Liberty League

[stlawus]

I'll DM you, don't want to put any public pressure or speculation on anyone that doesn't want it at this point.

[kevdog]

Yes that true. Thanks.

[Saint of Old]

Just want to send my best wishes to Hobart as they battle on the national stage.
It is always a shame when we don't get at least 2 dancers out of the LL, but that is also a testament to the fierceness of our league.

Hoping Hobart puts it on a few people to show them that the region and league is deserving of much respect.

The entire team and especially the seniors should be extremely proud of what their hard work has achieved and there should be much more to come!

[PaulNewman]

Genuine question about the dearth of bids for the LL this year and in recent years...

I think many agree that the LL is a very good conference with strength that extends towards the bottom (aside from Bard in the past and a down spell for Union that ended this year).

What do you LL experts think accounts for the variance with other conferences that are strong pretty much across the board like NESCAC and UAA and even Centennial in terms of accumulating the preferred stats and getting bids or even being considered in the mix to get bids?  How do NESCAC and UAA teams perennially have high SoS, partly off playing each other, and end up with so many bids?  If the LL suffers because the teams in it beat each other up too much then why does that dynamic not transfer in the same way compared to these other conferences?

[College Soccer Observer]

I will take a stab at it from the NESCAC point of view. The 4 Nescac teams that got bids were Midd, Amherat, Conn, and Tufts. Midd and Conn did not lose a game in the regular season. Amherst lost to Babson and Conn. Tufts lost to Midd and Amherst. The rest of the league did not beat them up.

[PaulNewman]

I will take a stab at it from the NESCAC point of view. The 4 Nescac teams that got bids were Midd, Amherat, Conn, and Tufts. Midd and Conn did not lose a game in the regular season. Amherst lost to Babson and Conn. Tufts lost to Midd and Amherst. The rest of the league did not beat them up.

That may help explain this year but there are other years where NESCAC is more jumbled especially after the top couple of spots and they've still gotten 4-5 teams in.  And we often hear the same refrain from NESCAC followers that its teams face the murderer's row that is the NESCAC....teams from NESCAC and UAA also often have records that are 9-4-4 or 8-5-2 and they get bids.

[PaulNewman]

One also could argue that at least at the presumed top end of LL the teams play a tougher non-conference schedule than NESCACs with the possible exception of Amherst (and there's only so much you can milk Montclair and Babson).  Yes, I know NESCAC has a week less to play but the argument often is that just playing each other is enough (but for whatever reason that doesn't work for LL).

Hobart -- Muhlenberg, Mary Washington, Hopkins, Rochester, Buffalo St

SLU -- Geneseo, Cortland St, Oneonta St, Plattsburgh

Vassar -- West Conn, New Paltz St, Montclair St, Drew, Brandeis, Middlebury

[Flying Weasel]

PN, I've wondered the same thing often, but never did a deep dive to try to develop a theory.  And I won't be doing it at this moment either.  What I will say . . .

(1) It's hard to compare the Liberty League to the UAA because of how the UAA is spread across so many regions.  Not to mention, the UAA has simply been a stronger conference in recent memory.

(2) The NESCAC over the past decade or so has become the strongest conference in the nation and far ahead of all but the UAA (and maybe the Centennial in some years).  That in and of itself makes a comparison between the two conferences less insightful, but another big/significant difference is that the NESCAC dominates their region while the LL has to share Region III honors with the SUNYAC and Rochester with their perpetual tournament berth.  This simply means that there are fewer teams genuinely fighting for a spot in the rankings and at-large berths in Region I and it's dominated by NESCACs.  What this means is that the NESCAC schools can pick up more wins and ties versus ranked opponents and can do it just be playing their conference schedule (and playoffs).  With the SUNYAC in their region, LL teams have much fewer chances for these crucial wins/ties against ranked teams unless they schedule SUNYAC schools and besides Oneonta and Cortland, who knows which other SUNYACs will be ranked in a given year (just like how would you know which LL teams would be most beneficial to have on your schedule ahead of time).  I imagine if you took the top 7 teams that missed getting ranked in Region III, they would be on the whole better than the next seven in Region I, but for Region III and LL teams, having a deeper region (even if not as strong at the top) provides no benefit to their RvR, but it does add additional risk of picking up blemishes.

