2015 D3 Season: NATIONAL PERSPECTIVE

[lastguyoffthebench]

Pacific Lutheran with a chance for the AQ, I'd consider them biggest winners.
Mary Washington over CNU
Brockport St over Plattsburgh St.
Tufts over Williams
SLU over Skidmore
Kings over Eastern
Camden over Newark

[PaulNewman]

Pacific Lutheran with a chance for the AQ, I'd consider them biggest winners.
Mary Washington over CNU
Brockport St over Plattsburgh St.
Tufts over Williams
SLU over Skidmore
Kings over Eastern
Camden over Newark

Wow, you're right.  Pac Luth needs Puget Sound to beat Whitworth tomorrow and then they will need to beat Puget Sound themselves on their last game.  That would be something, but I'm also wondering if Pac Luth could play themselves into a Pool C even if Whitworth is clean.

[lastguyoffthebench]

Teams that could ill-afford slip ups:
Wesleyan 0-5 to Amherst
Newark 0-2 to Camden
Kean 0-2 to Stockton
CNU 1-2 to Mary Washington
Salisbury 0-0 to Frostburg St
Connecticut 1-2 to Bowdoin
RPI 1-2 to Vassar
Knox 1-2 to Monmouth

Teams that should be okay:
Eastern 0-1 to Kings
UWO - UWW loser
Plattsburgh St 2-3 to Brockport St

[PaulNewman]

And the UWs in OT in a 0-0 game (of course).

[PaulNewman]

NCAC Top 25 (thru 10/24)

1) Amherst
2) Calvin
3) Haverford
4) Franklin & Marshall
5) Montclair State
6) Thomas More
7) Brandeis
8) Kenyon
9) OWU
10) Oneonta State
11) Trinity (TX)
12) UW-Whitewater
13) Elizabethtown
14) Lycoming
15) Middlebury
16) Case Western
17) Stockton
18) Whitworth
19) Redlands
20) Macalester
21) Tufts
22) Wash U
23) Colorado College
24) MIT
25) Brockport State/Wheaton (Ill)/SLU/Loras (TIE) [Would make for a very solid Final Four!]

RV/Watch List (no order) -- Rowan, Kean, Messiah, Washington & Lee, ECSU, Randolph, Oglethorpe, Christopher Newport, Ohio Northern, Emory, Carnegie Mellon, Pacific Lutheran, Stevens, DePauw, Endicott, Gordon, Rose-Hulman, Texas-Dallas, Concordia (Wisc), Kalamazoo, North Park, Carthage, Cortland State, Plattsburgh State, Conn College, Bowdoin, Williams, Eastern, King's, Cabrini, UW-Oshkosh, UW-Superior, Greensboro, Rutgers-Camden, Rutgers-Newark, Methodist, Hobart, Skidmore, St Scholastica, UMass-Boston, Salisbury, Dickinson, Johns Hopkins, St Johns, Denison, York (PA), Westminster (MO), Morrisville, Keuka, Dominican, Milwaukee Engineering, Mt Aloysius, Penn State-Behrend, Wheaton (MA), Babson, Springfield, WPI, Bridgewater State, Roanoke, Wentworth, John Carroll, Capital, Wabash, Oberlin

[Golden_Fan]

Teams that could ill-afford slip ups:
Wesleyan 0-5 to Amherst
Newark 0-2 to Camden
Kean 0-2 to Stockton
CNU 1-2 to Mary Washington
Salisbury 0-0 to Frostburg St
Connecticut 1-2 to Bowdoin
RPI 1-2 to Vassar
Knox 1-2 to Monmouth

Teams that should be okay:
Eastern 0-1 to Kings
UWO - UWW loser
Plattsburgh St 2-3 to Brockport St

Plattsburgh will drop, they lost got dominated by geneseo the day before. Geneseo did not even make the conference tournament

[Dark Knight]

Calvin won again last night, 5-0, against 4-11-2 Adrian. They're cleaning up in the MIAA, with 26 goals for and 1 goal against in their last round through the MIAA (7 games). Other than Calvin, the MIAA doesn't have any team rated higher than #85 by Massey, though, and Calvin has played only one top-50 team this season. (And they didn't win.)

Still, it's fun to be able to say that they are undefeated since September 5, 2014, i.e. 36 games ago.

[PaulNewman]

And then there were three....the Keuka Wolfpack have fallen to Bryn Athyn 1-0 (I think, as Live Stats has been frozen at 1:41 of 2nd half for quite some time).  Keuka can still win the regular season in the NEAC in a showdown at home with nemesis Morrisville State on Saturday, and then the conference crown and AQ will be determined in the NEAC playoffs.

Amherst, the only unblemished team in the country, now joined as an unbeaten by only Calvin and Macalester.

[Nutmeg]

NCAC Top 25 (thru 10/24)

1) Amherst
2) Calvin
3) Haverford
4) Franklin & Marshall
5) Montclair State
6) Thomas More
7) Brandeis
8) Kenyon
9) OWU
10) Oneonta State
11) Trinity (TX)
12) UW-Whitewater
13) Elizabethtown
14) Lycoming
15) Middlebury
16) Case Western
17) Stockton
18) Whitworth
19) Redlands
20) Macalester
21) Tufts
22) Wash U
23) Colorado College
24) MIT
25) Brockport State/Wheaton (Ill)/SLU/Loras (TIE) [Would make for a very solid Final Four!]

