Top 25 talk

[Darryl Nester]

#30 Scranton-Wilkes was a neutral court game @ Marywood.

Thanks for the heads up. My program catches some automatically, but doesn't get them all. I'll edit to fix that.

[John Gleich]

So... What's the next next top 25 going to look like? All of the 2+ loss teams should drop, without question.

Are there any "good" losses? Hope's loss to Cornerstone is over that comes to mind. Perhaps Stevens Point's to Hope? SP was the only top 25 team to lose just one game to another ranked team (others that lost to a ranked team also lost other games or lost a single game to a non-ranked team). But the win over St. Olaf is tempered by Olaf's subsequent loss to UW River Falls.

It has been mentioned how difficult this top 25 was to put together by the voters... So maybe lots of stock shouldn't be put in the current poll.

By all accounts, Benedictine should be ranked, so IWU's two losses are to Ohio Wesleyan and a very good Benedictine team.

St. Norbert's win vs an over-rated UW Oshkosh team is tempered by their loss to UWSP.

Lots of moving pieces. Any other thoughts?

[Dave 'd-mac' McHugh]

You are just making it more complicated in my head. LOL

[Mr. Ypsi]

So... What's the next next top 25 going to look like? All of the 2+ loss teams should drop, without question.

Are there any "good" losses? Hope's loss to Cornerstone is over that comes to mind. Perhaps Stevens Point's to Hope? SP was the only top 25 team to lose just one game to another ranked team (others that lost to a ranked team also lost other games or lost a single game to a non-ranked team). But the win over St. Olaf is tempered by Olaf's subsequent loss to UW River Falls.

It has been mentioned how difficult this top 25 was to put together by the voters... So maybe lots of stock shouldn't be put in the current poll.

By all accounts, Benedictine should be ranked, so IWU's two losses are to Ohio Wesleyan and a very good Benedictine team.

St. Norbert's win vs an over-rated UW Oshkosh team is tempered by their loss to UWSP.

Lots of moving pieces. Any other thoughts?

I think Benedictine (who won AT IWU and AT Elmhurst, as well as a home win over Wheaton) will definitely enter the rankings between 15 and 20 - not bad for a team receiving zero votes in the preseason poll!  Unfortunately, IWU's losses were both at the Shirk, so I would expect they will be gone - but I have strong hopes they will return in a few weeks.

[magicman]

I would think Oswego State's 6-0 start would get them some love and into the Top 25 somewhere between 20 and 25.

[sac]

http://www.d3hoops.com/top25/men/2015-16/week1
There are 10 new teams in the Top 25 this week, that's the most from pre-season to week 1 in the polls history.  We had 9 in 2009.  I imagine that's also a record for all of the polls, hard to imagine we've ever had 10 new teams at any other time.

The 4 new Top 10 teams ties the record which is 3 consecutive years now.

[wooscotsfan]

There may be 10 new teams in the top 25 but it is also clear that voters have trouble admitting their preseason mistakes so we still have two teams with 2 losses that are still ranked despite very unimpressive results.    At this stage, I would expect that a 2 loss team that is ranked would have 2 quality losses and/or have 1-2 quality wins that suggest they are deserving of a Top 25 ranking.

#15 Viriginia Wesleyan (4-2) and #22 Catholic (3-2) fit neither description so they are still ranked because the voters cannot admit their preseason mistakes.

#15 Virginia Wesleyan (4-2)
-Have a Loss vs. a team that has a record of 1-3 (that's right...they beat Va. Wesleyan and then LOST their next 3 games)
-3 of Virginia Wesleyan's 4 Wins are against Teams that have a Losing Record so far this season

#22 Catholic (3-2)
-Have a Loss to a team with a record of 3-2
-Catholic's 3 wins are against 3 teams that have a cumulative record of 4-11

No logical reason for these two teams with 2 losses and unimpressive results to be ranked ahead of other undefeated or 1 loss teams.

[Pat Coleman]

http://www.d3hoops.com/top25/men/2015-16/week1
There are 10 new teams in the Top 25 this week, that's the most from pre-season to week 1 in the polls history.  We had 9 in 2009.  I imagine that's also a record for all of the polls, hard to imagine we've ever had 10 new teams at any other time.

The 4 new Top 10 teams ties the record which is 3 consecutive years now.

I feel it's important to point out that this year there's an extra week between preseason and week 1. There were 17 playing days in between (16 if you don't count Thanksgiving).

[Mr. Ypsi]

So... What's the next next top 25 going to look like? All of the 2+ loss teams should drop, without question.

