South Region playoffs

[Bill McCabe]

Ralph, would that be the one they spilled coffee on and got the pages out of place?

[firewater]

For the semis, does bracket one play bracket two and bracket three play bracket 4?

[Bwana]

A hypothetical question, and one I ask because I am math impaired...

If BC had beaten McDaniel in Game 1, how much (if any) would that have improved their playoff position?  Could they have bumped Thiel from the #2 slot?

Note I said slot and not seed...

[Bob.Gregg]

For the semis, does bracket one play bracket two and bracket three play bracket 4?

The National Semifinals have the Linfield bracket vs. the Trinity bracket
and
The Wabash bracket vs. the Delaware Valley bracket

[Ralph Turner]

Bwana,  This is my guess.  Still only one home game...

1.  Trinity                      8-0,  11.000
2.  Thiel                      10-0, 11.1
3.  Wesley                    5-0,  12.500
4.  Bridgewater            8-0, 10.500
5.  UMHB                      7-1, 10.375
6.  W&J                         7-1, 9.375
7.  Ferrum                     8-1,  10.111
8.  Johns Hopkins          7-2,  9.444

[Bwana]

Ralph, you are a good man!

Unfortunately, I had a hunch it would be that way.  Funny how sometimes your post season chances can be limited by the schedule you choose!

[Ralph Turner]

Bwana, Bridgewater could have used another in-region game playing a team with at least a .500 record.

A road win over a .500 team would have given you 13 pts, or raised your QOWI to 10.778.  a road win over a .667 team would have given you 15 QOWI pts and raised the QOWI to 11.000 and a9-0 in-region record.

[mizzou_mafia]

Bwana, Bridgewater could have used another in-region game playing a team with at least a .500 record.

A road win over a .500 team would have given you 13 pts, or raised your QOWI to 10.778.  a road win over a .667 team would have given you 15 QOWI pts and raised the QOWI to 11.000 and a9-0 in-region record.

Enter Ferrum onto the schedule next season.

[Pat Coleman]

My GUESS (and it's only that) in the South bracket is:

1.  Trinity
2.  Thiel
3.  Wesley
4.  UMHB
5.  Bridgewater
6.  W&J
7.  Ferrum
8.  Johns Hopkins


If UMHB & Wesley win, Posters say Pat said Wesley hosts Round two.
Thiel would host anyone they play in the region except Trinity.
Johns Hopkins can not get a home game.
Ferrum only gets a home game if they play Johns Hopkins in the Region Final.

I may have said that regarding Wesley. If so, I meant to be more vague since we don't have seeds.

[ThielFan]

What is exactly the deal with the ESPNews broadcast stating that the teams are not seeded?  Is that their way of spoonfeeding a mainstream sports audience into understanding in a roundabout way that "the rankings will be used only to determine who plays at home, and not the actual pairings because we are dead-set on screwing the outstanding Texas teams into playing each other immediately?"  Saying that teams aren't seeded would be a nifty little trick into making people believe (except actual D-III fans of course) that there is actually nothing competitively unbalanced or unfair with the geographical nonsense that we are all used to.

[Pat Coleman]

Well, the NCAA didn't provide them to us, so it's not like we withheld them from you.

[Olinemom]

What is exactly the deal with the ESPNews broadcast stating that the teams are not seeded?  Is that their way of spoonfeeding a mainstream sports audience into understanding in a roundabout way that "the rankings will be used only to determine who plays at home, and not the actual pairings because we are dead-set on screwing the outstanding Texas teams into playing each other immediately?"  Saying that teams aren't seeded would be a nifty little trick into making people believe (except actual D-III fans of course) that there is actually nothing competitively unbalanced or unfair with the geographical nonsense that we are all used to.

So well expressed!

[ThielFan]

Well, the NCAA didn't provide them to us, so it's not like we withheld them from you.

I'm glad to hear that.  I was just bemused to hear about teams not being seeded because of all the discussion I've seen in the last couple of weeks about the regional rankings, and about what it meant for seeding in the individual regions.  I went to the NCAA's site to look over the championship handbook again, and they definitely DO mention seeding as one of the criteria for site selection, though that is secondary to geography, which we are all used to, though none of us like it.  They also have a championship bracket posted, which seems to show which teams are hosting games, but only for the first round, and none of the seeds are given.  So, as you say, apparently they are the ones keeping the seeds to themselves, perhaps so they don't look like idiots for sending #3 to go play at #1, while #2 gets to host #8.  It's just hard to get used to eating crumbs from the tablecloth, especially when there's so much confusion over where teams would play if they met a couple of rounds down the line, which is what I think most of us would like to be able to infer from a bracket.

Secondly, I was glad to see Division III football get a little bit of coverage on TV, and I'm glad that they had you on there, Pat, because it meant that we viewers could be confident that somebody on there knew their stuff.  I wish they hadn't rushed us through everything so fast, and it would have been much better if they had you and K-Mack on there for about an hour to break things down a little bit more, but again, we are beggars at the table.

[Bill McCabe]

Just a thought on seeding.  Texas High School football does not seed nor do you automatically get homefield advantage.  Districts are grouped geographically and you play based on that.  Many times, very good teams meet early in the playoffs.  Doesn't make the NCAA brackets any easier to understand, but it is not unique.

[mizzou_mafia]

Bill,

That reminds me of my senior year in high school.  Our football team was clearly an underdog the whole way through the playoffs...had road games in both regional games.  Then, come state semis, we play the undefeated, Number 1 team in the state, and we got a home game.

I don't understand how we did, but we didn't complain...just went on to win the game before losing in the state finals. 

It'd be nice if the NCAA could do a little better than high school football.