My predictions for the field, assuming Tufts and La Roche win. Plenty of room for discussion about the last few Pool C bids, as always. For the teams I'm putting out of region, I tried to make them strong Pool C teams who had their conference winner in their home region. I think this is how it usually works out. Anybody know?

CENTRAL	Team	Conf	Pool
C1	Webster	SLIAC	A
C2	Buena Vista	IIAC	A
C3	Heidelberg	OAC	C
C4	Illinois Wesleyan	CCIW	A
C5	Augustana	CCIW	C
C6	St. Norbert	MWC	A

MID ATLANTIC	Team	Conf	Pool
MA1	Rowan	NJAC	A
MA2	Moravian	LAND	C
MA3	Rutgers-Camden	NJAC	C
MA4	Susquehanna	LAND	A
MA5	Widener	MACC	A
MA6	Keystone	CSAC	A
MA7	Misericordia	MACF	A
MA8	Haverford	CC	A

MID EAST	Team	Conf	Pool
ME1	Case Western Reserve	UAA	B
ME2	Amherst	NESCAC	C
ME3	Marietta	OAC	C
ME4	Adrian	MIAA	A
ME5	La Roche	AMCC	A
ME6	Rose-Hulman	HCAC	A
ME7	DePauw	NCAC	A
ME8	Thomas More	PrAC	A

MID WEST	Team	Conf	Pool
MW1	UW-Whitewater	WIAC	A
MW2	St. Thomas	MIAC	A
MW3	Concordia (Ill.)	NATHC	A
MW4	UW-Stevens Point	WIAC	C
MW5	Kean	NJAC	C
MW6	St. Scholastica	UMAC	A

NEW ENGLAND	Team	Conf	Pool
NE1	Eastern Connecticut	LEC	A
NE2	Tufts	NESCAC	A
NE3	Southern Maine	LEC	C
NE4	Endicott	CCC	A
NE5	MIT	NEWMAC	A
NE6	Worcester State	MASCAC	A
NE7	Mitchell	NECC	A
NE8	St. Josephs (Maine)	GNAC	A

NEW YORK	Team	Conf	Pool
NY1	Cortland State	SUNYAC	A
NY2	St. John Fisher	E8	C
NY3	Ithaca	E8	C
NY4	Farmingdale State	SKY	A
NY5	Union	LL	A
NY6	Stevens	CUNYAC	A
NY7	Castleton State	NAC	A
NY8	SUNYIT	NEAC	A

SOUTH	Team	Conf	Pool
S1	Shenandoah	ODAC	C
S2	Emory	UAA	B
S3	Birmingham-Southern	SAA	C
S4	Salisbury	CAC	A
S5	Bridgewater (Va.)	ODAC	A
S6	Covenant	USAC	A

WEST	Team	Conf	Pool
W1	Linfield	NWC	A
W2	Cal Lutheran	SCIAC	A
W3	Trinity (Texas)	SCAC	A
W4	John Carroll	OAC	A
W5	George Fox	NWC	C
W6	Letourneau	ASC	A

Last teams in:
Rutgers-Camden
Augustana
Kean
George Fox


First teams out:
Washington U. - Probably will get in if they jump Augustana in the regional rankings. I'm surprised they didn't last week.
Baldwin-Wallace - Two conference tourney losses hurt their Win% just enough.
UW-La Crosse - Two conference tourney losses hurt their Win% just enough.
Rhodes - Might take the spot I'm giving to Augustana/Washington U. in the Central but they have 3 Pool B/C teams ahead of them in the South.
Gettysburg - I'm surprised they've been out of the regional rankings.
Concordia (TX) - If they jump George Fox for some reason.
Wheaton (Mass.) - Two conference tourney losses hurt their Win% just enough.
Wooster - Two conference tourney losses hurt their Win% just enough.

Predictions as of New Regional Rankings:

POOL A IN

School	Conf	Region
Linfield	NWC	W
Rowan	NJAC	MA
Cortland State	SUNYAC	NY
Cal Lutheran	SCIAC	W
Trinity (Texas)	SCAC	W
Salisbury	CAC	S
Bridgewater (Va.)	ODAC	S
Farmingdale State	SKY	NY
Widener	MACC	MA
Endicott	CCC	NE
Susquehanna	LAND	MA
MIT	NEWMAC	NE
Misericordia	MACF	MA
Worcester State	MASCAC	NE
St. Josephs (Maine)	GNAC	NE
Castleton State	NAC	NE
Haverford	CC	MA
Covenant	USAC	S
Mitchell	NECC	NE