(3) I think the better comparisons/contrasts to look into are with the Centennial, MIAC, SUNYAC, also the NCAC (and this year the OAC).

Sometimes I wonder if it's a matter of too much parity within the league each year instead of just over time.  In other words, would it be better if just 2-4 LL teams rose to the top in any given season.  It's great that from year to year different programs can be successful, but if too many are good but not great in a given year and beat up on each other, it hurts your chances in a region shared with the SUNYAC.  Without actually studying data, I have the sense that most of these other conferences (1) don't typically have as many teams in the mix year-in, year-out and (2) don't have as much or as quick turnover of who the top teams are from year to year.

If someone did a deep dive, you'd need to look at out-of-conference scheduling league-wide versus those other conferences.  The Region III schools have less scheduling options (with no schools to the north or west) than Region IV and V schools, but Region VIII schools (home of the MIAC) has the issue of distance.

Well, I don't have the time or energy to really dig into it even though it has fascinated and perplexed me over the years.  Well, I'm just rambling and talking off the top of my head FWIW.

[stlawus]

What's that quote from Jack Nicholson in The Departed?  "And if I can slander my own environment, it makes me sad".  Simply put the Liberty League is a step below the NESCAC and UAA on the whole.  While the top half/two thirds of the league generally plays a decently strong schedule, the difference between it and the NESCAC/UAA is that the Liberty League loses more of those games.  So while they'll get the SOS they don't get win %, the RR wins and head to head comparisons.  When it comes time for the league to cannibalize itself it results in teams losing regionally ranked criteria that a NESCAC or UAA would otherwise keep. 

The furthest a LL team has got in a decade or so is RPI's elite 8 run in 2019.  Other than that, it's usually been a sweet 16 or lower run for Liberty League teams.  A great league that I'm proud to be a fan of, but the Liberty League will always have those slight recruiting disadvantages compared to the NESCAC and UAA which creates the dynamic I just explained.

[PaulNewman]

PN, I've wondered the same thing often, but never did a deep dive to try to develop a theory.  And I won't be doing it at this moment either.  What I will say . . .

(1) It's hard to compare the Liberty League to the UAA because of how the UAA is spread across so many regions.  Not to mention, the UAA has simply been a stronger conference in recent memory.

(2) The NESCAC over the past decade or so has become the strongest conference in the nation and far ahead of all but the UAA (and maybe the Centennial in some years).  That in and of itself makes a comparison between the two conferences less insightful, but another big/significant difference is that the NESCAC dominates their region while the LL has to share Region III honors with the SUNYAC and Rochester with their perpetual tournament berth.  This simply means that there are fewer teams genuinely fighting for a spot in the rankings and at-large berths in Region I and it's dominated by NESCACs.  What this means is that the NESCAC schools can pick up more wins and ties versus ranked opponents and can do it just be playing their conference schedule (and playoffs).  With the SUNYAC in their region, LL teams have much fewer chances for these crucial wins/ties against ranked teams unless they schedule SUNYAC schools and besides Oneonta and Cortland, who knows which other SUNYACs will be ranked in a given year (just like how would you know which LL teams would be most beneficial to have on your schedule ahead of time). I imagine if you took the top 7 teams that missed getting ranked in Region III, they would be on the whole better than the next seven in Region I, but for Region III and LL teams, having a deeper region (even if not as strong at the top) provides no benefit to their RvR, but it does add additional risk of picking up blemishes.

(3) I think the better comparisons/contrasts to look into are with the Centennial, MIAC, SUNYAC, also the NCAC (and this year the OAC).

