8217;s had his share of ups and downs. He&#8217;s experienced the highs of winning Rookie of the Year and an MLS Cup in Kansas City, to the lows of being loaned out to a USL club. Along the way <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sbnation.com\/soccer\/2011\/9\/15\/2428100\/video-cj-sapong-serenades-hope-solo\">he also did this<\/a>, which was much cooler before Solo became Solo. \u00a0We&#8217;re glad to see CJ is doing all of JMU proud. We&#8217;ll be pulling for him (but not Philadephia, we have some standards) all season long.<\/p>\n<iframe src=\"http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/plugins\/like.php?href=https%3A%2F%2Fjmusportsblog.com%2F%3Fp%3D9395&amp;layout=standard&amp;show_faces=true&amp;width=450&amp;action=like&amp;colorscheme=light&amp;height=80\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"border:none; overflow:hidden; width:450px; height:80px;\" allowTransparency=\"true\"><\/iframe>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>After the Capitals and Wizards losses last night, we&#8217;re a little bit down on sports this morning. But thankfully, there&#8217;s a JMU related story to lift our spirits. Former JMU soccer player CJ Sapong is off to the best start of his career with 7 goals through 9 games. That&#8217;s good enough to have him [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":2251,"url":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/?p=2251","url_meta":{"origin":9395,"position":0},"title":"JMU Alum CJ Sapong Scores 1:43 Into His MLS Debut","date":"March 23, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"\u00a0 Former JMU soccer star, CJ Sapong, got his MLS career started with a bang over the weekend. The rookie striker earned\u00a0the start\u00a0for the season opener and\u00a0then scored in the second minute of the match. Scroll to the 48 second point in the video above to see it. The goal\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;News&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8500,"url":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/?p=8500","url_meta":{"origin":9395,"position":1},"title":"CJ Sapong Is Having a Pretty Damn Good Season in MLS","date":"April 24, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"CJ Sapang scored again for the Philadelphia Union this weekend. The goal, as seen above, put the Union up 2-0 over NYCFC and moved them to the top of the table in the Eastern Conference. It's still early in the season, but the JMU soccer alum, is off to one\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;JMU Sports&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2613,"url":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/?p=2613","url_meta":{"origin":9395,"position":2},"title":"CJ Sapong Scores First Goal Ever at Livestrong Sporting Park","date":"June 21, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"\u00a0 Former JMU soccer player CJ Sapong seems to have a knack for scoring memorable goals. He scored the fastest goal for a rookie in MLS history in his debut in March. Last weekend, he became the first player ever to score in the brand new Livestrong Sporting Park. The\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;News&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2671,"url":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/?p=2671","url_meta":{"origin":9395,"position":3},"title":"Links Roundup: Dukes Doing Work on the Pitch","date":"July 7, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Here's a brief look at\u00a0some\u00a0of the JMU related\u00a0stories you might have missed,\u00a0highlighted by some big moments for a couple of former JMU soccer stars,\u00a0CJ Sapong and Christina Julien. Blogger Blair Hawkins says CJ Sapong might be the \"Sporting Kansas City's new face\" and is a strong contender for MLS rookie\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"CJ Sapong\"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/jmusportsblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/cj-sapong-2-300x204.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":7736,"url":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/?p=7736","url_meta":{"origin":9395,"position":4},"title":"Hopefully One of JMU&#8217;s Pros Provides an Example for Current Dukes","date":"May 26, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"As our eleven long-time readers know, we've always had fun following JMU athletes into the professional ranks when the best of them were able to continue their careers beyond the 'Burg. And as most of you know, with the possible exception of Arthur Moats, there's probably no former Duke we've\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;JMU Sports&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3204,"url":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/?p=3204","url_meta":{"origin":9395,"position":5},"title":"OGL Weekly Roundup (No football talk, we promise)","date":"November 8, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"While we've all been cringing about the gridiron freefall the last few weeks, there's been big news elsewhere in JMU land, both incredibly good and unbelievably tragic. First, we want to send\u00a0our thoughts and prayers out to the family and friends of fifth-year senior cheerleader, former Duke Dog, and incredible\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;News&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9395"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9395"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9395\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9397,"href":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9395\/revisions\/9397"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9395"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9395"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jmusportsblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9395"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}