Are there any "good" losses? Hope's loss to Cornerstone is over that comes to mind. Perhaps Stevens Point's to Hope? SP was the only top 25 team to lose just one game to another ranked team (others that lost to a ranked team also lost other games or lost a single game to a non-ranked team). But the win over St. Olaf is tempered by Olaf's subsequent loss to UW River Falls.

It has been mentioned how difficult this top 25 was to put together by the voters... So maybe lots of stock shouldn't be put in the current poll.

By all accounts, Benedictine should be ranked, so IWU's two losses are to Ohio Wesleyan and a very good Benedictine team.

St. Norbert's win vs an over-rated UW Oshkosh team is tempered by their loss to UWSP.

Lots of moving pieces. Any other thoughts?

I think Benedictine (who won AT IWU and AT Elmhurst, as well as a home win over Wheaton) will definitely enter the rankings between 15 and 20 - not bad for a team receiving zero votes in the preseason poll!  Unfortunately, IWU's losses were both at the Shirk, so I would expect they will be gone - but I have strong hopes they will return in a few weeks.

Wow!  The voters were even less tied to 'anchoring bias' than I expected - Benedictine went from zero points to #12!  As I expected, IWU fell out, but still got 45 points, so I'm quite hopeful they will be back soon.  (But I'm offended that Hope rose from #16 to #5, while OWU beat IWU at the Shirk and only rose from #13 to #6! )

Benedictine has probably already played their two toughest games of the season - I'd say they have an outside shot at being the 2006 Lawrence of 2016.

[Titan Q]

Benedictine has probably already played their two toughest games of the season - I'd say they have an outside shot at being the 2006 Lawrence of 2016.

Benedictine is not favored to win their league...

http://www.naccsports.org/sports/mbkb/2015-16/releases/20151029dlydu5

Guessing they have plenty of tough games left.

[Mr. Ypsi]

Benedictine has probably already played their two toughest games of the season - I'd say they have an outside shot at being the 2006 Lawrence of 2016.

Benedictine is not favored to win their league...

http://www.naccsports.org/sports/mbkb/2015-16/releases/20151029dlydu5

Guessing they have plenty of tough games left.

Yeah, and we know how infallible coaches' pre-season polls are!

I doubt they will go undefeated, but I don't see any games on their remaining schedule tougher than @IWU and @Elmhurst.

So I'll stick with outside chance of reprising Lawrence.

[coachrcal]

There may be 10 new teams in the top 25 but it is also clear that voters have trouble admitting their preseason mistakes so we still have two teams with 2 losses that are still ranked despite very unimpressive results.    At this stage, I would expect that a 2 loss team that is ranked would have 2 quality losses and/or have 1-2 quality wins that suggest they are deserving of a Top 25 ranking.

#15 Viriginia Wesleyan (4-2) and #22 Catholic (3-2) fit neither description so they are still ranked because the voters cannot admit their preseason mistakes.

#15 Virginia Wesleyan (4-2)
-Have a Loss vs. a team that has a record of 1-3 (that's right...they beat Va. Wesleyan and then LOST their next 3 games)
-3 of Virginia Wesleyan's 4 Wins are against Teams that have a Losing Record so far this season

#22 Catholic (3-2)
-Have a Loss to a team with a record of 3-2
-Catholic's 3 wins are against 3 teams that have a cumulative record of 4-11

No logical reason for these two teams with 2 losses and unimpressive results to be ranked ahead of other undefeated or 1 loss teams.

I agree, some of these rankings make no sense. How dose a team get beat by 30 and move up one spot

[Ryan Scott (Hoops Fan)]

I didn't think IWU was a top 25 team in preseason - they're pretty much playing to form.  ORV sounds about right until they prove something.  I don't think that's too harsh.  I'm guessing there's a number of teams in the poll almost entirely because they haven't lost yet.

This is going to be a tough year to figure out.

[Mr. Ypsi]

I didn't think IWU was a top 25 team in preseason - they're pretty much playing to form.  ORV sounds about right until they prove something.  I don't think that's too harsh.  I'm guessing there's a number of teams in the poll almost entirely because they haven't lost yet.

This is going to be a tough year to figure out.

Two of IWU's best bigs are in street clothes.  Once they return, I think they are a top 20 team.  And since it will be an even year tourney, I have hopes they will finish much higher (2006: FF; 2008: nobody's perfect ; 2010: E8; 2012: FF; 2014: FF; 2016: ??)

[Ryan Scott (Hoops Fan)]

Looked at Brooklyn's roster tonight.  Three dudes all seniors all named Gjonbalaj.  I did a story on them last year, could've sworn there was only one Gjonbalaj.  Is Brooklyn doing secret human cloning work?  If so, they may need to be ranked higher than #24.  They look pretty similar in the team photo.