Top 25 talk

[John Gleich]

FDF,

Based on research already performed...  I'll repost it here from DC's "news and notes" from week 7:

Top 25 News and Notes–Week 7
Tuesday, January 15th, 2008
This week, I decided to do some number-crunching to see what the historical Top 25 polls might have to say about which regions are the strongest. Be prepared to be bored, and don't say you weren't warned!

The first thing that leaps off the page at me is the balance in the men's polls, relative to the women. At present, there are 386 non-provisional D3 men's teams; of those, over one in three (138, 35.8%) have been ranked in at least one of the 131 polls taken since 1999. There are 23 more women's programs, but 16 fewer teams (122, 29.8%) have cracked the poll (and there's even been one extra women's poll!) The same pattern holds when you look at voting patterns rather than rankings: nearly 60% of the men's teams (229) have received votes, while less than half of the women's programs (195) have earned voting support. What these data suggest to me is that the women's game tends to be more concentrated at the top, with the best programs sticking in the poll, while the men's teams have a slightly stronger tendency to come and go. This is perhaps underscored by the fact that there are now eight women's programs that have been ranked in at least 100 polls, vs. just two for the men.

Looking at the men's regions, it seems to be the conventional wisdom that the "strongest" regions have generally been the three westernmost–the West, Midwest, and Great Lakes—but the data doesn't necessarily support this. The Midwest (48%) and West (44.4%) have each produced 24 ranked teams, but third on this list is not the Great Lakes (17) but the South (20 teams). These two regions are roughly equal on percentage terms, as the south is a larger region (33 to 26), meaning that about 40% of each region has been ranked. The four eastern regions lag far behind, with 17 teams each from the large Northeast (24%) and smaller Mid-Atlantic (33%), and less than 30% of the East (10) and Atlantic (9), having been ranked. The voting patterns are somewhat more balanced, with each of the West, Midwest, and South regions having two-thirds of their current members receiving votes, leading the Great Lakes (62%), East (57%), Atlantic (56%), and Northeast (49%).

The women's polling has been much more balanced. The Central Region (20 ranked teams out of 52 non-provisionals, 38.5%) is on top, but only the Atlantic (11/46, 24%) is more than 12 percentage points behind. The voting show a greater discrepancy, with the Great Lakes a clear leader at 61%, 9 percentage points ahead of the second-place Central. Perhaps this suggests that the Great Lakes has a number of good-but-not-great programs (15 that have received votes but never enough to reach #25), while the Central is filled with haves (20 ranked teams) and have-nots (25 programs that have yet to receive their first vote) with little (7 schools) in between.

On a somewhat related note, by virtue of the three points earned by Middlebury this week, the NESCAC becomes the seventh men's conference to have every team receive votes at one time or another. (The other six are the HCAC, NJAC, OAC, UAA, USA-South, and WIAC.) Of these, the WIAC stands alone as the only conference in which each team has been ranked. There are four other men's conferences that are one program short of 100% participation (CCIW, Empire 8, LEC, and NEWMAC), and one conference that is one team away from joining the WIAC with every team ranked: the CCIW (and that team is Millikin.) This is all in sharp contrast to the women, where the only conference to have every team receive votes is the UAA (and all but Emory have been ranked), and just two conferences (HCAC and NESCAC) are one team short.

Now, this research is from 3 weeks ago, and I don't have the database to see if there have been any newbies since then (though David's notes would duly note this!)

Hope that helps!

[David Collinge]

As of Week 9, there have been 233 men's teams and 197 women's teams that have received votes at one time or another.  Overall, 280 schools have received a vote on one poll or the other, counting Hobart/William Smith and St. John's/St. Benedict each as one "school."  Thus, 150 schools appear on both lists.  Four schools on the lists (Lincoln [men only], Savannah Art & Design [both], UC San Diego [both], and Upper Iowa [men only]) are no longer in D3.  Excluding those, the totals are

On both lists: 148
Men's list only: 81
Women's list only: 47
Either list: 276
Neither list:  you tell me   

PointSpecial quotes me as saying that there are 386 non-provisional men's programs, and 409 non-provisional women's programs, but I haven't merged the lists to get an overall total.  It could be 410 (i.e., the women's total plus Wabash), but that assumes that every co-ed school has both teams, and I doubt that's true.

EDITED to treat SJU/CSB the same way I treated Hobart/Wm. Smith

[OC_SID]

PointSpecial quotes me as saying that there are 386 non-provisional men's programs, and 409 non-provisional women's programs, but I haven't merged the lists to get an overall total.  It could be 410 (i.e., the women's total plus Wabash), but that assumes that every co-ed school has both teams, and I doubt that's true.

or it could just be 409 since Saint Mary's (Ind.) in the MIAA is a women's only school. Interesting side note on this fact, in swimming competition tonight: The Kalamazoo men are swimming against Wabash, while Saint Mary's women are competing against Kalamazoo. The meet is being held at Notre Dame.

