D3 Top 25 Fan Poll

[bleedpurple]

Just a few observations of the differences between this week's Fan Poll and the D3Football.com poll:

1.  FP has UW-W a unanimous #1.  D3F has UW-W with 84% of 1st place votes.
2.  The Top 8 is identical in each poll, but Linfield is really pushing UMHB for 4th in the FP, while Wesley is pushing NCC for 6th in the D3F.
3. The voting broke Wabash's way this week in the FP, moving them from 14th to 9th.  They sit at 12th in D3F.
4.  D3F has Kean 10th. FP slower to believe at 13th.
5.  D3F dropped Bethel 4 spots and Wheaton a whopping 12 after losses.  FP dropped Bethel 5 and Wheaton 8.
6.  UW-Platteville and UW-Oshkosh much more highly regarded in Fan Poll than D3F.  Is that FP WIAC influence, or is D3F underestimating those teams?

Any thoughts? Other observations?

[BoBo]

6.  UW-Platteville and UW-Oshkosh much more highly regarded in Fan Poll than D3F.  Is that FP WIAC influence, or is D3F underestimating those teams?

Any thoughts? Other observations?

IMO FP WIAC influence (darn I was trying to write all that in abbrev.)!!

In the AFCA poll, UW-O is 31st with 51 votes, UW-EC is #36 with 23 votes, & UW-P is #37T with 5 votes.

[bleedpurple]

IMO FP WIAC influence (darn I was trying to write all that in abbrev.)!!

In the AFCA poll, UW-O is 31st with 51 votes, UW-EC is #36 with 23 votes, & UW-P is #37T with 5 votes.

To me, one of the fun things about looking at polls and filling out a ballot is to decide how much to weigh out the various factors.  In other words, how much do you hold a loss against a team? How much do you weigh or not weigh comparative scores? A big factor I look at is "Who would win head to head more often if a team played x times?"

In the "Who would win" category: What do people think UW-O's record would be against the following schedule?

Thomas More
Kean
Montclair State
Wittenberg
Cortland State
Delaware Valley
Illinois Wesleyan
John Hopkins
Salisbury
Alfred

I obviously don't know the answer myself. I will say that I believe UW-O would go 4-0 against the four teams NOT in the top 25 but receiving more votes than them in the D3F poll:

Hobart, Dubuque, St Olaf, Adrian

More WIAC bias or simply WIAC strength?

[emma17]

IMO FP WIAC influence (darn I was trying to write all that in abbrev.)!!

In the AFCA poll, UW-O is 31st with 51 votes, UW-EC is #36 with 23 votes, & UW-P is #37T with 5 votes.

To me, one of the fun things about looking at polls and filling out a ballot is to decide how much to weigh out the various factors.  In other words, how much do you hold a loss against a team? How much do you weigh or not weigh comparative scores? A big factor I look at is "Who would win head to head more often if a team played x times?"

In the "Who would win" category: What do people think UW-O's record would be against the following schedule?

Thomas More
Kean
Montclair State
Wittenberg
Cortland State
Delaware Valley
Illinois Wesleyan
John Hopkins
Salisbury
Alfred

I obviously don't know the answer myself. I will say that I believe UW-O would go 4-0 against the four teams NOT in the top 25 but receiving more votes than them in the D3F poll:

Hobart, Dubuque, St Olaf, Adrian

More WIAC bias or simply WIAC strength?

UW Oshkosh 242- The rest a negative 7.  Da Titans!
Bleed, I don't know how the mighty Titan would fare against the teams you listed, fact is, we WIACers never see those teams play.  D3 poll has Franklin at #25- and imo, Oshkosh beats them. 
This is where the comparative scores/6 degrees of separation/Kevin Bacon comes in to play.  Many of the teams on your list have had a run-in with teams we WIACers have seen play of late.  Thomas More, Mont St, Del Vall, Alfred have all been beaten badly by MHB, Wesley and Mt in the last year.  Comparatively, Oshkosh played a tighter game vs UWW (please don't pick on this point, I was at the game) and they certainly scored more vs Mt. 
This doesn't tell us who would win.  IMO the comparative scores at least justify WIACers bias.     

