Quote from: D3BBALL on Yesterday at 03:09:44 PM

Quote from: ziggy on Yesterday at 12:00:20 PMTechnically with current bracketing principles put in place by the Championships Committee, the men's basketball committee would have had the latitude to not put #8 overall seed Wesleyan and #9 Tufts on a path to meet in the Sweet 16 as their true seeding warrants but I am glad they did not.

Coming at this as a general Division III basketball fan, I do want to see conference matchups avoided whenever possible in the opening weekend but have a preference for seeding holding over trying to avoid conference matchups beyond that.

I don't think it is unfair to the NESCAC schools to be in the correct spot they earned via their seeding and moving them in the bracket simply because they are from the same conference would create an unfair matchup according to seeding for the teams they would instead play as a result.

As for the balance of the Trinity (CT) pod (and treatment/placement of some other pod #2/3s), I am in complete agreement that different decisions could have and should have been made. I see these two things that are getting mixed into one discussion as two completely separate issues, however.

Reasonable people can certainly disagree, staying within the context of current bracketing principle mandates and the familiar constraints of creating a D3 bracket. That's OK.

Agree we can disagree, but the d1 committee would agree with me. And yes, it it 2 different things. And the committee has stated they want to protect the top 8, my point is they need to protect the tournament. You and others can say don't compare to D1, but this is pretty simple and common sense. As much as I knock the ncaa the d1 committee is smart enough not to put 3 top 10 teams from the same conference in the same bracket. It is just fundamentally smart and common sense, imo. Something this committee is just not good at, again imo.
The babson/wpi is just the committee being lazy and not caring.

D1 gets a little more leeway.  Unless there are nine teams in a conference in the tournament, their rules say conference opponents can't meet until the Elite Eight.

But the thing is, three top ten teams do meet in one bracket every year.  That's how the 1-8-9 overall seeds work.

Quote from: el_jefe_90 on Yesterday at 02:41:14 PMJust curious, what year did the NESCAC get three teams in the Final Four? I know two teams has happened quite a few times. That would have to be the only time, or one of a very few, that a conference got three teams into the Final Four.

No.  You're right.  I'm wrong.  I always get that mixed up in my mind because there was one year it was set up to happen and one of them didn't win.  I'm getting old.  Apologies.

Quote from: D3BBALL on Yesterday at 11:39:52 AMHow does the committee justify the Babson/WPI placements.

This may be the key point.  I think they bracketed Babson and Bates poorly, based on their own criteria and stated intentions.  These committees are human and there are always sacrifices made to align with the prescribed limitations of the tournament.

I'm just not sure it's right to argue that because they diverged from their intentions and criteria in one place, it justifies doing so further in another.

Perhaps a better argument would be, "hey, you moved things around to avoid sending some (but not all) teams to a different location than last year - why is that consideration more important than keeping conference opponents apart as long as possible.

Of course, as a NESCAC fan, you'd have to be prepared for the rebuttal that, in the history of the d3 tournament, it's been much, much easier to keep NESCAC teams apart longer than it has for any other conferences (except the UAA).  The WIACs have been crammed together for decades - they've never had even two teams make the final four the same year, rarely even had the opportunity for it to happen.  The NESCAC got three one time and two fairly often.

Again, I agree it stinks this year and it wouldn't be that difficult to resolve.  You have that point in spades.  I tend to think, though, in the grand scheme of things, very few in D3 are going to have much time for those complaints, given the history.

Quote from: stlawus on Yesterday at 01:19:27 PMA lot of d3 schools have their transfer application deadline this week or next. Entering the portal without an already planned destination could be tricky. I don't know of schools make exceptions with athletic transfers as far as extensions though.

D3 athletes are required to use the portal now (if I understand the new legislation correctly), so it may be a formality for guys who've already worked that out.  You'd assume you'd want to wait until the season is over, just for team chemistry.

Quote from: D3BBALL on Yesterday at 10:39:29 AMSeeds 1-4, 5-8, 9-12, 13-16 are all interchangeable

This is definitely not true.  Not true according to the committee, not according to the intentions of the division in moving to NPI.

This is the main sticking point.  You continue to base your argument on a fallacy.

Under the current system, those seeds are interchangeable only if the NCAA limits flights, which they did not do this year - at least not to the extent in previous iterations of the tournament.

