Great Lakes Region

[KnightSlappy]

I'm actually expecting the NCAC to get 3 bids.  However there is the possibility they cannabalize  themselves out of that 3rd bid.


.700 winning percentage in in-region games seems to be at or near the annual cut-off for the at-large births.  While I'm not high on the OAC getting a 2nd bid either, there is that possibility if someone finishes on a strong run and loses in the OAC tournament championship.   The problem for the OAC team, whoever it is, is going to be strength of schedule and other metrics.  They just won't look very good.



I was meaning to go through and list the in-region records like I have in the past but a major computer blowup has delayed that.

Here they are (sorted by PCT):

Hope	11-0
Bethany	16-2
Wooster	15-3
Wittenberg	14-3
Thiel	14-4
John Carroll	13-4
Ohio Wesleyan	14-5
Wabash	13-5
Marietta	13-5
St. Vincent	12-5
Capital	12-6
Thomas More	12-6
Adrian	7-4
Baldwin-Wallace	12-8
Trine	9-6
Hiram	11-8
Wilmington	9-7
Calvin	6-5
DePauw	8-7
Penn State-Behrend	9-10
Kenyon	9-11
Albion	7-9
Grove City	8-11
Carnegie Mellon	7-10
Case Western Reserve	7-10
Denison	8-12
Mount Union	7-11
Ohio Northern	6-10
Kalamazoo	6-10
Muskingum	6-11
Alma	4-10
Otterbein	5-14
Heidelberg	5-14
Allegheny	5-14
Pitt-Greensburg	5-14
Westminster (Pa.)	5-14
Geneva	4-12
Olivet	3-9
Oberlin	4-14
Washington and Jefferson	3-13
Waynesburg	3-14
Franciscan (Ohio)	0-16

[KnightSlappy]

And here's a similar list if you find RPI to be interesting to the discussion:

Team	WP	SOS	RPI
Hope	1.000	0.524	0.643
Wittenberg	0.824	0.544	0.614
Wabash	0.722	0.569	0.607
Ohio Wesleyan	0.737	0.558	0.603
Wooster	0.833	0.519	0.598
Adrian	0.636	0.553	0.574
Capital	0.667	0.542	0.573
Marietta	0.722	0.515	0.567
Carnegie Mellon	0.412	0.605	0.557
John Carroll	0.765	0.482	0.553
DePauw	0.533	0.556	0.550
Thiel	0.778	0.473	0.549
Bethany	0.889	0.436	0.549
Thomas More	0.667	0.500	0.542
St. Vincent	0.706	0.486	0.541
Baldwin-Wallace	0.600	0.509	0.532
Wilmington	0.563	0.505	0.519
Hiram	0.579	0.499	0.519
Calvin	0.545	0.502	0.513
Penn State-Behrend	0.474	0.511	0.502
Ohio Northern	0.375	0.542	0.501
Case Western Reserve	0.412	0.520	0.493
Trine	0.600	0.445	0.484
Alma	0.286	0.542	0.478
Kenyon	0.450	0.487	0.478
Denison	0.400	0.500	0.475
Grove City	0.421	0.479	0.465
Albion	0.438	0.472	0.463
Otterbein	0.263	0.529	0.462
Heidelberg	0.263	0.513	0.451
Mount Union	0.389	0.467	0.448
Muskingum	0.353	0.464	0.436
Allegheny	0.263	0.490	0.433
Kalamazoo	0.375	0.450	0.431
Geneva	0.250	0.488	0.429
Olivet	0.250	0.488	0.428
Oberlin	0.222	0.491	0.424
Pitt-Greensburg	0.263	0.476	0.423
Westminster (Pa.)	0.263	0.464	0.414
Washington and Jefferson	0.188	0.483	0.409
Waynesburg	0.176	0.478	0.403
Franciscan (Ohio)	0.000	0.444	0.333

[sac]

I am no longer expecting the NCAC to get 3 bids.

[WAlum]

I am no longer expecting the NCAC to get 3 bids.

What changed your opinion?

[sac]

I am no longer expecting the NCAC to get 3 bids.

What changed your opinion?

The #3 and #4 teams in the NCAC have too many in-region losses right now.  Neither is likely to survive  without picking up at least another.  That can certainly change if one gets on a hot streak, but it just seems pretty unlikely the NCAC has a viable 3rd team, the only way looks like if Witt and Wooster don't win the NCAC tournament and both get selected as C's.

[ScotsFan]

I am no longer expecting the NCAC to get 3 bids.

What changed your opinion?

The #3 and #4 teams in the NCAC have too many in-region losses right now.  Neither is likely to survive  without picking up at least another.  That can certainly change if one gets on a hot streak, but it just seems pretty unlikely the NCAC has a viable 3rd team, the only way looks like if Witt and Wooster don't win the NCAC tournament and both get selected as C's.

I really wasn't expecting 3 bids from the NCAC either.  As you said sac, there is the chance that someone other than Witt or Woo wins the NCAC tournament and if that were to happen, I could see the NCAC getting two Pool C's.  But, my overall premise is that I don't see any other GL conference worthy of getting multiple bids with the exception of the OAC and JCU winning out but losing in the OAC Tournament and likewise, the MIAA would be another candidate in the highly unlikely event of Hope not garnering the automatic bid from the MIAA.

Looking at those RPI numbers, nice to see the top 5 teams from the NCAC in the top 11 spots including 4 out of the top 5!     Also of note, the top team from the PrAC doesn't check in until #12 in the RPI standings.  THAT says all you need to say about the possibility of a team from the PrAC getting a C bid... 

[KnightSlappy]

I am no longer expecting the NCAC to get 3 bids.

What changed your opinion?

