Pool C 2018

[wm4]

The funny part is, I *do* have a bunch of experience w/ this process and I still don't understand why RROs sometimes come out the way they do. 

On the podcast, Chairman Catanzano pointed out they had their mock RROs last week.  The national committee uses those mock RROs to see how the different committees weighed certain criteria.  Then the national committee uses the results of the mock to "recenter" the regional committees on criteria to be used.  Seems that would be a great opportunity to reduce the "how silly it is" occurrences.

[USee]

You have a good point in that the more experience one has, the less one knows about the workings of the various committees.

[wally_wabash]

So we'll have to just wait and see.  The first rankings often throw curves and can be pretty unpredictable, particularly after we've been conditioned to contextualize teams' relativism through the top 25 poll.  The regional rankings are a totally different exercise (Bethel fans rejoice).

To speak to this, why are they different?  What instructions do the regional committees get that's something other than "give us your order of the best 10 teams in the region".  And what would the point be of instructions any different than that? 

I realize a few key games are still to be played that may solve any discrepancies between the RR's and the top 25 poll.  I also understand the top 25 poll is of no use in the playoff selection process.  It just baffles me how an RR could be subtly but notably different than the contextualized view of teams.  Yes, reserving the right to look at you, West RR committee.

I was thinking in the extreme cases where a team like Eureka- undefeated but getting zero attention in the Top 25- may well be ranked tomorrow ahead of a number of teams that are getting poll attention.  Or maybe somebody like Western Connecticut pops up at the tail end of the East rankings in front of some other multiple loss teams that would be heavily favored against WCSU.  I mentioned Bethel specifically in my earlier because even though Bethel is 400 poll points away from St. Thomas, they ought to be much closer and possibly ahead of St. Thomas per the selection criteria.  My guess for tomorrow is that St. Thomas is ranked higher, but they should be much closer in the RRs than what the top 25 indicates.

[Titan Q]

And also an NCC loss all but eliminates them, because they would fall back BEHIND Wheaton due to the Head to Head. NCC would never see the board to have their name called on Sunday.

Agree that the North Central path is not good with a late season loss.  The h2h with Wheaton is a killer and their noncon game with LFC isn't helping.  Unless they scored big points with the committee chair when they played LFC.   

Yes, good call.  North Central has no chance at Pool C since they would be behind Wheaton.

[Titan Q]

I think a 2-loss CCIW team with 2 wins vs RRO would be competitive in that final Pool C spot.

[Ralph Turner]

I think a 2-loss CCIW team with 2 wins vs RRO would be competitive in that final Pool C spot.

...with 2 losses to RROs, as we might see in other sports like baseball and basketball, going 2-2 vs RRO's IMHO.

[hazzben]

I think a 2-loss CCIW team with 2 wins vs RRO would be competitive in that final Pool C spot.

...with 2 losses to RROs, as we might see in other sports like baseball and basketball, going 2-2 vs RRO's IMHO.

Is any consideration given by the National Committee to where those teams are ranked in a given region.

For instance, Team A is 2-1 vs RRO's, but the two wins are against the 8th and 9th ranked teams in their respective regions. Team B is 1-2 against RRO's, but the two losses are to teams ranked in the top 3-4 of their respective regions.

I'm obviously thinking of Bethel and UST here, where each will carry a loss to an undefeated team in the mix for a top seed. Honestly, as familiar as I am with Pool C stuff (and I know it shifts a bit each year), I'm not sure I know the answer to this. My gut is that the national committee would dig a bit into who the RRO's are when the compare the four teams at the table.

My gut is, if they are looking at teams with 3 to 4 RRO's results, one of the questions human nature says they ask is, 'how strong are those RRO's' and right behind that, 'are those RRO's in the playoff field'?

A loss to a RRO that doesn't make the field looks different than a loss to a team that's in and has a good resume in their own right. At least that's how I assume and imagine this works out.

Another caveat, wondering if the National Committee looks at and discusses the relative strengths of the regions. Would love to be a fly on the wall to see how they handle this type of stuff.

