Top 25 talk

[Dave 'd-mac' McHugh]

FDF - hope you are well.

Just wanted to share something with you about Hope not being in the Top 25.

First off, in my ballot this past week... I had at least 40 teams I was considering for the Top 25. The week before... that number was about the same... and the pre-season poll I must have no less then 50. What I am trying to say is that I - and most voters - just don't have enough space to put the teams we want on the ballot. It requires plenty of debating in your head along with head-scratching plus writing and rewriting my list until I feel as comfortable as I can and time will allow.

Secondly, I can't speak for all voters, but right now I am not voting on a week to week basis. I am still trying to figure out what teams who looked good in the pre-season data are living up to it and who aren't. And who might be surprising me with their start - along with who is disappointing me. So, I am looking at what happened the week before while also looking at how the first few weeks are unfolding. I realize Aquinas is considered a non-D3 school and won't reflect on the schedule to the NCAA Selection Committee, but I do look at the game and consider it.

Finally, I then take a ton of information and do what I can with it. Carthage, not in my Top 25 list this week; Chicago, thought about them for a second, but weren't close to making my Top 25; Hope, hardest debate of my week and only missed my Top 25 ballot by one.

Should they be on mine? Sure. Could I fit them? No... not this week. I did note their win against to Wheaton which why they nearly made my ballot... but they also lost in OT at home against a team that I had decided to eliminate from my Top 25 ballot this week.

Will you agree with my thinking? Probably not. Though, I thought I would share my thoughts - now let those who disagree blast me for my opinion. Just keep in mind, Pat does have 25 voters from around the country to vote to keep this as evenly-keeled as possible. While you might not agree right now, I have not known the poll to really be that badly off. Trust me... there is no conspiracy either... I have only talked to ONE Top 25 voter about teams so far this season.

[sac]

77-52

[scottiedawg]

I'm a Hope fan, and I can say this about the Hope and Wheaton discussion.  I can see Wheaton falling very fast, and Hope rising (not quite as fast) if Wheaton loses another game or two, and if Hope keeps winning.  Maybe the voters got this poll wrong, but as more data flows in, it'll get better quickly.

[Pat Coleman]

I am having a really hard time deciding who IS good. Anyone have a reasonable, logical Top 15 for me? I have lots of candidates to live in that 16-25 range -- 20 teams or so.

[Hugenerd]

Virginia Wesleyan's win over Guilford was definitely a big one, and clearly got a lot of press and resulted in VWU jumping from receiving 2 votes to 90, but why do the voters treat every game in a vacuum? VWU beats somebody so they get more votes, that make sense, but what about the only team that has beat them?  Exactly a week earlier Eastern Mennonite (8-0) handed VWU their only loss on VWU's court.  It seems to me that that win should look pretty big right now, considering that the previous #4 team in the country could not pull off a similar result.  I understand that you cant put too much weight in any single game, but it seems to me that with the results we have so far, if you are going to rank VWU for their win over Guilford, you would need to rank Eastern Mennonite ahead of them for their win at VWU.

I believe the argument above is less convoluted than the one involving Hope, where one team beats a high ranked team and loses to a lower ranked team, so where do you rank them?  Eastern Mennonite was receiving 3 votes the previous week and VWU had 2, but VWU pulled an upset so they shot up ahead of Eastern Mennonite?  Is Eastern Mennonite's win the week before devalued because VWU was lower ranked at the time?  If Eastern Mennonite beat VWU tomorrow would it be somehow a better win than their win 10 days ago?  I dont think so, I think people voting need to look at the whole resume for teams, and not just make changes to their previous  weeks rankings based on only the 1-3 games played by that team in the previous week  (especially since Eastern Mennonites win was only a week prior).

[David Collinge]

Top 25 voting, especially in the dimly-lit world of D3, is one of those things that's easy to criticize but difficult to do.  Most of us have our own specialized pools of knowledge, beyond the periphery of which things can be very opaque.  For example, I could tell you that in no way, shape, or form is Wooster the 23rd best D3 team in the nation right now, but that doesn't mean I know who is, or whether Wooster is better or worse than #22 Mississippi College or #24 Carthage.

[Hugenerd]

Top 25 voting, especially in the dimly-lit world of D3, is one of those things that's easy to criticize but difficult to do.  Most of us have our own specialized pools of knowledge, beyond the periphery of which things can be very opaque.  For example, I could tell you that in no way, shape, or form is Wooster the 23rd best D3 team in the nation right now, but that doesn't mean I know who is, or whether Wooster is better or worse than #22 Mississippi College or #24 Carthage.

That is why I wasnt trying to make a contention about where VWU and Eastern Mennonite should be ranked, I just think Eastern Mennonite should be ranked ahead of VWU.  Whether that be in the top 25 or out of the top 25, I think given the current results, Eastern Mennonite clearly has a better resume.  Seriously, this does not seem like a grey area at all.  Eastern Mennonite beat VWU at VWU and Eastern Mennonite is undefeated, how do you rank VWU ahead of them?

[John Gleich]

Look at the CCIW board HERE for a post regarding Wheaton.  They're too high.  And the thing is, ALL the voters (or at least, the average of the voters) agrees with you.

[Pat Coleman]

It's hard to look at this slate of opponents and be blown away by Eastern Mennonite.