The #3 and #4 teams in the NCAC have too many in-region losses right now.  Neither is likely to survive  without picking up at least another.  That can certainly change if one gets on a hot streak, but it just seems pretty unlikely the NCAC has a viable 3rd team, the only way looks like if Witt and Wooster don't win the NCAC tournament and both get selected as C's.

The fact that a lot of those losses come against regionally ranked teams has to help them out though. I just hope that Bethany doesn't get the benefit of the doubt for tearing through a 10th percentile schedule.

Wabash and OWU are around 90th percentile for schedule difficulty.

[sac]

Didn't PSU-Behrend get a C bid with a gaudy w/l record and weak rpi last season?

[sac]

OAC

Capital          10-3
John Carroll    10-3
Marietta         9-4
Wilmington      8-5
Bald-Wally      7-6

The OAC has worked itself in an almost perfect symmetrical separation.  BW has a two game lead on the 6th place team, so this is your list of title chasers.   Once again this weekend we get the odd happening of all 5 games being top of the standings vs bottom of the standings.  So nothing really to focus on.  In fact the next 10 days will be short on big games, so if anything happens that's noteworthy it probably means someone was upset by someone they shouldn't have been.



NCAC

Wittenberg          10-1
Wooster               8-3
Ohio Wesleyan      7-4
Wabash               7-4
DePauw               6-5

The more things change........with 5 to go we can put DePauw in the spoiler role and OWU and Wabash right on their heals.  Still some big games remaining, but we may miss out on what could have been a number of crucial head banging contests.

Sat game to watch:

Wabash @ Wooster  --Wabash won the first meeting way back in December.  Another Wabash win would probably just about wrap this thing up for Wittenberg.  A Wooster win keeps it interesting.

bonus:  Game times are 1, 3 and 5......all with video available so sit back and enjoy a 6 hour NCAC marathon.



MIAA


Hope           9-0
Adrian         6-3
Calvin          5-4
Trine           5-4
Albion          4-5


Hope's win at Adrian Wed. night nearly puts a death grip on the MIAA Championship,  Adrian has no more games with Hope so they are at the mercy of the upset God's, and it would probably take more than is reasonably expected even by the most optimistic/pesimistic of fans.  With the MIAA's new four team tournament format the run-in will be all about the #2, #3 and #4 seeds and who finds no chair when the music stops.  Some head to head games in the next 10 days will shake that out.

Sat. game to watch:

Hope at Albion --  almost always a tough, gritty game at Kresge. 

Trine at Adrian --  Last season Adrian collapsed the 2nd half of the year, Trine might be in the middle of theirs.  A win for Trine would go a long way to securing a tournament slot.



PAC

Thiel              10-1
Bethany           9-2
Thomas More    9-3
St. Vincent       8-3

Wed. was supposed to be the night that confirmed my season long belief that this league was all about Bethany/Thiel, then they both lost to Thomas More and St. Vincent and just like that we have a reason to post the conference race.

Still counting down to Bethany @ Thiel next Saturday, but if nothing else Wed. may have showed the PAC tournament could be interesting.


Sat game to watch:

Thiel at Thomas More  -- Thomas More is fresh off their upset of Bethany, pulling a 2nd in one week would put them right in the thick of things.

[Flying Dutch Fan]

Didn't PSU-Behrend get a C bid with a gaudy w/l record and weak rpi last season?

Yes, and promptly lost 83-54 to Rhode Island College

[KnightSlappy]

Didn't PSU-Behrend get a C bid with a gaudy w/l record and weak rpi last season?

Yeah, but they had the benefit of having all of their losses come against regionally ranked teams (La Roche and Medaille). Bethany won't be afforded that.

[sac]

2 of Bethany's losses are to Illinois Wesleyan and Thiel and I don't think its too far fetched to think that Thiel will garner one the Great Lakes' meager 6 spots next week.  IWU will probably be in the Midwest mix as well.

They could certainly have a similar resume to PSU-Behrend when its done.

[KnightSlappy]

2 of Bethany's losses are to Illinois Wesleyan and Thiel and I don't think its too far fetched to think that Thiel will garner one the Great Lakes' meager 6 spots next week.  IWU will probably be in the Midwest mix as well.

They could certainly have a similar resume to PSU-Behrend when its done.

IWU is out of region, so that's in the secondary criteria. Bethany also just lost to Thomas More, a type of loss that was NOT on PSU-B's resume.

I should hope Thiel doesn't get ranked, but you never know.

[WAlum]

Of the top 9 teams in the Great Lakes by winning percentage, four lose today.
#5 Thiel - Lost
#6 John Carroll - Lost
#8 Wabash   - Lost
#9 Marietta - Lost

[sac]

Wooster 77 Wabash 59 --the little giants are putting on a big giant collapse from their earlier position this season.   Wooster win keeps the pressure on Witt.



Otterbein 89 John Carroll 75----this score makes the most perfect sense of course.  Cap has the OAC lead now.


Ohio Northern 70 Marietta 63

This is probably the knockout blow to Marietta's chances at repeating as OAC champs by themselves.  They still have games with JCU and Capital to finish but they'll need help now.  Also their Pool C chances are plenty bleak, they'll have to win the OAC tournament to get in now.

Cap and JCU both have to travel to Bald-Wally next week before both travel to Marietta the following week.  So B-W and Marietta will have a big say in who wins the OAC.



Also

Thomas More 73 Thiel 63  ---this makes the PAC a tie in the loss column between Thiel and Bethany who play next Saturday.  TM and St. Vincent are now just 1 game back in the loss column.  Scratch those 'Pool C' chances for Thiel probably, if there were any.


Adrian lost at home to Trine 51-50 in a Van Halen special, throwing the MIAA seedings into disaray.   Hope held off Albion on the road 75-69 and clinched a share of the MIAA Championship.