[emma17]

Ex Tartan- my son's game starts in 52 minutes, otherwise I'd be glad to point out the flaws of your arguement. I do have time to say this, the reason I showed wins and losses of opponents of the OAC was to demonstrate the flaw in the D 3 writers' inclusion of the "7-3 vs non conf" as if that should be impressive.
I'll give you plenty of other reasons why the CCIW's top 4 would blank the OAC's 2-5 teams when I have time.
Go Hawks

Is it a violation of board etiquette to reply to myself?  I owe this response to ExTart. 

5 reasons why I feel the CCIW is a better conference than the OAC (with or without Mt "lopped off", which was the original basis for this dicussion):
-As of today, both the D3 Poll and the Fan Poll list 3 CCIW teams in the top 25.  The "lopped off" OAC has 0, otherwise 1.   
-From '08-'10 (3 seasons)- 2 non Mt OAC teams made the playoffs, winning a combined 1 playoff game in the strecth.  3 CCIW teams made it, winning a combined 8 playoff games in the stretch.
-During same period, 3 CCIW teams won at least 1 playoff game.  Lopped off OAC only 1 team won a playoff game, otherwise 2. 
-During same period, the record of the top 5 teams in conference:  OAC (lopped off): 93-60.  CCIW:120-43.  Obviously Mt record will make a big difference.
-2011 record of all teams:  OAC:  22-18.  CCIW: 22-10 (7 teams at 3-1 or better). 
Ex Tartan, I agree that both the OAC and the CCIW play weak non conference schedules, which is why I place their 2011 results at the end.       

[ExTartanPlayer]

Is it a violation of board etiquette to reply to myself?  I owe this response to ExTart. 

-From '08-'10 (3 seasons)- 2 non Mt OAC teams made the playoffs, winning a combined 1 playoff game in the strecth.  3 CCIW teams made it, winning a combined 8 playoff games in the stretch.
-During same period, 3 CCIW teams won at least 1 playoff game.  Lopped off OAC only 1 team won a playoff game, otherwise 2. 

Fair point.  In particular, these points are probably your strongest - the fact that three different CCIW teams have won at least one playoff game in the past three seasons; I'm not sure any other conference can match that claim today.

My point was merely pointing out that your initial post (which, I understand, was brief) did not really present the argument in full; it seemed only fair, to me, that if you were going to use the weakness of the OAC's non-conference opponents to debunk the validity of their 7-3 nonconference record, then I should point out that the CCIW's non-conference opponents had a record that was equally poor.

*FWIW: I don't have a big beef with relatively "lightweight" nonconference scheduling in Division III, particularly in tough conferences like the CCIW and OAC where you're likely to be tested multiple times in-conference anyway, it's not easy to arrange a big nonconference showdown, and the margin for error in making the playoffs is very thin; lose a tough non-con game and you virtually HAVE to win your conference to get in, not an easy task if your conference schedule includes Wheaton/NorthCentral/IWU or (in better times for the OAC) Capital/Baldwin-Wallace type teams.

[emma17]

ExTart- I'm with you on the issue of lighter non conference schedules for teams in established conferences. NCC, Oshkosh, Platteville are 3 examples of teams that played tough non conf games, took a loss and now have almost no chance of playoffs if they lose in conference- unless committee is kind to 8-2's.

[Ron Boerger]

I know you guys think lightly of the SCAC (given that there are three teams without a loss with a total of 9 points in your poll) but would encourage you to keep an eye on those teams.  Birmingham-Southern has arguably the best results of the three but both Trinity and Centre have had their moments.   Should one of the three roll through the rest of the conference schedule undefeated, they'd certainly be worthy of some consideration for the lower rungs of the poll. 

Maybe one of these days a SCAC team will even win a playoff game again.   I guess if they're going to do it, it will have to be this year since, unless something dramatically unexpected happens, the conference won't have enough football teams for an automatic bid next year and competing with Wesley for the one B means .. Wesley gets it.

[emma17]

I know you guys think lightly of the SCAC (given that there are three teams without a loss with a total of 9 points in your poll) but would encourage you to keep an eye on those teams.  Birmingham-Southern has arguably the best results of the three but both Trinity and Centre have had their moments.   Should one of the three roll through the rest of the conference schedule undefeated, they'd certainly be worthy of some consideration for the lower rungs of the poll. 

Maybe one of these days a SCAC team will even win a playoff game again.   I guess if they're going to do it, it will have to be this year since, unless something dramatically unexpected happens, the conference won't have enough football teams for an automatic bid next year and competing with Wesley for the one B means .. Wesley gets it.

Ron, it's not that I think lightly of the conference, I just don't know much about it.  I'm all for new teams making a splash so I'll be rooting for some success there.

