Photo courtesy of the NCAA

The final week of the regular season is in the books, and I'll recap the action in the MEC a little bit later. The forums are ablaze with messages regarding the committee's selections. Below are the final rankings with the bracket, and I'll try to explain why I think it unfolded the way it did.

1. IUP
2. Shepherd
3. Assumption
4. Shippensburg
5. West Chester
6. California
7. Findlay


IUP - No surprise there. Deserving of the top spot

Shpeherd - No surprise here. #3 was fair all along, fortunately for them Assumption lost last week and the Rams move up to possibly host at least two games

Assumption - This is where I had them. Only one loss, to a team with a winning record. I didn't see a 1-loss team dropping below others with 2-to-3 losses.

Shippensburg - This is where I had them. All three teams ahead of them lost and they follow Assumption as the other team with 1-loss.

West Chester - I could see them falling off, but I'm not surprised they made it. The #5 seed is a little surprising--but not too much. Findlay dropped further losing to a team that wasn't in consideration for the playoffs and the same with Slippery Rock. I will break down the final three selections below.

California - As I stated elsewhere, the pieces fell into place for the Vulcans.

Findlay - I had Findlay making the playoffs with my predictions all along. With West Chester, I will break them down further.




The passionate arguments in SR1 seem to be centered around four teams: Findlay, LIU-Post, Ohio Dominican and West Chester. Below is a somewhat in-depth analysis about those four teams. The arguments also seem to be Findlay vs. OH Dominican and LIU-Post vs. West Chester, so I'll kind of compare the data accordingly. First, a reminder of the criteria used for the Regional Rankings as published by the NCAA ....

I admit, I did not take the time to go through the Strength of Schedule data by compiling Opponent's Win Percentage and Opponent's Opponent's Win Percentage. I believe someone else in the forums may post it in the General Discussion or in another conference's thread, but I encourage anyone else to do the legwork and report back.

D2 Win Percentage
Findlay - 81.8%
ODU - 77.7%
LIUP - 80%
WCU - 72.7%

SR1 Win Percentage
Findlay - 85.7%
ODU - 87.5%
LIUP - 80.0%
WCU - 72.7%

D2 Head-to-Head
Ohio Dominican def. Findlay
No other head-to-head between these four teams existed

Results vs. Common Opponents (GMAC teams have common opponents due to conference play, but no common opponents with the other two schools. LIU-Post and West Chester had one common opponent)
Findlay - 6-0, combined score of 328-61
ODU - 6-0, combined score of 267-71

LIU-Post - 0-1, lost to Bentley 21-40
WCU - 1-0, defeated Bentley 51-9

D2 Away Record
Findlay - 5-1
ODU - 3-2
LIUP - 4-1
WCU - 4-1

D2 vs teams .500+
Findlay - 3-2
ODU - 2-2
LIUP - 3-2
WCU - 4-3

SR1 non-conference win/loss record
Findlay - 0-0
ODU - 0-1 (lost to California)
LIUP - 0-0
WCU - 1-0 (defeated Bentley)


Findlay vs. Ohio Dominican

Despite the head-to-head loss, Findlay had a better D2 Overall win percentage, better "results" vs common opponents (record was the same, but the point differential leans toward them), a better D2 on-the-road record, one more win against a .500+ team, and the SR1 non-conference record was neutral (0-0) to Findlay, but hurt Ohio Dominican (0-1).

I agree Ohio Dominican is rolling, riding a 7-game win streak including an impressive win against Findlay, but the items used to make the determinations account for the entire season and the 0-3 hole at the beginning didn't help. In a way the game against Penn (FCS) doesn't technically count against OH Dominican, but in a way it does because of the chance it took away to improve some of the other areas.

Ohio Dominican wasn't even in the top 10 in SR1 going into the final week of the regular season which tells me they weren't serious contenders for a spot. I would argue LIU-Post gets in over Ohio Dominican due to overall D2 win percentage, away record and record against .500+ teams. Strength of schedule should favor LIU-Post over Ohio Dominican as well just by the fact the NE-10 had two more .500+ teams in the conference.



LIU-Post vs. West Chester

This one is a little trickier to explain. LIU-Post had a better overall D2 win percentage (80% vs. 72.7%). When you look at records against teams with a .500+ record, West Chester defeated more of them (4 vs. 3), but LIU-Post had a better percentage (.600 vs. .571). You know what that means--the West Chester fans will argue they defeated more good teams while Post fans will make the point they had a better percentage against good teams. Remember I didn't actually run the SOS numbers, but playing against 7 teams opposed to 5 indicates West Chester likely gets the check mark in that category as well.

SR1 non-conference win/loss record goes to West Chester. LIU-Post was neutral (0-0) while West Chester (1-0) gets to use Bentley again.

Bentley helped West Chester in several ways: Better record against common opponents -and- better win/loss record against SR1 non-conference opponents.

LIU-Post was already playing behind. West Chester was up at #6 going against the #1 team in the region. LIU-Post started the weekend down at #10 playing 1-8 Saint Anselm. The committee may have looked at it as, "It took a 1-8 team for LIU-Post to equal the number of wins West Chester already had."




I think (for whatever that's worth), the committee did a solid job with the SR1 final rankings. The selection criteria above is known to the schools, and schools should plan accordingly. There is risk/reward with maintaining an insular schedule like Shepherd and LIU-Post, and risk/reward with scheduling out-of-conference games. Do you schedule a good team and risk losing or do you schedule a team you're certain you can beat but take the hit on SOS and lack games against teams with .500+ records? That's for each individual program to decide.

I hope this provides some explanation for the final rankings in SR1. If you agree, disagree, have some other information to offer please comment below, send me an email, message on the forums, etc. Good luck to those still playing and safe travels to all!