D3Boards.Com Soccer Top 20 Fan Poll

[PaulNewman]

Just realized a failure of omission.  I somehow lost Calvin who I had at #7 just the week prior.  After the loss to Trine, I intended to put the Knights probably between Amherst and Cortland, so around #13.

[jknezek]

Not much interest in doing a final poll, so instead I will take our pre-tournament poll and label the finishes. Very proud and thankful for our contributors who livened up this section of the board with some hard work and did a fantastic job with the poll this season.

D3Boards.com Soccer Fan Poll Games as of 11/7/2021

National Top 20

Rank		School			Points		Weekly Change		Final
1		Messiah (4)			137		1		Elite 8 -- W&L
2		Tufts (3)			136		1		Elite 8 -- Conn College
3		Washington University			116		4		Rd 2 -- North Park
4		Washington and Lee			113		-3		Final Four -- Conn College
5		Trinity (TX)			100		-1		Rd 1 -- Pac Lu
6		Kenyon			98		-1		Rd 2 - Messiah
7		Connecticut College			87		1		Champions!!
8		Ohio Wesleyan			86		-2		Rd2 -- Calvin
9		Amherst			79		4		Finals -- Conn College
10		St. Olaf			67		-1		Sweet 16 -- North Park
11		Chicago			66		-1		Final Four -- Amherst
12		Otterbein			63		2		Rd2 -- Chicago
13		Montclair State			58		-1		Rd2 -- Washington Col
14		Calvin			53		-4		Elite 8 -- Chicago
15		Cortland State			51		0		Sweet 16 -- Amherst
16		Emory			27		0		Rd2 - Hanover
17		John Carroll			21		---		Sweet 16 - Middlebury
T18		New York University			15		0		Rd2 - Conn College
T18		North Central (IL)			15		---		Rd1 -- Loras
T18		North Park			15		1		Elite 8 -- Chicago

Also Receiving Votes:
Denison (14) Rd1 -- Covenant, Franklin and Marshall (12) Rd2 - Middlebury, Middlebury (12) Elite 8 - Amherst, Washington College (11) Sweet 16 - Tufts, Lynchburg (6) Rd1 -- Hanover, Christopher Newport (4) Sweet 16 -- W&L, Claremont-Mudd-Scripps (3) DNP, Rowan (3) Rd2 -- CNU, Penn State-Harrisburg (2) Rd1 -- Johns Hopkins

[PaulNewman]

Nice.  Great touch to close it out.

[jknezek]

Of the teams who made the field but didn't make our poll, Stevens, Pac Lu, Redlands, Loras, Covenant, Hanover, Babson, and Kean made it out of the first round. Several played other teams that weren't in our poll, ensuring at least one would advance. Of those that did, only Hanover made it out of Round 2. So of the 16 teams in the Sweet 16, 15 were among the 29 teams ranked or receiving votes in our poll.

Overachievers:
Hanover was the unranked team going the farthest, losing to Messiah in the Sweet 16, Middlebury was the Receiving Votes team that went the farthest, reaching the E8 before being edged by Amherst, and Chicago (11) was the lowest ranked team that reached the Final Four, also being tipped by Amherst.

Underachievers:
Trinity(TX) at 5 was the highest ranking team to crash out in the First Round. North Central at T18 was the only other Top 20 team to lose in Rd 1.

Wash U at 3 was the highest ranking team to go out in the second round, followed by Kenyon at 6, Ohio Wes at 8, Otterbein at 12, Emory at 16, and NYU at T18. Of these teams, Kenyon, Otterbein, and NYU lost to higher ranking teams, Kenyon to Messiah, Otterbein to Chicago, and NYU to Conn College. Hard to consider that underachieving.

Wash U lost to T18 North Park and Ohio Wes lost to 14 Calvin, neither of which I'd consider massive upsets but to be ranked so high and go out in Rd2 is difficult. Emory lost to Hanover, an unranked team that wasn't really on the Top 20 radar. That is a bit tougher to swallow than the other 2.

[Gregory Sager]

Nice.  Great touch to close it out.

Yes, this was a nice coda to the whole fan-poll project.

