Alright, at last here is the start of things at least. Hopefully, I can start to keep a steady pace. Was it just me, or were there a lot of lower potential recruits out there this year? I was struggling to find many guys above your average potential guys. I digress. Here we go.
SIAC
Miles (Seniors Lost: 12/Current Seniors: 12) – Miles had a bit of an up and down season last year. They had a nice upset over Saint Joe’s but then were unable to upset them again in the CCG. The down came with a first round loss to ESUP. It was a pretty even matchup going in so it’s nothing to be ashamed of but I’m sure husker would have liked to make it at least one step further. This will definitely be the season to take advantage of the offensive talent because that’s going to start to slide a bit next year. This is especially true at the WR position as Miles will have four senior WRs and an unknown amount of freshmen. It will be an interesting turn on the other side of the football as there will be lots of seniors on defense next season. This year they are still a good notch up from where they were last year. Husker didn’t skimp on the schedule as there will be OOC games against both Mansfield and Indiana (PA). Then they also end up getting Quincy in the cross-division draw. Even if they wind up losing all three of those games, there’s a very solid chance Miles will be going to the playoffs, even potentially with a top 5 seed, given how good the SOS should be. I would say the goal this year is to find a way to beat one of those 3 very tough teams and play in the CCG with a hope to win the conference, though that’s unlikely. Then to win at least one playoff game. This team definitely has the ability to pull an upset and find themselves in the third round but 2nd round would suffice.
Fort Valley State (Seniors Lost: 8/Current Seniors: 18) – It wasn’t a very good follow up to the 9-4 start that arigold had his first year. He swapped wins with losses and ended at 4-9. Plenty of seniors this year makes it a bit more hopeful to turn it around. The OOC schedule isn’t impossible to come away with a winning record but it’s still unlikely. Three human teams to face with all a considerable amount more talent will make it difficult. Then in conference a game against Saint Joe’s and yearly meetings against Miles and Kentucky State might make this season tough to get over .500. All that being said, it should still end better than 4-9. Some of the skill positions have a decent player here and there, but the big problem on offense will be the O-Line. Defense has more issues in the general sense, as no specific area looks very good at all. I think a realistic hope this year will be to try to get to 6 or 7 wins. Anything more than that isn’t likely at all.
Kentucky State (Seniors Lost: 13/Current Seniors: 13) – Chetty was able to finish with the same 7-6 record that the Sim predecessor was able to finish with. I’m sure he was hoping for a couple more wins against Sims that maybe slipped away a bit but things could have been worse. There were some bright spots of competitive effort against some decent human coached teams. The offense still has a ways to go before being able to scare many opposing defenses. The defense is still going to have many issues and the D-Line will especially be very shallow in terms of experience or talent. This team may need a few more years to bring everything together. The schedule was certainly made up with some promising teams to have to go against, which could make that win total stay right around the same total it was last year. A record of 8-5 seems to be about the best I think that Kentucky State could finish. I think that 8 wins is probably a goal that is at the very top of what they hope to accomplish. Playoffs would be doubtful unless the SIAC has a great OOC record as a whole and Kentucky State can have a top 10 or better SOS to go along with at least 8 wins.
Saint Joseph’s (Seniors Lost: 16/Current Seniors: 12) – Saint Joe’s won only their second CC last year in team history, which was a huge feat to finally get passed Quincy, who had been dominant for quite some time. The only two games that SJC has won against Quincy have both been close though and I would hardly say that things will be clear sailing for Saint Joe’s any time soon. The playoffs ended in the third round with a loss to NCCU in a game that SJC just couldn’t quite complete a 2nd half comeback in due to not being able to finish those 2nd half drives. The main problem last year was at QB, which there will still be issues at this season, but should look much better in the next two seasons. The team still lost a lot of talent, mostly at positions like WR and D-Line. There will still be two studs at LB and DB to try to carry the defense this year. On offense, they will rely on a better O-Line and a great one-two punch at RB. One problem that may be big this year will be the weak SOS. This may not make as much of a difference if SJC can beat Quincy and run the table and win the conference but if they lose that game to Quincy, they could be looking at a playoff seed as low as #6 or #7. That would not be a first round game that they’d want to be involved in. I think the goal this year will be to beat Quincy and win the conference against the likely opponent of Miles. Then hope for a good enough seed to try to make a deep run. This sounds like a tall task considering they’ll have a young team with 16 freshmen that could cause depth to be a bit of a problem.
