TOP 25

[Ralph Turner]

IMHO, Wabash must beat Witt convincingly, like Huntingdon did, for the LG's to maintain their place in the Top 25.

[smedindy]

The big game in my eyes is this weekend - the wonderful trip to Meadville. That's where the Witt / Huntingdon comparisons will come into play - how does this LG team react to a long road trip.

Witt has barely impressed since Huntingdon, and frankly had 3 1/4 quarters of issues with Oberlin before their depth got the best of them.

From 7-17 on my fans ballot is one big mess and a case could be made for each team to be replaced by the other. The Salisbury / Wesley game is going to be very telling.

[ExTartanPlayer]

Thomas More I think is the team that is furthest from the top 5 in terms of quality but benefits most from the void and from rarely being challenged.

At the risk of being crucified by my own kind, I think your comments about TMC can also be applied to Wabash. The LGs have beaten only one team with a winning record and took a notable drop on my ballot after the Oberlin game. In the broader Top 25 though, like Thomas More, Wabash has crept up the rankings perhaps in response to a void of certainty about who to slot in that 8-12 range.

I agree that Wabash and TMC are probably overranked, mostly due to their undefeated records and general reputation as "teams that have made the playoffs recently and have a good chance to go undefeated."

Wabash and TMC play in conferences that are clearly a bit down this year, so it's hard to get a really good read on either team, and struggling to get by Oberlin ('Bash) and St. Vincent (TMC) makes it hard for me to believe that either team warrants a Top 10 ranking.  Yes, I can understand that teams will have an off day, but that sort of "off day" in a tougher conference would result in a loss. 

I find TMC's struggles a bit worse than those of Wabash - 'Bash was way ahead of Oberlin and fell asleep at the switch, while TMC trailed at halftime and was arguably outplayed overall by St. Vincent.  And don't give me that "St. Vincent is better than some people realize" excuse - they lost the next week to an 0-6 Grove City team.

I'm shocked to see how far Illinois Wesleyan dropped after losing to North Central.  They're 6-1 (with the lone less coming vs. #6 NCC and with a head-to-head win over #13 Wheaton) and somehow that's not worthy of a ranking in the top 15?  Personally, I think that teams like IWU, St. Olaf, and UW-Oshkosh have a more impressive season to date than Wabash and TMC.

[wally_wabash]

The big game in my eyes is this weekend - the wonderful trip to Meadville. That's where the Witt / Huntingdon comparisons will come into play - how does this LG team react to a long road trip.

I'm not sure a game against Allegheny provides a fair comparison to a game against Huntingdon.  Huntingdon is a much, much better team. 

IMHO, Wabash must beat Witt convincingly, like Huntingdon did, for the LG's to maintain their place in the Top 25.

I'm also not sure it's fair to compare MOV's between Witt/Huntingdon and Witt/Wabash.  Huntingdon is a non-league game, against an unfamiliar opponent, after a looooong bus ride whereas Wabash is a league game, for a conference championship, against a familiar opponent and a bitter rival.  The contexts are way different between those two games. 

[bashbrother]

IMHO, Wabash must beat Witt convincingly, like Huntingdon did, for the LG's to maintain their place in the Top 25.

Anyone looking for a blowout win here, may be dissappointed.... Wabash/Witt has turned into a true rivalry, turf battle game....with a conference title riding on it virtually every year.  The games in this series have been decided by a total of 93 points the last 10 years..... (9.3 ppg avg.) (6 of the 10 by a TD or less)  In the last 5 meetings, their games have been decided by (6.4 ppg).  Don't know what your definition of convincingly is,  but just like the St. Thomas/Bethel game,  one can't be too disappointed with St. Thomas for only winning by 10.  (A game most expected to be a larger victory for the Tommies) 

Wabash has split their regular season series with Witt 5 - 5 over the last 10.   (Overall in the Past 10 years, Bash is 6 and 5, with a playoff victory over the Tigers in 2002)

[smedindy]

Yes, Wally, Huntingdon is better. But this is a conference game, it's a long trip, the Gators had the bye week and interesting things happen in Meadville. I wouldn't be surprised if the score is as close as it was in 2007 or 2005. But if it's a score like 2007 or 2005, the voters may punish Wabash.

The Salisbury / Wesley game could squeeze Wabash as well, depending on how close the game is and who wins. Cal Lutheran's impressive performances of late also will weigh in there. I can see Wabash winning, and dropping spots.

At any rate, anyone under Linfield can't be too confident to keep their ranking based on merely winning.

[wally_wabash]

It would seem to me that the voters have already decided how they feel about Wabash.  Some who like to see teams play and beat strong teams will place Wabash behind teams that play in better leagues.  Others who think Wabash is good and are going to believe that and vote accordingly whether or not Wabash wins by 3 or 13 or 30 this weekend.  That's the nature of the beast for teams that play in leagues that aren't particularly deep. 

