NESCAC

[All NESCAC]

Willimas dominates WNEC 4to 1. Shots 32to 3.  Westling 3 goals this weekend for Ephman.  Amherst dominates Gordon 5 to 0.  NESCAC showing its quality.  Still believe Wesleyan/Bowdoin/Middlebury/Conn/tufts were better teams than many who received NCAA bids.....shame they had to miss the party this year but the league is the best in New England by far.  Go Ephman and Lord Jeffs..

[amh63]

Agreed!  The last goal was made on pure effort by the backup Amherst goalie who was put in along with an entire new team in the last few minutes..it seems.  In any case, the backup goalie got time on the offensive side....surprising the announcers a little who thought Bull would be taken out in the last 5 minutes of the game. played on a damp cold field.  Gordon was still attacking until the end....so I guess Bull was being left in to complete a shutout.  Good win for Amherst....no injuries reported.  Saw only the 2nd half and heard it was a little rough in the first half.

[1970s NESCAC Player]

SLU's 8-0 dismantling of a previously pretty good Wheaton team sets up a final four caliber Sweet 16 match up with Amherst.  It's a shame that other quality Liberty League and NESCAC teams get squeezed out by AQs from such obviously inferior leagues. . .

[CacCaptain]

Seconding AllNescac and Colby Union. Sorry for the rant...

A year like this is simply infuriating for the Nescac teams left out of the dance. I can only help but think there'd be 4-5 CAC teams still left if they had been given bids.

All you need to do is look at Williams' schedule. 13 Nescac games and ONLY ONE decided by more than a goal. Of course Amherst had a few 2 and 3 goal Nescac wins but results like the Hamilton and Conn ties further go to show the Nescac's strength.

Amherst + Williams outscoring teams 16-1 through 4 games. Simply a disgrace to see Gordon college and other teams in there over Wesleyan/Conn/Tufts/Bowdoin.

[lastguyoffthebench]

Isn't there usually a list of the Pool C teams... which team was the last one in? 

[PaulNewman]

CacCapt, seems a little harsh, especially given that NESCAC usually gets 4 and at least 3.  What does the regional cmte do with a Gordon that is like 18-1 or 18-2?  They also had a solid first round win.  WNEC had Williams in trouble so the final score is deceiving.  The NESCAC women got 5.  It's all in the regional rankings and there were teams that took losses during the year like Dickinson, F&M, Brandeis, etc which managed to keep high regional rankings. 

Who was the strongest team that didn't get in?  I wouldn't say a NESCAC team.  DePauw and North Park are the first ones that come to mind for me.

[lastguyoffthebench]

Calvin got shafted.   They lost to OWU, Kenyon, Loras first 3 games of season, Hope, and Kalamazoo.   (Rutgers-Newark got in with L to RU-C (2x), Montclair, SIT, Plattsburgh)

DePauw with only losses to OWU and Oberlin...

Emory had a case over MIT and Miseri.

[Saint of Old]

I also think that Skidmore is a strong squad, who should be dancing next season.

WNEC is a solid program. I concur the Williams score seems a bit sdecieving, although the best team probably did win.

[PaulNewman]

Calvin is a good team with a great player, but they let in a ton of goals.  That was their undoing.

If you're going to talk about the other NESCACs then you need to compare not just to the regional teams with great records that may have  suspect SOSs.  You have to ask if any of them should have gotten in over other similar strong teams that also didn't get in, and as suggested there are quite a few -- DePauw, North Park, Wash U, Emory, St. Olaf, Calvin, Denison, Oglethorpe, Carthage, Haverford, Swat, etc.  Haverford and Swat actually finished ahead of F&M and Dickinson in their conference.  And that's not even including ranked teams that didn't get in like Randolph and Texas-Dallas.

[PaulNewman]

Oh, sorry, and yeah I forgot Union, Skidmore, Vassar and RPI who probably all compare pretty favorably with mid-table NESCAC.

[All NESCAC]

Did any of those touting WNEC actually see the game vs Williams?  I did.  Williams absolutely DOMINATED the game it wasn't as close as the 4 to 1 score.....they outshot them 33 to 3....repeat 33 to 3....no contest.  The NESCAC league and top 7 teams this year are superior to any other new England teams except Brandeis (very good team)....should all 7 teams be in the dance probably not just because of sheer numbers but definitely 4 or 5 should be in like the women's side.  NESCAC teams typically win 90% of there non league regular season games.  Year in year out top to bottom nescac league is in the top 3 D3 leagues EVERY YEAR. If they played 4 more non league games the dominence would be evev greater. Go Eph and Go Lord Jeff.

[PaulNewman]

Disagree.  Historically NESCAC gets plenty of love (as it should).  Are there too many AQs?  Sure.  Were there some teams in New England region probably ranked too high (in hindsight)?  Perhaps.  But you're looking at this too locally.

Let's look at some records of the teams you are talking about vs other notables who didn't get in and then explain how NESCAC 3-7 trumps more than half of the other omissions listed below.

Middlebury -- 9-5-1
Wesleyan -- 9-6-1 (with losses to regional teams who got in)
Tufts -- 8-5-2
Bowdoin -- 8-4-4
CC -- 8-5-2

DePauw -- 14-2-3
Calvin -- 14-5-1
Union -- 12-3-2
Haverford -- 11-5-2
Swat -- 12-5-4
Chris Newport -- 13-5-2
North Park -- 11-5-3
Emory -- 11-5-2
Wash U -- 10-4-3
RPI -- 11-5-2
Skidmore -- 12-6-2
Denison -- 12-4-3
John Carroll -- 15-4-1

You don't just have to beat out teams in your region.  You have to beat out teams in other regions as well.

[All NESCAC]

Add 4 more wins to each of these nescac teams if they played 18 games and they would have the requisite wins and winning %...with only 14 game schedule these superior teams are at a severe disadvantage vs rest of field in getting a bid.....yet even with that disadvantage I would take them vs any other #3-7 from any other league.

[lastguyoffthebench]

NESCAC is very hard to gauge because of the limited schedule and strictly in-region games.  The NE region is "fairly" weak, aside from the NESCAC... so any out of conference games should be wins.

I would love to see the NJAC and NESCAC have something similar to the ACC-B10 Challenge...   Mix up the match-ups, but below is the seeding.  I would put the NJAC about even with the NESCAC:

RU-C vs Amherst
Montclair St. vs Williams  (both played WNEC)... MSU won 2-0   Williams 4-1
RU-N vs Middlebury   
TCNJ vs Wesleyan
Stockton vs Tufts
WPU vs Bowdoin


8th place Ramapo lost in 2 OT at ECSU... (a team that tied Wesleyan on the Road this year)

Last place Kean beat Kenyon this year, lost to Rochester, lost to OWU (badly).

[PaulNewman]

It's not just about the relative strength of leagues.  No one (or hardly anyone) would contest that NESCAC is one of the top 2-3 leagues, if not the top league.  The issue in terms of actual bids comes down to specific teams.  Please tell me why Wesleyan at 9-6-1 should get in ahead of a Union at 12-3-2, DePauw at 14-2-3 or Calvin at 14-5-1.  Even if you add 3-4 wins to all of the NESCAC teams (which if they are going to play some tough non-league extra games you can't just assume), the number of "blemishes" are still high relative to other strong teams out of region.  I also agree with lastguy as I have said before.  Let's get the NESCAC alternating between 4-5 games per year against NJAC, Centennial and Liberty league teams.