Quincy (Seniors Lost: 14/Current Seniors: 12) – The streak of 10 straight CCs and 12 out of 13 was broken last season against a Quincy team that has dipped a small amount over the last couple years in talent, but this is hardly a significant amount. They are still going to have some deadly weapons and a solid defense that will be hard to move the ball against. They have the similar amount of depth and talented players on each side of the ball, but a bit less daunting and dominating on the lines. Quincy will fall into a similar position as SJC as they have a very weak SOS overall. With the game against Miles, it will likely be slightly better than Saint Joe’s but that game against them on day 11 will be ever so important. It will be even more important if they happen to get upset by Miles, although I’d be a bit surprised if that happened. I think the goal will be pretty much identical to Saint Joe’s goal, in that they will try to run the table and win the conference. Something will have to give for one of these two teams to do so. If they can set themselves up nicely in the playoffs, they have a chance to make a deep run but I’d say that the chance of winning a NC is starting to dwindle a bit. This isn’t a boom or bust year but if the worst case scenario happened where they finished 11-2 and lost a 1st round playoff game against a bad draw, that could really start to make things difficult in the coming years for Quincy.
SAC
Carson-Newman (Seniors Lost: 21/Current Seniors: 12) – Cubsfandave has had better follow up years the last couple years compared to his first season with CN. There is a big sign of trouble, however, in that he has failed to sign a single recruit during this season’s recruiting session. If that holds course, that will be 21 walk-ons. That’s enough to ruin a team pretty thoroughly. If not this season, then in the very near future. Recruiting issues aside, this team still has some firepower. The problems will arise more with issues of depth. The O-Line, D-Line and LB core will have some major problems dealing with this. And at the TE position, everyone stinks. Add that to the potential that there won’t be a coach steering the ship and things could get ugly for CN. It won’t very likely come at the hands of any OOC opponents, as they are all Sims. But this gives Lenoir-Rhyne a good shot at stealing the conference this year. It’s hard to say what kind of goals to expect for a team that may not be paying any attention. They still have the talent from the starters to win the conference, but I’m doubting they’d go anywhere in the playoffs.
Lenoir-Rhyne (Seniors Lost: 14/Current Seniors: 11) – Lenoir-Rhyne and Findlay seemed to make the good ole fashioned coach swap during the offseason as last year’s coaches for Findlay (Alanmr123) and Lenoir-Rhyne (mgoblue0586) traded places. So Alanmr123 is leading the way for LR after a couple of so-so positive seasons at Findlay. LR had a brutal OOC schedule last season that kept them from having much of a chance at the playoffs and finished with an understandable but still disappointing 7-6 record. This year’s OOC is still going to be tough but it’s at least survivable. They’ll really need to win at least 2 of the 5 games to put themselves in a more tolerable position to get back to the playoffs. Then they’ll still have to take care of business in conference with some up and comers themselves. So this won’t be an easy task to get back on track. The team has some consistent talent on both sides of the ball for the most part. It isn’t phenomenal talent but it should keep them in games against 2nd or 3rd tier teams. Looking at the schedule and LR’s roster, this season seems like it could have a lot of closely fought battles throughout the year. This really opens up the possibilities for what that final record will look like. I think the goal will have a wide range, but hopefully one that will allow a playoff bid. The biggest game/games will be against CN. CN definitely has them outmatched when it comes to starters. But with the unknown element of their coach and the straight up bad depth with 21 freshmen, things start to look more opportunistic for LR to be able to win their game against CN on day 6 and/or the game they’d play against them in the CCG (given that LR makes it there). Anywhere from 8-5 to 11-3 is what I think LR is looking for. 8-5 may be good enough to get in, it may not. A win against CN on day 6 will be a great sign for a playoff appearance though.