Full disclosure: I tried bending over backwards to avoid showing favoritism to North Park on my ballots, and I might've bent a little too far. I didn't have NPU on my first three ballots (Sept. 29, Oct. 6, and Oct. 13), although, as it turned out, nobody else did, either, until the Oct. 13 poll, when one person had the Vikings 20th. I did have NPU 16th on my Oct. 20 ballot, since the Vikings had just beaten #13 North Central and I figured that I would have some company. As it turned out, NPU placed #15 in the Oct. 20 poll, one spot higher than I'd had them, with three of the other six voters putting the Vikings higher than I did and one putting them in the same spot where I had them.

For the Oct. 27 poll, which came after North Park had lost 1-0 to Chicago, I dropped the Vikings down to 19th, based upon the rule of thumb that you don't drop a team too far if they lose to another ranked team unless it's a blowout. That was a rare moment in which I didn't read the room, because the Vikings dropped out of the poll entirely (although they were the top Also Receiving Votes team, just two points behind Johns Hopkins at #20). For the Nov. 3 poll I had the Vikes at #18, more due to teams losing above them than anything else, and the poll had them just behind me at #19 with all but one fellow voter (who didn't have NPU on his ballot) joining me in the 16-to-19 range. For the Nov. 11 poll I dropped out NPU entirely in the wake of the Vikings' CCIW tourney semifinal upset at the hands of Wheaton -- and was surprised to see that the Vikings had not only stayed in the poll but had moved up into a three-way tie for #18!

I felt pretty good about North Park's chances to make a tourney run, so in retrospect I probably should've worried less about being a homer and made a better pre-tournament forecast with my final ballot.

[PaulNewman]

@jknezek, appreciated your addendum on the "disappointment " category. 

On a side note, I found that one of the biggest challenges for a pollster is what to do with, relatively speaking, high blemish teams with high SOS.  IMO it's easier to deal with teams with sterling records and low SOS, unless of course the latter have some notable results against "the big boys."  I'm probably missing one or two, but the ones I debated the most in my head were Chicago, North Park, CNU, Midd, and as the season wore on Emory, NYU, Wesleyan.  I don't know if this is roughly how others vote but I viewed poll status as distinct from who I really think are the top 10-15 teams in the country and in the end sometimes weighed both as sort of a compromise.  For much of the season I viewed Chicago, North Park, Kenyon, and for a time Emory and NYU as legit contenders who in my heart of hearts were among the top 6-8 but my personal view on that wasn't always reflected in my polls.  I also tried to be conservative re: homerism, and iirc didn't put Kenyon in to the top 20 at all until the last 2-3 weeks of the season even though they were not a high blemish team but also didn't any really notable wins until OWU.

[jknezek]

@jknezek, appreciated your addendum on the "disappointment " category. 

On a side note, I found that one of the biggest challenges for a pollster is what to do with, relatively speaking, high blemish teams with high SOS.  IMO it's easier to deal with teams with sterling records and low SOS, unless of course the latter have some notable results against "the big boys."  I'm probably missing one or two, but the ones I debated the most in my head were Chicago, North Park, CNU, Midd, and as the season wore on Emory, NYU, Wesleyan.  I don't know if this is roughly how others vote but I viewed poll status as distinct from who I really think are the top 10-15 teams in the country and in the end sometimes weighed both as sort of a compromise.  For much of the season I viewed Chicago, North Park, Kenyon, and for a time Emory and NYU as legit contenders who in my heart of hearts were among the top 6-8 but my personal view on that wasn't always reflected in my polls.  I also tried to be conservative re: homerism, and iirc didn't put Kenyon in to the top 20 at all until the last 2-3 weeks of the season even though they were not a high blemish team but also didn't any really notable wins until OWU.

Numbers aren't always the whole story, and the addendum to the Underachiever section was necessary when I thought about it for more than a second. Yes, those teams underachieved based on where we had them in the poll, but the NCAA didn't care about our poll and those losses needed to be looked at differently given the opponents.