[David Collinge]

PointSpecial quotes me as saying that there are 386 non-provisional men's programs, and 409 non-provisional women's programs, but I haven't merged the lists to get an overall total.  It could be 410 (i.e., the women's total plus Wabash), but that assumes that every co-ed school has both teams, and I doubt that's true.

or it could just be 409 since Saint Mary's (Ind.) in the MIAA is a women's only school. Interesting side note on this fact, in swimming competition tonight: The Kalamazoo men are swimming against Wabash, while Saint Mary's women are competing against Kalamazoo. The meet is being held at Notre Dame.

St. Mary's is far from being the only women's school in D3.  Wabash is, to the best of my knowledge, the only D3 men's school.  That's the main reason, if not the entire reason, why there are 23 more women's programs than men's in D3.

[sac]

From our good friends at Wikipedia.........

However, Hampden-Sydney College and Wabash College are the only two true all male colleges left because they do not combine classes with females.

[Jacketfan2011]

How does Hobart/William SMith fit into this.  If at all.  I believe, and I could be way off, they are separate colleges that share certain if not all facilities

[sac]

There are several colleges that are "all male" that share facilities or classes with a neighboring "all female" school.  Here's the link that provides more detail, learned some things I didn't know.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Men%27s_colleges_in_the_United_States

[David Collinge]

If I am reading this page correctly, there are 422 active D3 members, and 22 provisional members.  Of these 444 institutions, 433 sponsor women's basketball and 407 sponsor men's.  (Then again, these numbers may include conferences as well.  I am fairly confused by the NCAAs method here, not for the first or last time!)

My hand count of programs from this website's regional lists (e.g., NE Region men here) is 386 men and 409 women, excluding provisionals.  Now, this is not apples to apples with the NCAA's list; for example, I assume (but could be wrong) that the NCAA counts the Claremont Colleges as 5 members (Pomona, Pitzer, Claremont McKenna, Harvey Mudd, and Scripps) while we count them as 2 (Pomona-Pitzer and CMS).  Whether Hobart/William Smith is one or two members or one or two programs is another potential discrepancy, as is the St. John's/St. Benedict pairing (thanks to sac for the link, I didn't know about that one). 

But in round numbers, one-third of the active D3 membership has not yet received its first vote in either D3hoops.com poll.  There are something in the neighborhood of 410-420 eligible schools (active D3 members that sponsor hoops either alone or in a group like CMS), and of those, 276 have appeared in the voting at one time or another.

[Greek Tragedy]

HOW THEY FARED (week of Jan. 28 - Feb. 3)       
#   12   UW-Stevens Point (15-4) won at UW-River Falls 71-40 and hosts UW-Stout Sat.

Not that it matters much, but Point is off this weekend.  Oshkosh is at Stout, you have that listed correctly below.  Point hosts Stout on Wednesday, Feb. 6.

Thanks, fixed!  Nine-team leagues really test my schedule-reading-comprehesions skills, and I frequently fail the test. ...dc

[smedindy]

Also from Wikipedia...and my research. Here are the D-3 women's colleges (unless I missed some).


Agnes Scott • Alverno • Bay Path •  Bryn Mawr • Cedar Crest • Chatham • College of Notre Dame (MD) • Hollins • Mary Baldwin • Meredith •  Mount Holyoke • Mt. Mary •  Peace • Pine Manor • Rosemont • Russell Sage • St. Benedict • St. Catherine • St. Elizabeth • Saint Joseph (CT) • Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College • St. Mary's (Indiana) • Salem • Simmons • Smith • Spelman •  Trinity (DC) • Wellesley • Wesleyan (GA) • Wilson

They also had Stern listed, but that's under the Yeshiva blanket as far as I could tell...

[Dave 'd-mac' McHugh]

How does Hobart/William SMith fit into this.  If at all.  I believe, and I could be way off, they are separate colleges that share certain if not all facilities

To answer your question, listen to William Smith's Coach Lindsay Drury who joined me on Hoopsville a few weeks back. She explained how the school works early on in the segment.

[LogShow]

Sounds like the Rochester Wash U was one heck of a game...would have been a great one to watch!

[hope1]

number  4 lost to albion today at albion   56  to 52   

[LogShow]

sad sad day for Puget Sound. They didn't play like the 7th best team in the country tonight...not even the 70th.

[LogShow]

The worst part is, there is no way I can rationalize the loss.  I can't say the other team banked in a half court 3 to win, or the refs sent the other team to the freethrow line way more the Puget Sound did.  UPS just flat out lost that game, and the finger points right at us.