Sometimes I wonder if it's a matter of too much parity within the league each year instead of just over time.  In other words, would it be better if just 2-4 LL teams rose to the top in any given season.  It's great that from year to year different programs can be successful, but if too many are good but not great in a given year and beat up on each other, it hurts your chances in a region shared with the SUNYAC.  Without actually studying data, I have the sense that most of these other conferences (1) don't typically have as many teams in the mix year-in, year-out and (2) don't have as much or as quick turnover of who the top teams are from year to year.

If someone did a deep dive, you'd need to look at out-of-conference scheduling league-wide versus those other conferences.  The Region III schools have less scheduling options (with no schools to the north or west) than Region IV and V schools, but Region VIII schools (home of the MIAC) has the issue of distance.

Well, I don't have the time or energy to really dig into it even though it has fascinated and perplexed me over the years.  Well, I'm just rambling and talking off the top of my head FWIW.

Thanks, FW.  Very helpful, especially imo the highlighted portion above.

[PaulNewman]

What's that quote from Jack Nicholson in The Departed?  "And if I can slander my own environment, it makes me sad".  Simply put the Liberty League is a step below the NESCAC and UAA on the whole.  While the top half/two thirds of the league generally plays a decently strong schedule, the difference between it and the NESCAC/UAA is that the Liberty League loses more of those games.  So while they'll get the SOS they don't get win %, the RR wins and head to head comparisons.  When it comes time for the league to cannibalize itself it results in teams losing regionally ranked criteria that a NESCAC or UAA would otherwise keep. 

The furthest a LL team has got in a decade or so is RPI's elite 8 run in 2019.  Other than that, it's usually been a sweet 16 or lower run for Liberty League teams.  A great league that I'm proud to be a fan of, but the Liberty League will always have those slight recruiting disadvantages compared to the NESCAC and UAA which creates the dynamic I just explained.

Also helpful...and btw it was never my intention to suggest that LL is on the level of NESCAC or UAA but more to address the refrain heard from NESCAC and LL folks at times that their own conference is their worst enemy...although in the case of NESCAC the opposite seems to hold for the most part.  For you LL folks, that's tough to the extent that it is true that you have a very competitive conference (among yourselves) without getting much benefit out of it (in terms of rankings, bids, etc at least).

[PaulNewman]

I have a math phobia, and this is slightly off-topic, but my sense is that some schools are masters at perennially scheduling one of the top two out of the weakest conferences as a way to boost or mitigate SoS...but the schedules of those teams that include the 2-15 teams in their conference also figures in.  I do know that a couple of 1-16 or 3-14 teams on the schedule can do a lot of SoS damage.  And sometimes you just don't know.  You could have Centre the year the make the Final Four or a subsequent season where they are below .500.

[Flying Weasel]

All that said (and to be honest I'm not sure of the data bears out that Region III teams have a harder time piling up ranked win/ties), probably the biggest question to answer is why are the SOS among Region III ranked teams general and significantly lower than Region I/NESCAC schools.  And that's why I said any deep dive needs to look at non-conference scheduling between the different conferences (in additional to how differently the conference schedule that you can't control does or doesn't widen the gap).  In other words, do the bottom teams in the NESCAC schedule tougher non-conference schedules (the OOWP contribution to SOS) to help compensate for their lower winning pct. (the OWP portion of SOS) than the bottom teams in the Liberty League.  IIRC, Union's schedule has been considered embarrassingly weak over the years and that impacts the SOS of the teams that play them.   If the bottom LL teams have similar win pcts. to the bottom NESCAC schools, but generally play weaker schedules, that all impacts their opponents' SOS.

Again, just thinking out loud.

[soccerpapa]

How is SoS even calculated?  Historical? 

[stlawus]

How is SoS even calculated?  Historical?

You multiply your opponents' win percentage by 2/3 and multiply your opponents' opponents win percentage by 1/3, then add the two values together.