When I do the football poll I always try and go with who I think will win on the field. That gives me a poll that doesn't always align with other people, and is generally heavy on traditional favorites, but I think it also is the best way to project the best order. One of the reasons I refused to be part of the soccer poll was because I just didn't feel I could watch enough games to make those decisions, and I would have had to rely on the numbers too much. It's also why I stick to the Regional football poll, not the national one. When you have 240 football teams, or 400+ soccer teams, there just isn't a great way to decide between closely grouped teams. As we tend to see year after year, 1-4 hardly ever all make the Elite Eight, let alone the Final Four. This year only W&L of the top 4 seeds (theoretically of course) made the Final Four, and the other 3 teams were likely somewhere in the 5-15 range.

As the Final Four showed, the difference between those 4 teams was miniscule. Even in the E8, the difference in those games was razor thin. What does that tell us? Generally the difference between #1 in our poll, and #20, isn't as big as we think. The difference between #10 and those RV probably isn't real large. And the difference between a team RV and simply having a good conference championship type season, is probably just a win here or there. So any way you decide your ballot, there isn't enough crossover to do anything but provide rough estimates.

I will say that I think the best indication of how well you guys did as pollsters was that 15/16 in the Sweet Sixteen came from our last 29 on the ballots. 12 of 16 came from our top 20. 2 of the 3 RV teams were highly competitive teams that played difficult schedules, so teams we punished for blemishes despite playing top competition... Middlebury and CNU. And the last 2 were teams that just got Tournament hot, Washington College and Hanover.

Getting so many of the Sweet 16 indicates you guys really did have a finger on the pulse.

[PaulNewman]

@jknezek, I mostly agree with leaning in the direction you suggested (the top teams period and who in my heart of hearts is stronger between Team X and Team Y), and I think probably many of us did lean that way but I would find it difficult to do that 100%.  Couple of examples.  Preseason I believed Kenyon was top 6-8 and that never changed, but after an opening day narrow loss at home to JCU and no great wins soon after to counter that I couldn't justify putting them where I "deep down" believe they rated.  And if I have like say an Otterbein and Chicago both in my top 15 or so for several weeks it's hard not to put Otterbein a little higher if they keep winning if Chicago has an 0-2-1 stretch even though I wouldn't have favored Otterbein over Chicago H2H.  One of my adjustments for that is when Chicago loses I'm not going to whack them as hard as Otterbein or like a C-M-S after taking a loss.  This also comes up in a case like PS-Harrisburg who is undefeated or nearly undefeated when they beat Messiah.  Definitely give them some credit for that but it's a question of how much...and do I just consider the W or L or do I consider a team like that getting the W when shots are like 30 to 3 in the other direction.  Anyway imo I felt I needed to weigh all those factors but with the most weighting usually going in the direction you suggest.  North Park is a great example.  I felt from Day 1 that NP was one of the most talented, dangerous teams in the country, but if they have a rough patch and are 5-3 it's hard to rationalize keeping or putting them at #7...but maybe instead of out of the poll entirely my "true" feeling about them gets them at that point at #17 or in RV.

Big picture, I think there are few if any of us who truly can fairly rate all of the teams.  Like even sitting here today, I have no real feel for how good Redlands was.  Same with some others like North Central, Hopkins, Rowan that might be more familiar.  And I don't conclude based on a single tournament loss that so and so wasn't as good as they were ranked or their record suggested.  Better teams losing, especially in tournaments, is a high frequency event.

[PaulNewman]

The other thing in terms of matching up poll numbers with tournament results/finish is the wild card of the draw as you touch on.  With some of the 2nd round games (and even a couple of 1st rounders) a highly ranked team was going to get knocked out by definition.  So the comparison is certainly interesting and very glad you did it but it's also inherently flawed (and hence your very on the mark addendums).

[WUPHF]

Wash U at 3 was the highest ranking team to go out in the second round, followed by Kenyon at 6, Ohio Wes at 8, Otterbein at 12, Emory at 16, and NYU at T18. Of these teams, Kenyon, Otterbein, and NYU lost to higher ranking teams, Kenyon to Messiah, Otterbein to Chicago, and NYU to Conn College. Hard to consider that underachieving.