[Pat Coleman]

hazzben -- a lot of those answers are in our podcast with the committee chair from last week:
http://www.d3blogs.com/d3football/2018/10/25/around-the-nation-podcast-216-committee-chair-explains-it-all/

[Pat Coleman]

Rankings are out:

http://www.d3football.com/playoffs/2018/first-regional-ranking

[hazzben]

hazzben -- a lot of those answers are in our podcast with the committee chair from last week:
http://www.d3blogs.com/d3football/2018/10/25/around-the-nation-podcast-216-committee-chair-explains-it-all/

Thanks Pat, queued up for my flight to Boston tomorrow 

[SaintsFAN]

hazzben -- a lot of those answers are in our podcast with the committee chair from last week:
http://www.d3blogs.com/d3football/2018/10/25/around-the-nation-podcast-216-committee-chair-explains-it-all/

Thanks Pat, queued up for my flight to Boston tomorrow 

Boston, eh?  You in beantown much or is this a one-off?

[hazzben]

hazzben -- a lot of those answers are in our podcast with the committee chair from last week:
http://www.d3blogs.com/d3football/2018/10/25/around-the-nation-podcast-216-committee-chair-explains-it-all/

Thanks Pat, queued up for my flight to Boston tomorrow 

Boston, eh?  You in beantown much or is this a one-off?

First trip. Little late fall getaway for a long weekend. Any must sees or eats?

[GRIZ_BACKER]

hazzben -- a lot of those answers are in our podcast with the committee chair from last week:
http://www.d3blogs.com/d3football/2018/10/25/around-the-nation-podcast-216-committee-chair-explains-it-all/

Pool B (Thomas More, West NE, or Merchant Marine) 

[ADL70]

CWRU IN, Centre OUT, Muhlenberg OUT? Am I mis-reading?  Not sure what you're smoking.

[wally_wabash]

I'm going to crank out a projection here based on the first RRs.  If you're new to the process, I went through the mechanics in last week's post.  So let's dive in. 

Pool A
The projected 26 Pool A's as of this moment:


St. John's, Berry, and Whitewater have all clinched (golden ticket status noted appropriately).  Many, many more coming this weekend.  Other changes/notes on Pool A:
- The unofficial word has Denison winning a potential NCAC tiebreak and that's been noted here. 
- I'm still hedging toward Wartburg in the ARC, but it could go any of about four different ways.   

Pool B
Pool B is a touch more interesting now with MIT not being undefeated.  Based on the rankings, we're going to have Merchant Marine on the board from the East and Thomas More from the South. 

Round 1:
E8 Merchant Marine: 6-1, 0-0 vs. RROs, 0.603 (10th) SOS
S10 Thomas More: 6-2, 0-1 vs. RROs, 0.555 (49th)

Last week TMC had an SOS advantage over MIT, but now that SOS advantage swings dramatically over to the Mariners.  Classic case here where the NCAA's SOS metric isn't great because I'm having a hard time buying a NEWMAC schedule as being "stronger" than what the Saints have done so far this year.  But the numbers are the numbers and I think the vote swings toward Merchant Marine and their top 10 schedule strength.  Thomas More can absolutely play in though if they win at St. John's in Week 11. 

The remaining at-large tables shake out this way:
East: Cortland, Salisbury, Ithaca
North: John Carroll, North Central, Baldwin Wallace, Wabash, Wittenberg
South: Centre, Hardin-Simmons, Muhlenberg, CWRU
West: Bethel, Linfield, St. Thomas, UW-Oshkosh, Simpson, UW-La Crosse

Pretty different table than we had last week, yeah?  The regional rankings can definitely shuffle the deck and have done so here.   

Pool C:
Round 1:
3N John Carroll - 7-1, 0-1 RRO, 0.528 (84th)
4S Centre - 7-1, 0-1 RRO, 0.598 (14th)
5E Cortland - 7-1, 0-0 RRO, 0.473 (160th)
4W Bethel - 7-1, 1-1 RRO, 0.564 (42nd)
(Bethel, JCU, Centre, Cortland)

I mean, this foursome could be half of the quarterfinals.  That's the line I opened this section with two weeks ago!  Life comes at you fast.  So this board isn't quite as star-powered as it was two weeks ago, but that actually makes things a little easier.  Centre has a dominant SOS, JCU has a pretty good SOS and a pretty impressive result against N1 (which is like a super-RRO, really), but Bethel stands out to me with that RRO win over Simpson.  It's the only quality win on the board right now and I'm putting the Royals in first. 