You said it yourself...somebody has to be ranked in that hole behind Wesley and North Central.  There really isn't any team that you can put at 8 or 9 that somebody somewhere wouldn't say "you know, that seems a little high for (insert undefeated team in a bottom heavy league or 1-loss team from a top heavy league here)."  Maybe we should just have 7 teams in the top 10 and then start renumbering at 11 after that.  Seems like people get itchy when teams that aren't the usual suspects step into that top 10.   

[K-Mack]

Good posts.

Wabash and Thomas More are "usual suspects" though -- at least top 15 if not top 10. We do often have this "no way that's the No. 8 team in the country" thing crop up, and voters feel more comfortbale, IMO, when there's a good win on the resume -- or two or three by this point in the season.

[wally_wabash]

Good posts.

Wabash and Thomas More are "usual suspects" though -- at least top 15 if not top 10. We do often have this "no way that's the No. 8 team in the country" thing crop up, and voters feel more comfortbale, IMO, when there's a good win on the resume -- or two or three by this point in the season.

This is true...it just seems like most people are ok with TMC or Wabash being somewhere between 11-15, but when they get into the top 10 we all have a hey-wait-a-minute-here moment.  There's that perceptual difference between top 15 and top 10 that gets in the way. 

For the record, I don't think one philosophy of voting in this scenario is better than the other.  Wabash's game at Allegheny, IMO,  is pretty inconsequential as it relates to next week's rankings (unless of course things go really sideways).  If Salisbury beats Wesley, they're going to jump up ahead of Wabash and probably TMC regardless of Wabash's MOV against Allegheny.  And who could argue?  They'd have a signature win and an equivalent record against a way better schedule.  Is it Wabash's fault that they don't have better SOS metrics?  No.  But it also isn't the fault of voters who like factor in things like quality of opponent to put a ceiling on how they're willing to go with a team like Wabash. 

[Ralph Turner]

The big game in my eyes is this weekend - the wonderful trip to Meadville. That's where the Witt / Huntingdon comparisons will come into play - how does this LG team react to a long road trip.

I'm not sure a game against Allegheny provides a fair comparison to a game against Huntingdon.  Huntingdon is a much, much better team. 

IMHO, Wabash must beat Witt convincingly, like Huntingdon did, for the LG's to maintain their place in the Top 25.

I'm also not sure it's fair to compare MOV's between Witt/Huntingdon and Witt/Wabash.  Huntingdon is a non-league game, against an unfamiliar opponent, after a looooong bus ride whereas Wabash is a league game, for a conference championship, against a familiar opponent and a bitter rival.  The contexts are way different between those two games.

Thanks for the comparison and comment. I have Wabash at #13 on the Fan Poll and the 4th North Region team.  Yes,  I am wary of that ranking, just like my vote for TMC at #9.

By convincingly, I realize that this is a rivalry game with the conference title on the line, but a #13 Wabash team versus a Witt team that is not receiving votes should have the game in control, and be recognized as such by our posters who have seen 20-30 Wabash Wittenberg games, including the ones that they played in.   

[smedindy]

Ralph,

The issue for me is that Witt is not playing to potential, at all. For whatever reason they're not playing as well as they should. Not even close. They have a nagging tendency to let teams hang around, and absolutely stunk at Huntingdon.

But I always take rivalry games into consideration, especially in-conference rivalries, and I think he voters do as well. And Witt and Wabash will be playing for an "A" bid (no offense to Allegheny or Wooster) and Witt will have a week off before Wabash. I know darn well that they've got tapes on the first half of Wash U. the second half of Oberlin and the first half of Denison to study.

So if Wabash wins a 21-17 squeaker, I don't think it's a reflection on Wabash's unworthiness as a top 10 school, much like Oshkosh's close shave didn't diminish (on the whole) Whitewater's claim to #1.

Great teams can win when having a bad game. And this year, it seems teams below the Top 5 are having their share of them.

[Ralph Turner]

The Top 25 is out.

[Ralph Turner]

The Final top 25 is out.

I plotted the Final Top 25 to the brackets and came up with this "scoring", applying the Top 25 ranking as a score for the team.

The 6 "not-receiving votes" teams that made the playoffs were given a value of "41".

UMHB bracket = 103 points   [lowest ranked team was Hobart at "receiving votes #26"]
UMU bracket  =  173 points  [one not-receiving votes (NRV) team]
Tommies bracket = 178 points [two NRV teams]
UWW bracket  =  181 points [three NRV teams]

In the second round...

UMHB bracket = 28 points
UMU braceket = 33 points
UWW bracket =  35 points
Tommies bracket =  47 points.

[Ralph Turner]

Trinity TX still receiving votes (2) is still weird They have two ugly losses.

[jknezek]

Trinity TX still receiving votes (2) is still weird They have two ugly losses.

I think we can consider those "historical respect" votes. I don't have any other way of rationalizing them.