Wash U lost to T18 North Park and Ohio Wes lost to 14 Calvin, neither of which I'd consider massive upsets but to be ranked so high and go out in Rd2 is difficult. Emory lost to Hanover, an unranked team that wasn't really on the Top 20 radar. That is a bit tougher to swallow than the other 2.

Washington University was an underachiever relative to the rankings, but I don't think they were the best team in the UAA and therefore should have never been ranked so high.

[PaulNewman]

Wash U at 3 was the highest ranking team to go out in the second round, followed by Kenyon at 6, Ohio Wes at 8, Otterbein at 12, Emory at 16, and NYU at T18. Of these teams, Kenyon, Otterbein, and NYU lost to higher ranking teams, Kenyon to Messiah, Otterbein to Chicago, and NYU to Conn College. Hard to consider that underachieving.

Wash U lost to T18 North Park and Ohio Wes lost to 14 Calvin, neither of which I'd consider massive upsets but to be ranked so high and go out in Rd2 is difficult. Emory lost to Hanover, an unranked team that wasn't really on the Top 20 radar. That is a bit tougher to swallow than the other 2.

Washington University was an underachiever relative to the rankings, but I don't think they were the best team in the UAA and therefore should have never been ranked so high.

Aside from our little poll as well as the real ones, the more important factor is how teams get rated by the cmtes and for seedings.  I feel like some have suggested that info is accessible and would be very interesting to see.  Kenyon clearly didn't get seeded close to their rankings, and my guess is that Wash U was a high seed (and I believe was considered the home team vs NP).  I know seedings and placements are influenced by geography and cost considerations but it seems that certainly at the top end there are at least pretty clear #1 and #2 seeds per quads and maybe up to #3 and #4 per quads.

[jknezek]

Wash U at 3 was the highest ranking team to go out in the second round, followed by Kenyon at 6, Ohio Wes at 8, Otterbein at 12, Emory at 16, and NYU at T18. Of these teams, Kenyon, Otterbein, and NYU lost to higher ranking teams, Kenyon to Messiah, Otterbein to Chicago, and NYU to Conn College. Hard to consider that underachieving.

Wash U lost to T18 North Park and Ohio Wes lost to 14 Calvin, neither of which I'd consider massive upsets but to be ranked so high and go out in Rd2 is difficult. Emory lost to Hanover, an unranked team that wasn't really on the Top 20 radar. That is a bit tougher to swallow than the other 2.

Washington University was an underachiever relative to the rankings, but I don't think they were the best team in the UAA and therefore should have never been ranked so high.

5-1-1 in the UAA. They had 2 blemishes, no one else had less than 3, and if they were 3, all 3 were losses. They may not have looked the part, but they played the part of the best team. For me, it's really hard to discount what happens on the field. It's why the game is played. So when the top team from one of the top conferences in the country goes into the tournament, it is going to be as a pretty high seed.

[Christan Shirk]

As anyone who has followed the coaches' polls for numerous years knows, the final (post-NCAA tournament) coaches' poll is almost a direct reflection of tournament advancement: champion #1, runner-up #2, other two semifinalists #3 & #4, remaining four quarterfinalists #5 thru #8, the remaining Sweet 16 teams #9 thru #16, etc. (It's in keeping with how they do their ranking during the regular season when all the regional #1's have to be ranked ahead of all the regional #2's, etc.)

We at D3soccer.com considered that to be redundant and meaningless and did not want that for our final ranking.  We wanted teams to be judged on their full body of work which includes the NCAA tournament matches but is not completely defined by it. A poll is inherently meant to be subjective, and we have always made clear to our voters that we did not want a ranking that was rigid and formulaic and negated/muted their individual opinion and evaluation of teams. We have left it to our voters to decide how much (extra) weight to give to tournament matches. We give them the freedom to use their own discernment rather than having to conform to NCAA tournament finish or having to follow a rigid set of criteria we provide.