POOL A PREDICTIONS (LIKELY WOULD GET POOL C IF THEY LOST)

School	Conf	Region
UW-Whitewater	WIAC	MW
Webster	SLIAC	C
Eastern Connecticut	LEC	NE
Marietta	OAC	ME
St. Thomas	MIAC	MW
Amherst	NESCAC	NE
Buena Vista	IIAC	C
Concordia (Ill.)	NATHC	MW

POOL A PREDICTIONS (POOL C CONTENDER IF THEY LOST)

Augustana	CCIW	C
Wooster	NCAC	ME
St. Scholastica	UMAC	MW
Concordia-Texas	ASC	W
Rochester	LL	NY

POOL A PREDICTIONS (WOULD NOT GET POOL C IF THEY LOST)

Ripon	MWC	C
Keystone	CSAC	MA
Adrian	MIAA	ME
La Roche	AMCC	ME
Washington and Jefferson	PrAC	ME
Anderson	HCAC	ME
Staten Island	CUNYAC	NY
Gallaudet	NEAC	S

POOL C LOCKS

School	Conf	Region
Shenandoah	ODAC	S
Heidelberg	OAC	ME
UW-Stevens Point	WIAC	MW
Southern Maine	LEC	NE
Emory	UAA	S
Case Western Reserve	UAA	ME
Moravian	LAND	MA
Birmingham-Southern	SAA	S
Ithaca	E8	NY
St. John Fisher	E8	NY
Kean	NJAC	MA

POOL C CONTENDERS

School	Conf	Region
Rutgers-Camden	NJAC	MA
Washington U.	UAA	C
Tufts	NESCAC	NE
George Fox	NWC	W
Baldwin-Wallace	OAC	ME
Salem State	MASCAC	NE
UW-La Crosse	WIAC	MW
Wartburg	IIAC	C
Rhodes	SAA	S
Brockport State	SUNYAC	NY
Chapman	SCIAC	W
Alvernia	MACC	MA
Illinois Wesleyan	CCIW	C
John Carroll	OAC	ME

Predictions as of 5/5:

POOL A:
UW-Whitewater
Linfield
Webster
Heidelberg
Rowan
Cortland State
Southern Maine
Concordia (Ill.)
Amherst
St. Thomas
Buena Vista
Cal Lutheran
Trinity (Texas)
Salisbury
Augustana
Bridgewater (Va.)
Salem State
Endicott
Wooster
St. Scholastica
Concordia-Texas
Rochester
Keystone
Farmingdale State
Susquehanna
Adrian
Grinnell
St. Josephs (Maine)
Widener
Washington and Jefferson
Misericordia
La Roche
Castleton State
Anderson
MIT
Staten Island
Covenant
Haverford
Gallaudet
Mitchell

POOL B/C LOCKS:
Shenandoah
Moravian
Marietta
Emory
Eastern Connecticut
Case Western Reserve
UW-Stevens Point
Birmingham-Southern

POOL B/C LOOKING GOOD:
St. John Fisher
Ithaca
Kean
Rutgers-Camden
Tufts

BUBBLE (3 of these will be in if the remaining favorites win):
Baldwin-Wallace
Chapman
UW-La Crosse
Washington U.
Oswego State
Rhodes
Wartburg
Alvernia
Pacific Lutheran
North Park

Am I missing something?

● Win-loss percentage against Division III opponents.
● Division III head-to-head competition
● Results versus common Division III opponents
● Results versus ranked Division III opponents as established by the rankings at the time of selection.
● Division III strength of schedule
● Win-loss percentage — last 25% of the season (if applicable)

School	Conf	Win%	SOS
Webster	SLIAC	0.875	0.53
Buena Vista	IIAC	0.806	0.519
Augustana	CCIW	0.697	0.533
Wartburg	IIAC	0.639	0.544
North Park	CCIW	0.629	0.53
North Central (Ill.)	CCIW	0.667	0.499
Washington U.	UAA	0.65	0.572

Quote from: BigPoppa on May 02, 2014, 09:42:49 AM
Not sure I see much of this changing before bids are handed out besides the order of the CCIW teams. Webster is locked into the #1 slot, and I think BV is a safe #2.

Quote from: Colorado on April 29, 2014, 06:02:59 AM
Not a bad starting point. Were you using Spence's Index for Pool B/C? And did you mostly use conference leaders for your Pool A picks or hunches?

The regional rankings drive most of my order. Also, I weight SOS more because (up until last season) that has been what the selection committee has done. Pool A teams are those that have already qualified or those that would be most likely to be selected if they did not win their conference tournament.