RV/Watch List (no order) -- Rowan, Kean, Messiah, Washington & Lee, ECSU, Randolph, Oglethorpe, Christopher Newport, Ohio Northern, Emory, Carnegie Mellon, Pacific Lutheran, Stevens, DePauw, Endicott, Gordon, Rose-Hulman, Texas-Dallas, Concordia (Wisc), Kalamazoo, North Park, Carthage, Cortland State, Plattsburgh State, Conn College, Bowdoin, Williams, Eastern, King's, Cabrini, UW-Oshkosh, UW-Superior, Greensboro, Rutgers-Camden, Rutgers-Newark, Methodist, Hobart, Skidmore, St Scholastica, UMass-Boston, Salisbury, Dickinson, Johns Hopkins, St Johns, Denison, York (PA), Westminster (MO), Morrisville, Keuka, Dominican, Milwaukee Engineering, Mt Aloysius, Penn State-Behrend, Wheaton (MA), Babson, Springfield, WPI, Bridgewater State, Roanoke, Wentworth, John Carroll, Capital, Wabash, Oberlin

I would switch Tufts with Middlebury given that they beat them handily....

[PaulNewman]

Nutmeg, I understand your POV.  I already had Midd ranked and in my imaginary poll getting Tufts back well into my top 25 was a big jump for them already.  Midd also currently in 2nd in the NESCAC, and I probably wouldn't call a 1-0 win that was 0-0 through 55 minutes beating them handily (notwithstanding a final shot count of 13 to 3).  I would favor Tufts if they meet again but my rankings are not just based on who I think would beat who head to head.  As another example, I wouldn't necessarily favor Thomas More over Kenyon or OWU (the current OWU and not the one TMC beat previously), but I think, sitting here today, that TMC has earned a higher ranking on overall merit.

[Nutmeg]

Nutmeg, I understand your POV.  I already had Midd ranked and in my imaginary poll getting Tufts back well into my top 25 was a big jump for them already.  Midd also currently in 2nd in the NESCAC, and I probably wouldn't call a 1-0 win that was 0-0 through 55 minutes beating them handily (notwithstanding a final shot count of 13 to 3).  I would favor Tufts if they meet again but my rankings are not just based on who I think would beat who head to head.  As another example, I wouldn't necessarily favor Thomas More over Kenyon or OWU (the current OWU and not the one TMC beat previously), but I think, sitting here today, that TMC has earned a higher ranking on overall merit.

Understandable...

[PaulNewman]

Nutmeg, I understand your POV.  I already had Midd ranked and in my imaginary poll getting Tufts back well into my top 25 was a big jump for them already.  Midd also currently in 2nd in the NESCAC, and I probably wouldn't call a 1-0 win that was 0-0 through 55 minutes beating them handily (notwithstanding a final shot count of 13 to 3).  I would favor Tufts if they meet again but my rankings are not just based on who I think would beat who head to head.  As another example, I wouldn't necessarily favor Thomas More over Kenyon or OWU (the current OWU and not the one TMC beat previously), but I think, sitting here today, that TMC has earned a higher ranking on overall merit.

Understandable...

Also, one addendum/caveat to the above, and this is part of what makes soccer exciting, compelling, loved, disliked, confounding, etc....you can outplay an opponent, even substantially, and still lose.  And Midd, with their aerial abilities and danger on set pieces and capacity for a sudden strike against the run of play, I think is a particular team that could beat a Tufts (or anyone) even if "outplayed."  I think the NESCAC tournament this year is going to be special and very entertaining.  Amherst is going to be #1 in every real and mock poll in the country this week, unblemished in the NESCAC and overall, with some very capable and hungry teams who are trying to secure their own bids and who are familiar enough with Amherst to have no fear of the Lord Jeffs at all.  If Amherst is still unblemished at the end of the NESCAC tournament I will say right now that Serpone has my cyber-vote for national COY.

[Nutmeg]

Nutmeg, I understand your POV.  I already had Midd ranked and in my imaginary poll getting Tufts back well into my top 25 was a big jump for them already.  Midd also currently in 2nd in the NESCAC, and I probably wouldn't call a 1-0 win that was 0-0 through 55 minutes beating them handily (notwithstanding a final shot count of 13 to 3).  I would favor Tufts if they meet again but my rankings are not just based on who I think would beat who head to head.  As another example, I wouldn't necessarily favor Thomas More over Kenyon or OWU (the current OWU and not the one TMC beat previously), but I think, sitting here today, that TMC has earned a higher ranking on overall merit.

Understandable...

Also, one addendum/caveat to the above, and this is part of what makes soccer exciting, compelling, loved, disliked, confounding, etc....you can outplay an opponent, even substantially, and still lose.  And Midd, with their aerial abilities and danger on set pieces and capacity for a sudden strike against the run of play, I think is a particular team that could beat a Tufts (or anyone) even if "outplayed."  I think the NESCAC tournament this year is going to be special and very entertaining.  Amherst is going to be #1 in every real and mock poll in the country this week, unblemished in the NESCAC and overall, with some very capable and hungry teams who are trying to secure their own bids and who are familiar enough with Amherst to have no fear of the Lord Jeffs at all.  If Amherst is still unblemished at the end of the NESCAC tournament I will say right now that Serpone has my cyber-vote for national COY.

Regarding Serpone, I would reserve judgment to see how Amherst does in the NCAA tourney...

[PaulNewman]

Whitworth rebounds with a critical win at Puget Sound.  Meanwhile Texas-Dallas falters against Texas-Tyler 3-2.

And Randolph embroiled in a goalfest with Ferrum....3-3 at the half.

[PaulNewman]

Weather Alert:  Looks like games on Tuesday and especially many of the big slate of key games on Wednesday could be substantially impacted by very heavy rains Tuesday through Weds night (remnants of "Patricia").  Wonder how many might be moved to turf fields (if schools have them) and/or pushed over a day to Thursday.