Heidelberg drops out of the D3football top 25 this week.   Can't really fault the voters though since St. John's and UW Stevens-Point had big upsets to jump into the polls.   Still nice to see #3 and #6 from the OAC though, with Heidelberg and ONU both receiving votes

Quote from: ExTartanPlayer on September 18, 2014, 06:47:30 PM

Quote from: sac on September 18, 2014, 06:25:25 PM
Alma's non-conf schedule is quite a bit easier this year so take that into consideration.   Alma played Heidelberg, IWU, Lakeland and UW-Oshkosh last year, this year they traded  North Park and Concordia, Ill (CURF for Sager) for IWU/Oshkosh.  A decidedly easier task.

Sorry if that came out wrong; the intent of my post was not to bash on Alma so much as to say "Yo, D3SportzBall, "beating a team that lost close in Week 1 to a team that was in the playoffs last year" is a little misleading."  But you do make some great points that Alma's 1-9 last year included a couple of close losses and a brutal OOC schedule - Heidelberg, IWU, and UWO is a triumvirate that only a handful of Division III teams (like, literally, maybe 10, tops; Mount, UWW, UMHB, Linfield, North Central, Wesley are the only teams I can rattle off that would definitely be "favorites" against all three, anyone else is probably a toss-up) could comfortably navigate unscathed.  It's not like they were close to winning those games, but you're absolutely right that trading out three Top 25-caliber teams for a couple of opponents on their level could lead to a 3-7ish record.

I mean, it's only misleading if you interpret it how you did.  All I did was point out a fact, don't know why you thought I was being overly proud of said fact.

Quote from: ExTartanPlayer on September 18, 2014, 01:54:32 PM

Quote from: D3SportzBall on September 18, 2014, 01:37:02 PM
Well, Alma had a pretty convincing (31-7) win over North Park last Saturday, so they must not be all that bad.  Especially when you see that North Park only lost 28-31 in week 1 to a Concordia (Wis.) team that was in the playoffs last year.

Alma should be congratulated for their win over NP; after last season, any win for them is a good win.  But context matters when interpreting this stuff, and saying "they beat a team that played one of last year's playoff teams close in week 1!" takes a few leaps of logic that we need to clarify.

Concordia (Wis.) was a playoff team last year from one of the, uh, "least good" conferences in Division III.  That Concordia team got eviscerated by the two best teams it played (including 5-5 Augsburg from the MIAC, who beat them 51-17) and also lost to a Trine team that went 1-5 in the MIAA.  In any conference but the NACC, they're not going to the playoffs, and that's not a potshot at the NACC, just a realistic view.  Throwing out the fact that they were a playoff team without that bit of context is a little on the disingenuous side.

North Park is a trendy sleeper pick of sorts after their surprising three-win season last year, and I was surprised that Alma beat them, but please take a look at NPU's record over the last decade before you get too proud of Alma's win there.

Wow, talk about taking what I said and making it what you wanted it to seem like I said.  I was just trying to give Alma some credit for not being dumpster-fire bad like some people might have thought after getting slaughtered in week 1.   I still don't think they're great, nor am I getting "too proud" of their win.  Just interesting to see them rebound after such a demoralizing defeat in their first game.

Quote from: Dr. Acula on September 10, 2014, 06:29:43 PM
Random thought...Berg's senior class comes into this season at 22-5 in OAC play (.815 winning percentage).  I'm not familiar with Berg's history other than their one championship.  Is this going to be the winningest senior class ever to graduate?  I'd have to think there's a good chance of that being the case.

In terms of wins, they will if they tie the record if they win 8 and break it if they win 9.

From 1953-1956, Heidelberg went 7-1-1, 7-1-1, 9-0, and 8-1.

For winning percentage, they're probably not going to break it.  They would have to go 15-0 and win the national title to end up with an 86.9% winning percentage over their 4 years, while from 1953-1956 it was 86.11%.

Source: http://athletics.heidelberg.edu/mediaguides/Football_Media_Guide_2014.pdf

Quote from: formerd3db on September 13, 2014, 10:53:00 AM
Gregory:

Alma is simply not a very good team, unfortunately.  Let's keep it at that for now.  Obviously, you will have a better assessment of them after today's outcome, whatever that might be.

Well, Alma had a pretty convincing (31-7) win over North Park last Saturday, so they must not be all that bad.  Especially when you see that North Park only lost 28-31 in week 1 to a Concordia (Wis.) team that was in the playoffs last year.