My predictions as of today:

Pool A:
La Roche
LeTourneau
Salisbury
Gettysburg
Endicott
Augustana
Keystone
Staten Island
St. Josephs (Maine)
Manchester
Buena Vista
Moravian
Southern Maine
Rochester
Alvernia
Misericordia
Salem State
Adrian
St. Thomas
St. Norbert
Castleton State
Concordia (Ill.)
Wooster
Gallaudet
Mitchell
Amherst
Wheaton (Mass.)
Rowan
Linfield
Heidelberg
Bridgewater (Va.)
Washington and Jefferson
Trinity (Texas)
Cal Lutheran
Farmingdale State
Webster
Cortland State
St. Scholastica
Covenant
UW-Whitewater


Pool B/C Looking Good (12):
Shenandoah
Marietta
Emory
Eastern Connecticut
UW-Stevens Point
Case Western Reserve
Ithaca
Tufts
Birmingham-Southern
Kean
Rutgers-Camden
St. John Fisher


Bubble (4 of these):
John Carroll
Chapman
Oswego State
Bethel
North Park
Baldwin-Wallace
Wartburg
George Fox
York (Pa.)
Susquehanna
Brockport State
North Central (Ill.)
Allegheny
Randolph-Macon
Suffolk
Washington U.

Could all change very soon!

IMO, Ithaca and Huntingdon are safe. Huntingdon is done and there's nothing Ithaca can do in its final four games to not be a lock for Pool B.

From the SOS page:
Team   Record   Win%   OWP   OOWP   SOS
13 Ithaca   22-2   0.917   .5839 (19)   0.5499   0.573
49 Huntingdon   28-8   0.778   .5606 (49)   0.5245   0.549
199 Millsaps   29-8   0.784   .5033 (203)   0.5127   0.506
33 Case Western Reserve   22-10   0.688   .5605 (50)   0.5411   0.554
17 Washington U.   21-10   0.677   .5880 (16)   0.5355   0.57
10 St. John Fisher   16-10   0.615   .5997 (10)   0.52   0.573
150 Birmingham-Southern   27-12   0.692   .5191 (145)   0.509   0.516


That leaves Case Western Reserve, Washington U., Millsaps, St. John Fisher, and I also think Birmingham-Southern has an outside chance at remaining in the Pool B picture.

Millsaps has a weak SOS, but it will improve with the SAA tourney. An 0-2 or 1-2 performance might take them out of Pool B but I think they're in good shape because of getting #3 ranking in the South. If they were in another region, I wouldn't be so high on them. I think the South is weak this year.

Case will be improving its SOS with games against Baldwin-Wallace and Marietta. If they can split those games, I think they're in good shape for the last spot.

Washington U.'s SOS will probably not change much. I think they need to do slightly better than Case because of the head-to-head losses.

St. John Fisher needs some other teams to falter ahead of them, as their SOS will take a hit over their final games and their win% isn't outstanding.

If Birmingham-Southern can sweep through the SAA tourney, they might be back in business, but even if they do, it's a long shot.

Quote from: Ralph Turner on April 25, 2013, 10:49:37 PM
Pool B's in the first regional rankings

Central Region
5 Washington U. 19-7 20-11

Mideast Region
5 Case 20-8 22-9

New York Region
1 Ithaca 17-2 25-6
6 St. John Fisher 13-9 17-12

South Region
2 Huntingdon 26-8 27-9
3 Millsaps 25-7 28-10

I don't know if I think these are the BEST 50 teams in the country but I think they are 50 most likely to be selected for Pool C (or B) in order of most likely:

Team
Southern Maine
UW-Whitewater
St. Thomas
Johns Hopkins
Kean
Ithaca
Marietta
Ramapo
Illinois Wesleyan
Eastern Connecticut
St. Olaf
Texas-Tyler
Linfield
Huntingdon
Rowan
Cortland State
Wooster
Tufts
Salisbury
Washington U.
Misericordia
Wartburg
Endicott
William Paterson
DeSales
UW-Stevens Point
Wheaton (Mass.)
Adrian
RPI
Coe
Bridgewater (Va.)
Case Western Reserve
Benedictine
Western New England
Concordia (Ill.)
Salve Regina
St. John Fisher
Webster
Amherst
Union
Kenyon
Alvernia
Coast Guard
Millsaps
Denison
MIT
George Fox
Keystone
Manchester
Haverford