We let our voters know that they have the freedom to . . .
- consider a team who picked up a rare tie or loss (maybe their only one of the season) at the "wrong" time in the tournament to be better than a team who advanced further than them but on the whole did not have as good a season.
- consider the bracketing, recognizing that some teams were dealt tougher match-ups in the early rounds and a tougher tournament path.
- consider an upset to be just that — the better team being beaten by a inferior team.
- cast a No. 1 vote for a team other than the NCAA champion.

But there's the question of what a ranking is supposed to capture and signify, and it is hard to find consensus on this point. I personally don't think a ranking should be about where a team "deserves" to be ranked, but, that said, I understand the dilemma/distraction of the idea of where a team "deserves" to be ranked. To try to get past this, we suggest that our voters ask themselves questions like the following:
(1) If these teams played tomorrow, all things being equal and neutral, who in your judgement is more likely to win?
(2) If these teams started a series of ten games tomorrow, with all things being equal and neutral, who in your judgement is more likely to win more often?

Now, I don't think these questions are the be-all, end-all. Question 1 can result in overly rewarding the current team on a hot streak (which likely will end) while ignoring another team's hot streak that already ended but is still playing very well and is equally capable of taking off on another hot streak. And this is especially tough in the final poll when trying to decide what to do with a team that got hot in the tournament and made a nice run.  But these questions (especially throughout the season) try to find the sweet spot in between (a) basing your vote/ballot on merely the win/loss/tie results to date and (b) projecting how well you think a team will finish the season.  It requires considering performance, not just counting the number of wins and losses (or even who those wins and losses came against).  It allows (demands) that strength-of-schedule to be factored in. But it is not asking you to try to see into the future and forecast or predict based on potential or expected improvement by tournament time.

Anyway, it was interesting seeing how the fan poll turned out each week after years of seeing and evaluating the voting tendencies of the website's panel.  It's interesting to read about putting teams higher on the ballot even though in your gut you wouldn't have picked them to win a head-to-head against another team.  Given my perspective and approach (as I just tried to explain above), if I had participated, my ballot would have gone the other way in those cases.

But regardless of what you think the ranking is supposed to capture or signify, it's still impossible to confidently and consistently achieve your goal because of how many teams there are, how relatively few teams you actually get to see play, and how relatively few Top 25 and inter-regional match-up occur throughout the season.  But it can be fun (and worthwhile) trying.  I'm glad you guys did this fan poll.  It's an idea we at D3soccer.com had for many years, but already being stretched thin, it wasn't something we ever chose to take on and organize.  Glad to see it finally happen.

[jknezek]

@jknezek, I mostly agree with leaning in the direction you suggested (the top teams period and who in my heart of hearts is stronger between Team X and Team Y), and I think probably many of us did lean that way but I would find it difficult to do that 100%.  Couple of examples.  Preseason I believed Kenyon was top 6-8 and that never changed, but after an opening day narrow loss at home to JCU and no great wins soon after to counter that I couldn't justify putting them where I "deep down" believe they rated.  And if I have like say an Otterbein and Chicago both in my top 15 or so for several weeks it's hard not to put Otterbein a little higher if they keep winning if Chicago has an 0-2-1 stretch even though I wouldn't have favored Otterbein over Chicago H2H.  One of my adjustments for that is when Chicago loses I'm not going to whack them as hard as Otterbein or like a C-M-S after taking a loss.  This also comes up in a case like PS-Harrisburg who is undefeated or nearly undefeated when they beat Messiah.  Definitely give them some credit for that but it's a question of how much...and do I just consider the W or L or do I consider a team like that getting the W when shots are like 30 to 3 in the other direction.  Anyway imo I felt I needed to weigh all those factors but with the most weighting usually going in the direction you suggest.  North Park is a great example.  I felt from Day 1 that NP was one of the most talented, dangerous teams in the country, but if they have a rough patch and are 5-3 it's hard to rationalize keeping or putting them at #7...but maybe instead of out of the poll entirely my "true" feeling about them gets them at that point at #17 or in RV.

Big picture, I think there are few if any of us who truly can fairly rate all of the teams.  Like even sitting here today, I have no real feel for how good Redlands was.  Same with some others like North Central, Hopkins, Rowan that might be more familiar.  And I don't conclude based on a single tournament loss that so and so wasn't as good as they were ranked or their record suggested.  Better teams losing, especially in tournaments, is a high frequency event.

