NCAA North Region

Durantula · October 29, 2014, 03:21:33 PM

The St Olaf vs carleton regular season game will be important. if St Olaf ties or loses it will be hard for them to get an at large bid.

Durantula · October 29, 2014, 03:23:10 PM

Also Wartburg beating St Olaf and Gustavus head to head will make it hard for them to get the bid over Wartburg

PaulNewman · October 31, 2014, 01:22:22 PM

We've focused on Luther being dropped out of the regional rankings. What about St Scholastica? Not a great SOS but wins over two of the UWs and also Carleton and only losses to Trinity (TX) and GAC. A 16-2 team that is 12-0 in the their conference.

dontshootthegoose · October 31, 2014, 01:36:12 PM

The problem with St. Scholastica is that their conference is probably one of the worst in the nation. Secondly, of the 3 regionally ranked opponents they have faced, they lost two of them. The only real win they have is against Oshkosh, who themselves are looking from the outside in. But with Scholastica's case, they will receive an AQ for winning their conference, so truthfully regional rankings for them aren't a concern.

Flying Weasel · October 31, 2014, 02:40:08 PM

St. Scholastica has an even lower SOS than Luther.

And speaking of Luther's SOS, it's only going to go down with this week's games against Dubuque and Central. Not getting the #2 seed wasn't especially bad for them as it means an extra game against a sub-.300 Central. Ouch! Sure, maybe most of their previous opponents have winning weeks to compensate some, but they're adding two sub-.500 opponents and that's gonna keep their SOS under .500. And, no, I'm not ready to buy the NCAA committee's denial of an SOS threshold (OK, I'm sure there's no official policy they are bound to follow--that would be in the Pre-Championships Manual, but it could be more of a general, informal, non-binding, verbal agreement among committee members). Luther dropping like that has no other reasonable explanation.

Anyway, if Luther wasn't gonna get the #2 seed, it may have been better to have tied Dubuque on Tuesday night so they would have dropped to the #4 seed getting Simpson and their .667 winning pct. in the conference semifinals which may have helped Luther's SOS get back over .500 or at least would have kept it very close so that a semifinal game vs. #1 Loras would have gotten them over .500.

But as it is, Luther, needs to beat Wartburg in the semifinals, not so much for the win and the win vs. ranked, but for the extra game versus Loras and the .861 winning pct. which combined with the Wartburg's win pct. from the semifinal should more than compensate for this week's games and get their SOS back over .500. That combined with the additional win vs. ranked from the semifinal could be their ticket to an at-large berth if they wouldn't win in the final.

casualfan · November 02, 2014, 08:26:36 PM

UWO-UWW tied 1-1 in a bit of an unexciting affair for this rivalry. The strong wind was a factor most of the game with each team putting one in while attacking with the wind at their backs. Hard to tell who was the stronger team because of this factor. UWW keeps the edge over UWO for the Pool B bid, but UWO gets the #1 seed for the conference tournament. The basically meaningless WIAC Tournament may actually have some meaning if UWW & UWO meet for a second time.

dontshootthegoose · November 02, 2014, 08:36:35 PM

Although the IIAC teams had off this weekend, there were still some games.

1. Loras (13-2-1)
2. Wartburg (10-3-4)
3. UWW (12-3-4) - Beat Marian 3-0, Beat Platteville 2-0, and tied Oshkosh 1-1
4. St. Olaf (12-4-2) - Beat Augsburg 2-1, Lost at Carleton 3-2
5. GAC (13-4-1) - Beat Bethel 7-1, Beat Hamline 4-0
6. Oshkosh (12-5-2) - tied at Whitewater 1-1
7. St. Thomas (11-6)- Beat Superior 1-0, Beat Concordia 3-0.

Thoughts?

casualfan · November 02, 2014, 09:01:40 PM

UWW should jump Wartburg in Wednesday's rankings. GAC & and possibly UWO jump St. Olaf. Curious if Luther will be left off again..

Durantula · November 02, 2014, 09:57:00 PM

Luther only played Central, so they will have an even worse SOS. It would be pretty inconsistent by the committee to go back and rank them

repete · November 02, 2014, 09:59:58 PM

Quote from: dontshootthegoose on November 02, 2014, 08:36:35 PM
Although the IIAC teams had off this weekend, there were still some games.