Quote from: Richard Hamstocks on May 13, 2012, 06:35:16 PM
I'll also add that if you put Lewis & Clark (4-20 in NWC) in the SCIAC instead of Cal Tech (0-28 in SCIAC) we have the following OWPs.
Linfield: .500 as stated on NCAA.com as I haven't altered their schedule.
Pomona-Pitzer: .511
So now Pomona-Pitzer's OWP is as much higher over Linfield's than Linfield's was over P-P in the original data.
Is it a stretch to think that Pomona-Pitzer would have taken 4 games from L&C as they did over Cal Tech?
If not, that's what .010 means in strength of schedule. 
Despite Linfield having worse numbers in all other categories, they rank Linfield higher in the regional rankings because they beat Lewis & Clark instead of Cal Tech.  Bad form.
The NCAA should require someone with at least mild quantitative training to be on these regional ranking committees.

Agreed 100%. This is the biggest problem with the NCAA's current process nationally, and it affects the West the most because of the "Cal tech" problem you describe.

I think there are ways to "beat the system" that seem unfair to me.

Coaches can load up their non-conference schedules with the best teams in bad conferences, like Keystone or  St. Scholastica or Castleton State or Webster or Alvernia. (The West doesn't have a conference like this. Another reason their SOS numbers are skewed.) These teams are probably good, but not as good as their record says they are. Even if you lose the game, everyone knows those teams are going to have a huge win% to boost your SOS. It's worth it to take the loss.

You could also just play more non-region games instead of playing bad teams in-region. With a high enough SOS you only need to have a "good" season to make the playoffs. Not a great one. Look at the Central Regional rankings. IMO the only difference between North Park and Wheaton is that North Park played more in region early season games. Take away the first 10 in-region games from North Park and they're 19-10, likely with a SOS very similar to Wheaton. Does it really make sense to reward the 14-12 team for traveling further to play teams instead of the 28-11 team?

Quote from: Ricky Nelson on May 04, 2012, 05:28:18 PM
I corrected an error in my post above (the Central got two bids in 2011). To break my promise on that post being my last on the subject this season and to put a finer point on it, here are the bid breakdowns from last season. Some conferences besides the SCAC and NEAC overlap regions slightly.

Central has 4 Pool A leagues, 37 teams: 2 at-large bids in 2011.
Mid-Atlantic has 7.66 Pool A leagues, 60 teams: 3 at-large bids in 2011.
Mideast has 5 Pool A leagues, 48 teams: 2 at-large bids in 2011.
Midwest has 4 Pool A leagues, 39 teams: 2 at-large bids in 2011.
New England has 7.66 Pool A leagues, 67 teams: 2 at-large bids in 2011.
New York has 4.66 Pool A leagues, 37 teams: 1 at-large bid in 2011.
South has 3.5 Pool A leagues, 37 teams: 3 at-large bids in 2011.
West has 3.5 Pool A leagues, 38 teams: 2 at-large bids in 2011.

I'll have my predictions for regional rankings and the numbers for everyone, including Chapman, Wednesday. As is always the case, I think SOS is being somewhat undervalued by people here. I believe Chapman has a shot to be regionally ranked based on their numbers but they still would be a long shot either Pool B or C. Do we know which they are eligible for?

I think it's a 4 team race for Pool B:

Win%   OWP   OOWP   SOS   RPI   Team   Conf   W   L   T
0.675   0.629   0.517   0.592   0.613   Ithaca   E8   13   6   1
0.759   0.574   0.533   0.561   0.610   Washington U.   UAA   22   7   0
0.640   0.609   0.545   0.588   0.601   Chicago   IND   16   9   0
0.741   0.523   0.534   0.526   0.580   St. John Fisher   E8   20   7   0

The numbers are very close. For head-to-head Chicago is 3-1 against Washington U. and St. John Fisher is 3-3 against Ithaca. Should be a good race.

Also, I think all four of these will be selected as either Pool B or C.

I see the south looking something like...

1. CNU   A
2. Piedmont   B
3. Rhodes/WashU/Emory/Texas-Tyler    C
4. PrAC   A
5. SLIAC   A
6. Wabash    A

Only one flight. The 3 seed will be weak but that's not TOO bad. I like that it will have teams from multiple regions. It wasn't an awful choice.

Great addition of Alvernia to the schedule for St. John Fisher. I think the winner of that series is in, but the loser is out. Smart move by both teams to take matters into their own hands and settle it on the field.

Assuming Penn-State Behrend holds on to their 14-2 lead, St. John's Fisher will be 4-4 inregion against teams over .500.