[jknezek]

I know you guys think lightly of the SCAC (given that there are three teams without a loss with a total of 9 points in your poll) but would encourage you to keep an eye on those teams.  Birmingham-Southern has arguably the best results of the three but both Trinity and Centre have had their moments.   Should one of the three roll through the rest of the conference schedule undefeated, they'd certainly be worthy of some consideration for the lower rungs of the poll. 

I watched the Centre vs W&L game. It was a good win for Centre. I think W&L will do well in the ODAC, possibly finishing first or second. Centre won by one TD at home and I rate the teams as about even at the time. Truly a game where the home team was going to win. I'll be interested to see how Centre does against Birmingham-Southern. I also have noticed that Sewanee, despite still having a losing record, is much improved over prior years. They didn't stack up well against W&L, but have played close games since, including a tight home loss to Birmingham-Southern. I definitely think Centre is worthy of being in the receiving votes category of the polls and look forward to hearing about their matchup this weekend in Birmingham. If I wasn't so busy getting the house ready for my daughter's second birthday I would be tempted to go to that game since it is in town. The winner of that match, if I voted, would be well inside my top 25. That being said, for W&L's SoS (which is pretty poor), I'm pulling for Centre to win out.

[smedindy]

Ron, I have three SCAC teams on my watch list. There's just a lot of teams at 5-0 or 4-1 that are worthy. What a year! I mean, when do we think Augsburg, or Dubuque, or another 'outside' team is real? Why did many of us think Illinois Wesleyan was due for a fall when they definitely have the goods! Wow.

(I guess for Augsburg and Dubuque, it's this week - Augies vs. Tommies and Wartburg clashes with Dubuque)

As for the WI - OSHKOSH scenario via Massey Ratings:

Oshkosh - 21
Thomas More - 33
Kean - 17
Montclair State - 35
Wittenberg - 45
Cortland State - 30
Delaware Valley - 18
Illinois Wesleyan - 19
John Hopkins - 16
Salisbury - 29
Alfred - 38
Hobart - 12
Dubuque - 34
St Olaf - 56
Adrian - 49

I think Oshkosh would be favored against St. Olaf and Adrian anywhere. Maybe against Alfred.

I think it'd be a home / road scenario for most teams (especially Witt, whose Massey rating is hurt by their lack of road prowess), and a team like Hobart would be a slight favorite anywhere according to an impartial analysis.

[K-Mack]

The poll should be fluid rather than just this team lost and falls down to there and every team moves up 1.

I've had a team win and still fall out out of the poll. My 4-5-6 order has been different in each of the last 3 polls without anyone losing.

I agree with this totally. I re-evaluate every week, and look at the entire body of work. Sometimes a win that boosted up a team earlier (let's say Wittenberg's 45-28 win against Capital) later looks less impressive because of that losing team's subsequent results.

It's probably tough as a team to wonder what you could have done besides win; same time, polls are just intervals along the way. If you keep winning, you will eventually get your just due in the poll.

[K-Mack]

Kean may not be the greatest 4-0 team, but they did give Wesley their only loss on the year. That's one of the few things we know for sure about these two.[/quote]

I tend to agree. While all polling is subjective, h2h wins and losses are absolute, and it has to be a pretty heavy bit of data and outstanding circumstance for me to ignore an h2h win. Or when it gets to be a triangle or quadrangle that h2h wins can no longer solve.

Right now the only h2h win I think my ballot ignores is St. Olaf-Bethel, and I might well correct that after this week.

As of now, Kean worries me, but I still have to keep them above Wesley. Redlands, even with the L to CLU, stays above North Central.

Probably won't stay that way all year, but based on what we know now, that's how I interpret it.

Other people clearly disagree with the "who woulda done what on a neutral field" thinking and such. It's valid, I suppose.

[Ralph Turner]

If we are considering the indexes, then how about some love for the ASC.

Massey (minus the NESCAC) has UMHB #2, McMurry #5, LaCollege #17.

Massey-BCS has UMHB #2, LaCollege #7 and McMurry #12.

Bornpowerindex has UMHB #3, LaCollege #10 and McMurry #12.

LazIndex has UMHB #4, LaCollege #8 and McMurry #20.

[02 Warhawk]

I see I'm still the only one giving Muskingum points so far.

It makes me feel not totally stupid knowing they are getting 17 points on the D3football.com poll.