1. Loras (13-2-1)
2. Wartburg (10-3-4)
3. UWW (12-3-4) - Beat Marian 3-0, Beat Platteville 2-0, and tied Oshkosh 1-1
4. St. Olaf (12-4-2) - Beat Augsburg 2-1, Lost at Carleton 3-2
5. GAC (13-4-1) - Beat Bethel 7-1, Beat Hamline 4-0
6. Oshkosh (12-5-2) - tied at Whitewater 1-1
7. St. Thomas (11-6)- Beat Superior 1-0, Beat Concordia 3-0.

Thoughts?

Yeah, don't ever confuse SJU with USTd ....

dontshootthegoose · November 02, 2014, 10:39:06 PM

Santa Cruz just lost to Trinity Texas, making them 1-3-0 against Ranked Opponents. Looks like it's between Whitewater and Oshkosh for the pool B bid.

D3 Scout · November 03, 2014, 09:50:29 AM

Had the chance to see UWW play UWO on Sunday and like Casual Fan pointed out it was a boring game. There might have been 2 or 3 shots from the run of play. Everything else came from set pieces. UWW every chance they get sends their big guys forwards and wants to battle for headers in the box. UWO sat in and wanted to play a counter attacking style that did not seem to bother the UWW defense. UWW gave up a bad goal on a miscommunication between the center back and goalie. UWW should have won 1-0.

Overall I do believe UWW is the better team and in the drivers seat for the NCAA Tournament. They have figured out their problems on defense for the most part and they create a lot of opportunities to get the ball in the box through their long throws and long free kicks. This style is not the most appealing but come tournament time when you need to win games pretty doesnt always do it. I think the Loras faithful can attest to this.

casualfan · November 03, 2014, 12:17:25 PM

UC-Santa Cruz going down was exactly what UWW & UWO needed. As I was watching the live stats, it was a bit worrying that it was 0-0 with 15 minutes left. That should take the Banana Slugs out of the Pool B running with a 11-6-1 overall record, 7-4 in D3, and a 1-3 record vs ranked opponents.

Taking a closer look between UWW & UWO at the time of the Oct. 29th rankings...

Wis.-Oshkosh 12-5-1 Wis.-Whitewater 10-3-3
( 0.694) ( 0.719)
Record vs. RO's 0-2-1 Record vs. RO's 3-1-0
( 0.167) (0.750)
SOS 0.558 SOS 0.568

And then current records...

Wis.-Oshkosh 12-5-2 Wis.-Whitewater 12-3-4
( 0.684) ( 0.737)
Record vs. RO's 0-2-2 Record vs. RO's 3-1-1
( 0.250) ( 0.700)

SOS is too complicated for me to calculate.

WIAC Tournament Schedule

#4 UW-Platteville @ #1 UWO
#3 UW-Superior @ #2 UWW

UWO should easily get by UWP especially without Platteville's starting GK who was red carded against UWW.
UWW will have trouble with UWS. If they lose to UWS, is 12-4-4 enough? I'm not sure especially if UWO wins the final 2 to go 14-5-2.

Thoughts?

gustiefan04 · November 03, 2014, 12:41:17 PM

Record vs. Ranked Opponents appears really hurts UWO. I think UWW has it pretty locked up, unless they lose early in the WIAC touney and UWO wins the whole thing. Then maybe UWO has a shot to steal the Pool B. But right now, UWW should be feeling pretty good about their chances of making the NCAA's, especially given then higher NCAA Regional Ranking as of last week.

dontshootthegoose · November 03, 2014, 02:03:24 PM

There is also a very slight chance that one of these teams could steal a Pool C bid. Let's say UWW loses to Superior, and Oshkosh wins the conference. UWW goes to 12-4-4 with still a 3-1-1 record vs ranked and Oshkosh gets to 14-5-2 but still has the 0-2-2 record vs ranked. So Oshkosh would grab the Pool B, would UWW qualify for a Pool C or even with these loses does their resume look better than Oshkosh's for the Pool B? Very interesting.