2021 NCAA Tournament

[Saint of Old]

I think somebody forgot to tell Rochester that they got an at large bid.  Wesleyan must be sick watching this.

And looking ahead, there's no team in the country, including any NCAC teams, that feel more at home at Roy Rike Field at Dr. Jay Martin Soccer Complex than Calvin.  A home away from home.

Can anyone explain why Rochester was thrown into the Midwest quadrant? I know they're less than 6 hrs away from OWU which isn't too bad, but still feels weird seeing a New York team in there with the rest. Any chance Rochester only received the at-large due to geographical reasons? Obviously it wouldn't make sense to have Wes in this quadrant but were there no better candidates than UR here? I mean they're a team that finished below 6-7-3 Brandeis in UAA...and now they're down 4-0 first round and could easily be 5 or 6.

PN I'm sure Calvin loved this UR draw before the game even started and I was surprised to see quite a few people predict a Rochester W in their brackets. If Calvin had hypothetically played a team like Wesleyan I'd bet a lot on Wes not being down 4-0 at any point in the game. Anyways I'm hoping for first round exits for Rochester, Swarthmore and SUNY Oneonta...none of them should be here imo

Careful there man, people are passionate this time of year, I got smoted a minute ago for speaking my mind

BTW... I know it was you Fredo.

[Centennial1]

I think somebody forgot to tell Rochester that they got an at large bid.  Wesleyan must be sick watching this.

And looking ahead, there's no team in the country, including any NCAC teams, that feel more at home at Roy Rike Field at Dr. Jay Martin Soccer Complex than Calvin.  A home away from home.

Can anyone explain why Rochester was thrown into the Midwest quadrant? I know they're less than 6 hrs away from OWU which isn't too bad, but still feels weird seeing a New York team in there with the rest. Any chance Rochester only received the at-large due to geographical reasons? Obviously it wouldn't make sense to have Wes in this quadrant but were there no better candidates than UR here? I mean they're a team that finished below 6-7-3 Brandeis in UAA...and now they're down 4-0 first round and could easily be 5 or 6.

PN I'm sure Calvin loved this UR draw before the game even started and I was surprised to see quite a few people predict a Rochester W in their brackets. If Calvin had hypothetically played a team like Wesleyan I'd bet a lot on Wes not being down 4-0 at any point in the game. Anyways I'm hoping for first round exits for Rochester, Swarthmore and SUNY Oneonta...none of them should be here imo

Careful there man, people are passionate this time of year, I got smoted a minute ago for speaking my mind

BTW... I know it was you Fredo.

Post of the day. If you can use smoted and a Fredo in the same post: you win!

[BracketMaster]

Hey BracketMaster, how many had Calvin getting to the Final 4?

Only 6 picked Calvin to make the final four...and for what it is worth no one picked Rochester to make the final four.

[Domino1195]

I think somebody forgot to tell Rochester that they got an at large bid.  Wesleyan must be sick watching this.

And looking ahead, there's no team in the country, including any NCAC teams, that feel more at home at Roy Rike Field at Dr. Jay Martin Soccer Complex than Calvin.  A home away from home. 

2-0, barely saw the goal. Did it slip through the goalie's hands? The right side of the screen was dead on with the right post!

UR was playing with 10 men as the CB left to adjust equipment. Calvin took advantage with a smart pass into space that might have been occupied by the missing back.

Second goal was a beautiful and strong header off the corner service - no fault by the keeper. Left after that as the difference in quality on this night was not in doubt in my mind.

11 am at Otterbein tomorrow- hope to get to see all three games in Central Ohio tomorrow.

[PaulNewman]

Welcome back!  And what timing!

Now I remember seeing a UR player come back in after the 1st goal.  I think that was their best player...Eisold.

[Domino1195]

Welcome back!  And what timing!

Now I remember seeing a UR player come back in after the 1st goal.  I think that was their best player...Eisold.

Thanks! Only caught a handful of games in person this season, saw more on video broadcasts.