Round 2:
3N John Carroll - 7-1, 0-1 RRO, 0.528 (84th)
4S Centre - 7-1, 0-1 RRO, 0.598 (14th)
5E Cortland - 7-1, 0-0 RRO, 0.473 (160th)
5W Linfield - 5-1, 0-1 RRO, 0.577 (30th)
(JCU, Centre, Linfield, Cortland)

So much for writing Linfield off.  They're here and they're here pretty early in the process.  Now, what the summary above doesn't show is a second loss to NAIA Carroll(Mont.) and that loss is in fact useable data in the secondary criteria.  I'm not ignoring it or letting Linfield off the hook for that game.  I do think that Linfield's 100-point advantage over Cortland is noteworthy and I'm placing Linfield in front of Cortland.  Which brings me to JCU and Centre.  JCU took Mount Union to the wire which is an enormous feat.  Centre had Berry into overtime, which is an impressive result, but it just isn't the same.  Centre has a healthy SOS edge here, but I think JCU has the far better result and I'm putting the Streaks in.  If Maryville somehow edges in to these rankings, I think we might do this differently. 

Round 3:
5N North Central - 7-1, 0-0 RRO, 0.506 (84th)
4S Centre - 7-1, 0-1 RRO, 0.598 (14th)
5E Cortland - 7-1, 0-0 RRO, 0.473 (160th)
5W Linfield - 5-1, 0-1 RRO, 0.577 (30th)
(Centre, North Central, Linfield, Cortland)

North Central is the noob and North Central doesn't actually present very well if I'm being honest.  The North RACs decision to not rank Wheaton or WashU costs North Central some valuable criteria pros.  My analysis has already drawn clear differentiation between Centre and Linfield and I don't think I can place North Central in over Centre given the current set of rankings.  Centre is in.  I am going to place North Central ahead of Linfield largely because of Linfield's second loss. 

Round 4:
5N North Central - 7-1, 0-0 RRO, 0.506 (84th)
5S Hardin-Simmons - 7-1, 0-1 RRO, 0.571 (37th)
5E Cortland - 7-1, 0-0 RRO, 0.473 (160th)
5W Linfield - 5-1, 0-1 RRO, 0.577 (30th)
(HSU, North Central, Linfield, Cortland)

Hardin-Simmons we've long assumed to be a lock to make this field, but their placement behind Centre puts them much closer to the bubble than we thought they'd be.  I do think they present pretty well against this current board thought.  They are just 0-1 vs. RROs, but their RRO loss is to S1, and like Mount Union, UMHB losses don't sting quite as bad.  And while HSU wasn't anywhere close to winning that game, they did perform far better than anybody else has against UMHB.  I'm moving Hardin-Simmons to the front of the line and right into the field.  North Central not getting RRO credit here really hurts the Cardinals. 

Round 5:
5N North Central - 7-1, 0-0 RRO, 0.506 (84th)
6S Muhlenberg - 7-1, 1-1 RRO, 0.583 (27th)
5E Cortland - 7-1, 0-0 RRO, 0.473 (160th)
5W Linfield - 5-1, 0-1 RRO, 0.577 (30th)
(Muhlenberg, North Central, Linfield, Cortland)

Here come the Mules!  Guess what?  Muhlenberg has the best SOS at the table and they are also the only team at the table right now with an RRO (vs. S10 TMC).  That's a pretty good looking at-large profile, really.  They have a respectable loss to S3- something that I also look for here when I look at results vs. ranked teams are point margins.  Not so much that one team lost by 4 and another lost by 7 so the first one is better.  But significant margins.  Muhlenberg's loss isn't at all bad to a very good team.  North Central has a wipeout on their profile to an unranked team (we know Wheaton is strong, but today, they are unranked and it is what it is).  Linfield has a second loss that I'm not ignoring.  Cortland has been here the whole time, but despite being the top at-large team in their region, Cortland doesn't present well at all as a team with a sub-.500 SOS and no games against ranked teams.  So I'm putting the Mules in. 

And that's the field as I see it today.  Some things to keep in mind- this is a snapshot as of right now and not a projection as to what I think the field will look like in 10 days.  North Central is either going to beat IWU and qualify through Pool A or not even be in this discussion.  Bethel has to get through St. Thomas to be the first team off this board.  And even then might not be the first team off if JCU beats Baldwin Wallace and notches an RRO win.  And Simpson could well drop out which would cost Bethel a valuable RRO win.  I don't believe Cortland will be the first team up from the East.  Given what's left, I think the first team up there is likely to be either Salisbury, Frostburg, or Ithaca depending on how those teams' final couple of games go down.  So there's a lot left to be decided and this is all still very fluid.