Nov 15    HOME    Lancaster Bible (1-4, 0-0)    W    96-53
Nov 18    HOME    Shenandoah (1-6, 0-0)    W    87-81
Nov 21    HOME    Averett (1-5, 0-0)    W    101-81
Nov 22    HOME    Wesley (4-3, 1-1)    W    95-73
Nov 25    AWAY    Ferrum (3-4, 0-0)    W    66-81
Dec 02    AWAY    Lynchburg (1-6, 0-2)    W    82-89
Dec 05    AWAY    Penn St.-Brandywine ()    W    44-97

When you add this, yes, it certainly changes things.

Nov 28    AWAY    Virginia Wesleyan (7-1, 1-1)    W    76-79

For me, personally, I have to honestly wonder if it was some kind of fluke (aka Witt losing at Hiram) just because of everything else on their schedule.

[Hugenerd]

By the same token:

It's hard to look at this slate of opponents and be blown away by VWU:

Nov 18    HOME    Averett (1-5)    W    81-66
Nov 20    HOME    Greensboro (5-3)    W    80-72
Nov 21    AWAY    North Carolina Wesleyan (2-6)    W    78-68
Nov 24    AWAY    Christopher Newport (3-2)    W    69-58
Nov 28    HOME    Eastern Mennonite (8-0)    L    76-79
Dec 01    HOME    Methodist (0-8)    W    83-66
Dec 03    AWAY    Apprentice School ()    W OT    76-73

When you add this, yes, it certainly changes things.

Dec 05    HOME    Guilford  (4-1)    W    71-68


Combined record of opponents in wins minus Guilford win for VWU (for only d3 schools):  11-24
Combined record of opponents in wins minus VWU for Eastern Mennonite:  11-28

Pretty comparable, huh?  Big difference Eastern Mennonite beat VWU on the road.

[Flying Dutch Fan]

FDF - hope you are well.

Just wanted to share something with you about Hope not being in the Top 25.

First off, in my ballot this past week... I had at least 40 teams I was considering for the Top 25. The week before... that number was about the same... and the pre-season poll I must have no less then 50. What I am trying to say is that I - and most voters - just don't have enough space to put the teams we want on the ballot. It requires plenty of debating in your head along with head-scratching plus writing and rewriting my list until I feel as comfortable as I can and time will allow.

Secondly, I can't speak for all voters, but right now I am not voting on a week to week basis. I am still trying to figure out what teams who looked good in the pre-season data are living up to it and who aren't. And who might be surprising me with their start - along with who is disappointing me. So, I am looking at what happened the week before while also looking at how the first few weeks are unfolding. I realize Aquinas is considered a non-D3 school and won't reflect on the schedule to the NCAA Selection Committee, but I do look at the game and consider it.

Finally, I then take a ton of information and do what I can with it. Carthage, not in my Top 25 list this week; Chicago, thought about them for a second, but weren't close to making my Top 25; Hope, hardest debate of my week and only missed my Top 25 ballot by one.

Should they be on mine? Sure. Could I fit them? No... not this week. I did note their win against to Wheaton which why they nearly made my ballot... but they also lost in OT at home against a team that I had decided to eliminate from my Top 25 ballot this week.

Will you agree with my thinking? Probably not. Though, I thought I would share my thoughts - now let those who disagree blast me for my opinion. Just keep in mind, Pat does have 25 voters from around the country to vote to keep this as evenly-keeled as possible. While you might not agree right now, I have not known the poll to really be that badly off. Trust me... there is no conspiracy either... I have only talked to ONE Top 25 voter about teams so far this season.

d-mac - I truly appreciate your post, and I also appreciate the tough spot you're in trying to make those tough decisions.  And I can't disagree with your thinking on Hope and Carthage.  My real concern with the poll is how Wheaton could fall 2 spots, despite an absolute beat down by an unranked (technically an ORV) team.  If someone can explain that to me, I'd love to hear it.

[Mr. Ypsi]

FDF,

In the eclectic nature of D3 fans (especially the 'nationally-minded' ones), Point Special (WIAC) already did so on the CCIW Chat (regardless of the rename for convenience, it will always be 'the Chat' to me ).  In a nutshell, Wheaton in terms of votes fell from what 'ought' to be 7th to what 'ought' to be 11th, but voters were so undecided on which teams would be higher that their ranking was much higher than their 'average'.  I've seen that phenomenon on the Posters' Poll - at an extreme, a team no one ranked higher than 12th once finished 11th because the votes 'above' them were so scattered!

[David Collinge]

For me, personally, I have to honestly wonder if it was some kind of fluke (aka Witt losing at Hiram)...

Hiram has now beaten Wittenberg three straight times.  It's not as if Witt's schedule has been crammed with great teams, either. 

[Pat Coleman]

Fair enough, although a win against Wittenberg last year was not exactly rare.

[David Collinge]

Fair enough, although a win against Wittenberg last year was not exactly rare.

Right, and it's essentially the same team this year:  not more talented, just more experienced.  They should be competitive, likely back to a winning record, but losing at Hiram is not really a surprise.  Hiram has a lot of talent, but they're maddeningly inconsistent.  Beating Witt is not really a surprise (and they did so with ease), and losing to them by 30 wouldn't have been surprising either.