It was Eisold - he was telling the bench he was having trouble breathing due to the tightness of those health monitor harnesses some players wear. By rule he had to leave the field to take it off and was not allowed back until UR's next opportunity to sub.

[Ejay]

Also, with the how spread out the teams are, UAA league tourney will never happen.

Why can't they play a 4 team play-off like most other conferences? They could either do it at one central location on Fri/Sun or travel to higher seed Tue/Sat. That's not too much to ask for these schools.

[Buck O.]

Wouldn't be shocked if the UAA is down to 1-2 teams by Sunday night.

Maybe the UAA need a tournament like everyone else, or  just not have 8 teams from their league and several other good leagues just getting 1 bid.

While the UAA had a down year in 2019 (receiving only two bids, with neither of those teams making it to the second weekend), there were three UAA teams in the final eight in 2018 and four UAA teams in the final eight in 2017, and in each of those years, half of the final four teams came from the UAA.  Seems to me that not having a tournament has worked just fine for the UAA, notwithstanding UR's face plant yesterday.

[Ron Boerger]

There are just too many conferences.   I think some conference consolidation would resolve the at large griping (Never gonna happen btw).  D1 is almost half and half AQ and at large bids.

It could be worse, like American football which only gets 32 spots due to costs (per the NCAAs own access ratio they probably should have 8-10 more).  There are 27 Pool A conferences and only 5 at-large bids.  Thanks to that there is a very real possibility a one-loss top ten team will be left home on Monday.

[Falconer]

Also, with the how spread out the teams are, UAA league tourney will never happen.

Why can't they play a 4 team play-off like most other conferences? They could either do it at one central location on Fri/Sun or travel to higher seed Tue/Sat. That's not too much to ask for these schools.

Why should they have to? This is D3 soccer, not D1 basketball. Every UAA school is very demanding academically, especially Chicago and Wash U but all of them really. Why burden the "student-athletes" (a term that D1 basketball and football need, in order to pretend that players who never intend to graduate are actually students) at those schools with further time away from being students? The travel needed, all by itself, significantly takes away from study time at a crucial point in the semester.

[blooter442]

The way I see it, there are advantages and drawbacks to either scenario. With a conference tournament there is genuine hope in terms of a low-seed team that went a little above .500 to make the tournament — thinking 2014 Bowdoin (8-6-1) or 2015 Babson (10-6-2) — something that a UAA team with a comparable record would probably have no chance with given the current setup. On the flip side, having a decent season in the UAA with a few good ranked results (even if you don't win the UAA) perhaps gives the committee something to think about given the competitiveness of the league, whereas you might not get as good of a look-in if you had the same record and got knocked out of your conference tournament early.

ADDENDUM: Obviously the selection committee has "objective criteria" to use, so the whole "better look-in" thing should theoretically not be part of it all. That said, the decisions are made by people, not a computer, so in terms of marginal decisions and trying to compare apples to apples (no Rochester pun intended) you would be kidding yourself if you didn't think some level of subjectivity seeps into the process.

[camosfan]

Conference playoff seems a useless exercise,it forces teams to compress their season and results in more injuries to players.

[Buck O.]

Any UAA and Wash U faithful have any color to provide about Wash U?  Best season in years, wins UAA, skyrockets up the polls, but not much buzz about the Bears at all and not clear if most view them as true contenders.

I looked at some of their box scores.  Just a few where clearly dominated and within UAA only game with real advantage was CWRU.  Pretty even stats with Hope, North Park, and Brandeis.  In 3-0 win over CMU the Tartans led shots 13-9 and corners 7-2.  Otherwise, significant stats advantage for UR, NYU, and especially Emory -- 19-8 shots and 6-1 corners -- and Chicago -- 14-4 shots and 11-0 corners.  Emory was a 0-0 game.  I understand Chicago was chasing the game after Wash U scored in 5th minute, but still, 14-4 and 11-0 seems significant.  Does Wash U get a goal and then sit in the rest of the game?  Will this approach serve them in the NCAA tournament?

And for a team so highly valued, having to probably play North Park a second time at North Park seems pretty brutal.  I think I would lean North Park in that one.