Round 1
Zach McLaughlin, Farmington
Jason Reynolds, Farmington
Luke Chicone, John Carroll
Zevi Samet, Yeshiva
Remijo Wani, SJC
Tray Hughley, MUW
Phil Dotson, Rhodes
Nick Koch, TCNJ
Matthew Solomon, TCNJ
Donte Dupriest, Neumann
Hudson Johnson, UMHB
Babacar Pouye, Bates
Thomas Ferdinando, Babson
Shea Fitzgerald, Vassar
Will Householter, CMS
CJ Ruoff, Catholic

Round 1
Aurora
UWSP
Grinnell
Farmington
Rhodes
Babson
Vassar
Hope
Neumann
Whitworth
Loras
TCNJ
Bates
PSU-Harrisburg
Mount Union
UMHB

AWAY
Shea Fitzgerald, Vassar
Jayson Reynolds, Farmington


NEUTRAL
Zevi Samet, Yeshiva
Remijo Wani, SJC
Matthew Solomon, TCNJ
Lucas Gordon, Redlands


HOME
Ben Pearce, Emory
Jair Knight, Emory
Jacob Morales, Montclair
Shane Regan, Chicago
Kye Robinson, UMW
Sam Grieger, UWL
Jevon Yarbrough, Hood
Henry Vetter, Trinity
Mason Funk, IWU
Connor May, WashU

AWAY
Vassar (not sure they can win, but I get two games worth of points anyway!)


NEUTRAL
Redlands
Cortland
Trinity (TX)
TCNJ

HOME
Trinity (CT)
Chicago
RMC
Emory
Montclair
IWU
Wesleyan
Tufts
UMW
La Crosse
WashU

Both of those teams play with incredible confidence, which should make for a great game.  Whichever team can back up that confidence the most will win (obviously).

Quote from: WPI89 on March 02, 2026, 04:42:32 PMI thought it way to juicy for them to pass up - yes!  Did the committee see it as a "reward" for WPI regular season and beating Babson twice, to  move them away from Trinity? 

If you want to know my honest opinion, I think they had a bracket in place Friday morning and tweaked it a little based on conference tournament results rather than going back to start over once the weekend finished.  I say this mostly because the bracket we got looks a lot like the mock bracket I made Friday morning.  The teams are placed where they should've been placed most of the week and not necessarily where they should've been placed after the events of the weekend.

Quote from: D3BBALL on Yesterday at 09:10:52 AMYeshiva, played a tough out of conference schedule, but they lost most of those games. I think Bates has a shot, they have some defenders that could give Samet some issues. But as you say Pouye needs to play better and the traveling could be an issue.

Not to mention 95% of the people in that gym will be rooting for Yeshiva, which is about 20 miles away.

Quote from: Patrick Coleman on March 02, 2026, 09:45:50 PM

Quote from: Ralph Turner on March 01, 2026, 07:21:02 PMBy the projected bracket, the travel orphans, each the Pool A, Whitman (NWC), C-M-S (SCIAC), HSU (ASC), Austin (SCAC), Millsaps (SAA) and LaGrange (USAC) all fly.

https://d3hoops.com/playoffs/women/2026/projected-womens-bracket

Back in the old days, Millsaps could have hosted Webster (~490 miles), Austin College and LaGrange.

Hardin-Simmons would be flown somewhere as would Whitman and C-M-S.

The old days have nothing to do with it. Could have happened today if Millsaps had filed to host.

If Millsaps has filed to host, those 100% would've been the three teams there and WashU would've been the 1 seed.  That would've been the first and easiest pod they put together.

Quote from: SpringSt7 on Yesterday at 07:44:24 AM

Quote from: stlawus on March 02, 2026, 05:16:47 PMNPI is not the NESCAC Protection Index. This is part of the deal if you're getting a lot of teams in under the current system.

The last time the NESCAC got 5 teams in the tournament was 2017 and they were in 3 different quadrants. Williams and Middlebury were the top 2 teams and they were in the same quadrant but Tufts was also highly ranked and was in a quadrant with Amherst. Wesleyan was a bubble ish team and they were in their own quadrant. So while I understand that argument, it doesn't make a ton of sense to me that this is a byproduct of the system, even if that was pre NPI.

Not to mention there are plenty of second weekend hosting sites that would line up from an NPI and geography standpoint that you could've slotted either Tufts or Wesleyan into

This NPI system is night and day from what we being used in 2017.  Before, unless two teams were in the same region, there was no mechanism to measure them against each other.  Therefore you essentially had four pots - pod 1, 2, 3, and 4 seeds.  You could easily interchange them between pods, because they were, for all intents and purposes, considered even.

Now, we have a specific ranking of 1-64 and a stated intention to keep seeds in their prescribed positions unless it violates specific rules: the 500 mile travel restriction or conference teams meeting in the first round.

The committee further tries (but is not obligated) to keep conference opponents from meeting in the second round, as well.  This is above and beyond requirement.

After that, they don't really have license to move the 14th seed into the 15th spot, just because they like the matchups better.

Yes, as I've said, in the previous system everything you've said is correct.  It wouldn't make sense to keep all the NESCACs together unless there's a geographic imperative to do so.

This is a new system and you cannot hold the new system to the standard practices of the old.

There's a decent chance I'll be up at Scranton on Friday.  If it happens, I'll look forward to seeing you all.