Agree with most of this. It's easier in football, there are far fewer actual game day data points. It's a fun exercise for sure.

[jknezek]

As anyone who has followed the coaches' polls for numerous years knows, the final (post-NCAA tournament) coaches' poll is almost a direct reflection of tournament advancement: champion #1, runner-up #2, other two semifinalists #3 & #4, remaining four quarterfinalists #5 thru #8, the remaining Sweet 16 teams #9 thru #16, etc. (It's in keeping with how they do their ranking during the regular season when all the regional #1's have to be ranked ahead of all the regional #2's, etc.)

We at D3soccer.com considered that to be redundant and meaningless and did not want that for our final ranking.  We wanted teams to be judged on their full body of work which includes the NCAA tournament matches but is not completely defined by it. A poll is inherently meant to be subjective, and we have always made clear to our voters that we did not want a ranking that was rigid and formulaic and negated/muted their individual opinion and evaluation of teams. We have left it to our voters to decide how much (extra) weight to give to tournament matches. We give them the freedom to use their own discernment rather than having to conform to NCAA tournament finish or having to follow a rigid set of criteria we provide.

We let our voters know that they have the freedom to . . .
- consider a team who picked up a rare tie or loss (maybe their only one of the season) at the "wrong" time in the tournament to be better than a team who advanced further than them but on the whole did not have as good a season.
- consider the bracketing, recognizing that some teams were dealt tougher match-ups in the early rounds and a tougher tournament path.
- consider an upset to be just that — the better team being beaten by a inferior team.
- cast a No. 1 vote for a team other than the NCAA champion.

But there's the question of what a ranking is supposed to capture and signify, and it is hard to find consensus on this point. I personally don't think a ranking should be about where a team "deserves" to be ranked, but, that said, I understand the dilemma/distraction of the idea of where a team "deserves" to be ranked. To try to get past this, we suggest that our voters ask themselves questions like the following:
(1) If these teams played tomorrow, all things being equal and neutral, who in your judgement is more likely to win?
(2) If these teams started a series of ten games tomorrow, with all things being equal and neutral, who in your judgement is more likely to win more often?

Now, I don't think these questions are the be-all, end-all. Question 1 can result in overly rewarding the current team on a hot streak (which likely will end) while ignoring another team's hot streak that already ended but is still playing very well and is equally capable of taking off on another hot streak. And this is especially tough in the final poll when trying to decide what to do with a team that got hot in the tournament and made a nice run.  But these questions (especially throughout the season) try to find the sweet spot in between (a) basing your vote/ballot on merely the win/loss/tie results to date and (b) projecting how well you think a team will finish the season.  It requires considering performance, not just counting the number of wins and losses (or even who those wins and losses came against).  It allows (demands) that strength-of-schedule to be factored in. But it is not asking you to try to see into the future and forecast or predict based on potential or expected improvement by tournament time.

Anyway, it was interesting seeing how the fan poll turned out each week after years of seeing and evaluating the voting tendencies of the website's panel.  It's interesting to read about putting teams higher on the ballot even though in your gut you wouldn't have picked them to win a head-to-head against another team.  Given my perspective and approach (as I just tried to explain above), if I had participated, my ballot would have gone the other way in those cases.

But regardless of what you think the ranking is supposed to capture or signify, it's still impossible to confidently and consistently achieve your goal because of how many teams there are, how relatively few teams you actually get to see play, and how relatively few Top 25 and inter-regional match-up occur throughout the season.  But it can be fun (and worthwhile) trying.  I'm glad you guys did this fan poll.  It's an idea we at D3soccer.com had for many years, but already being stretched thin, it wasn't something we ever chose to take on and organize.  Glad to see it finally happen.

Thanks Christian. I think this is mostly in line with my thoughts as well, though better and more fully expressed. I also appreciate the technical help and advice you offered when I first broached this idea. I know we all appreciate the effort you put in to D3soccer.com. Hopefully I will get enough voters again next fall to continue this little experiment. Considering the time I put into building the infrastructure, I sure hope so!