Since WUPHF and I are the only WashU partisans who regularly post here, I'll take a stab.  Problem is, I only watched (parts of) two WashU games this year, which happen to be the two games you mentioned--Emory and Chicago.  OTOH, I did watch almost every game they played in 2019.

The Emory game was kind of weird.  Emory was completely on the front foot during the first half.  When they had the ball, WashU could barely get past the center line, and on those rare occasions when they could, they were promptly dispossessed.  The second half was completely different, and while both teams had good chances, I thought that WashU's were better.  Hard to see how that game wound up goalless.

I only caught the second half of the Chicago game and they were clearly packing it in (too much so, IMO--it reminded me of an NFL that goes to a prevent defense too early and allows the other team to drive down the field in 45 seconds), but they had a one-goal lead and knew that they would win the league even with a tie.  Hard to take much away from that other than to be a little concerned about the strategy.

With that said, the strength of the team is clearly defense.  Shaw (#2), a senior CB, has been a starter since more or less the day he walked onto the campus, and for my money, Lamba (#10), was one of the two best players on that 2019 team (although my recollection is that I preferred seeing him in the midfield).  In the attack, most of the goals come from Rivas (#4, who was my other choice as one of the two best players on that 2019 team, when he used as a back) and Culver (#11), but Wolf (#14), who led the team in scoring in 2019 despite inexplicably limited playing time, and who has also missed a lot of time this year (potentially due to injury, as he did not play for about a month) is dangerous.

As I've posted elsewhere, I'm not too happy that WashU was paired with NPU.  Of course it's not the NCAA's fault that WashU has an excellent women's team and that the women get hosting priority this year, but I think that NPU is a considerably stronger opponent than the top seeds in the other regions are likely to face in the second round.

[Futbol is Life]

Also, with the how spread out the teams are, UAA league tourney will never happen.

Why can't they play a 4 team play-off like most other conferences? They could either do it at one central location on Fri/Sun or travel to higher seed Tue/Sat. That's not too much to ask for these schools.

I believe the point of the original post isn't that they don't play a tournament, it's that everyone else does and it often adversely skews the worthiness of top performers in those conferences.  Rochester's gift of an at large bid wasn't their fault, but rather just an example of giving too much credit for being in a "great conference".   And if they had played a conf tourney, and found a way to win against NYU, they still would be a good but not great team.   More likely, however, they would have lost to NYU and had their regional ranking go down and been less of a threat to fool the committee.

However, I actually think the UAA does it right and everyone else has it wrong, especially for D3 soccer.  By definition, all but one team participating in a conf tourney will get at least one additional L or T that weakens their claim for an at-large, especially if a computer is being used in the analysis.   Since there are so many conferences in D3 soccer,  if you simply took the regular season winner from each conference and then the best at large teams,  the field would certainly be a better representation of the most competitive teams.   Those 8-10 teams in a conference all played the same schedule and one team earned the most points  (tiebreakers would be agreed upon prior to the season). The UAA could still get 3 at large bids this year( which were fair), and the NESCAC could still get 4 if they deserved it (like they did), but across the country you would have teams with little room to argue since they had the whole season to earn their spot. 

But more importantly, it's vital to get the most deserving team from the conference into the tournament. Basically 2/3 of the d3 soccer tourney are automatic bids, which already waters down the competition (i.e. already the best 64 teams in the country aren't in the tournament, but that's fine since it's great to have everyone getting a chance).   But the overall competitiveness of the tourney is further diluted by allowing conf tourney winners to get their conference AQ -  allowing teams that haven't shown over 2 months that they are the most competitive.   As a comparison, the NCAA men's basketball tournament (the standard for sports entertainment) has 36 at-large bids and 32 auto bids.   DI Hoops has the luxury of allowing the conference tourney upsets while not diluting the overall field, since the majority of the field will be picked by the committee.   

[Centennial1]

Very nice build-up for Chicago's second goal. Passed around/through the pressure, stretching the D, one time finish. Well done.