West Virginia Tech (Seniors Lost: 15/Current Seniors: 10) – The first year did not go so well for sdbmasters and West Virginia Tech. A 6-7 final record off the heels of a 10-3 record that a Sim put up. Things aren’t looking any better due to the fact that WVTU is in the same situation as CN with not having signed anyone yet. They will have 15 walk-ons as a result if things stay the same. That’s still a hefty amount of players that will be quite bad if the case remains. And unlike CN, WVTU does not have the starters that CN can rely on. There are few, if any, whose talent stands out among those on the roster. And though the schedule isn’t atrocious by any means, this is a team who could have some issues beating up on some of your average Sim teams. Another 6-7 record may end up being welcomed and things will only get worse in years to come if the recruiting has a 15 walk-on result this year. The goal will be to get to 6 or 7 wins and hope to bounce back next season with some solid recruits that a team with lower vision is capable of pulling in. Finding a way to sign some players this year would surely help more though.
West Virginia Wesleyan (Seniors Lost: 13/Current Seniors: 14) – Robbman started his first season away from West Chester as West Virginia Wesleyan’s head coach and had a decent start with an 8-5 regular season. It wasn’t enough to make the playoffs but then again, it wasn’t much expected that they would. Recruiting will be most important for the first few years here and though there is some okay talent on the team, another year out of the playoffs wouldn’t be all that disappointing. Robbman did set up a couple of uphill battles in the OOC against ex-conference mates, badaxe and fotman. Though I love the competitive and fun spirit that that shows and it certainly makes banter and the game in general more fun, it may set back WVWC a couple of wins that they may have otherwise had. Even with those two losses, I could potentially see this team finding a way into the playoffs if absolutely everything went right with SOS and what not. If they’re able to upset Lenoir-Rhyne in conference play, a playoff spot looks that much more possible, as they could potentially be playing for the conference and finish at 11-3. I’m guessing that won’t happen so I’ll say the goal is to finish 10-3 and hope that there is a weak bubble. Even a 9-4 finish heading into next year with improving recruits will be a good sign for things to come.
RMAC
Colorado-Mines (Seniors Lost: 20/Current Seniors: 12) – Last year marked the 3rd straight CC for tiltwar and Colorado-Mines. It also marked their 6th straight 1st round playoff exit. But with a lot more stiff competition in Warner DII, that seems very understandable. This is especially true for a team who tries to go against the odds and goes with the uncommon Wishbone offense. It is not easy to build a dynasty nowadays with a smash-mouth running team. It won’t be much easier as they lose 20 seniors and will have a lot of young blood to try to train. The biggest loss is the O-Line, which they will only have two returning players on the roster. The good news about that is that the freshmen get a lot of playing time and will be that much better come their senior year. But for the here and now, that doesn’t paint a pretty picture. The defense is still put together a bit more and though they aren’t super special, they can hold their own against the rest of the conference and have shown some strong outings. Besides the opening day game against Mansfield, everything else is wide open for a possible win and sweep of the schedule. This would end in another conference title and most likely another 1st round match that they’d be the underdog in. But maybe sooner or later they’ll get a matchup that they can pull out to increase their vision and start slowly moving up to a higher echelon of teams. I’d say the goal is win the conference with a record of 13-1 and hope for the right draw to get to the 2nd round of the playoffs.
Western New Mexico (Seniors Lost: 17/Current Seniors: 12) – A solid 10-4 season with a first round playoff last year for the newcomer tokerbob. But yet again, another no show for recruiting. Hopefully this doesn’t become a trend this year. I know life happens and that’s obviously more important than a game but it sucks to see teams that end up being ghost ships because a human name attached to a team doesn’t really make it much more than a Sim if no one is making changes or doing anything with the team. Oh well. There will be some of the same problems as most will have with walk-ons being signed. Those are lots of bad, young “talent” and very poor depth. This team had some alright players last year and that’s starting to thin out a little. The good news is that this team is really playing nobody outside of Mines this year. So the schedule is very, very winnable. So if tokerbob ends up gameplanning or at least sets a solid gameplan to start the year and then leaves it on autopilot, they can end up winning 11 or 12 games for sure. Twelve is almost always a certainty for a playoff spot so they’d have a good chance to bounce back next year if they decide to get back into the recruiting game. So I’d say the goal is to get into game planning and go for 12 wins with a likely first round playoff loss.
New Mexico Highlands (Seniors Lost: 8/Current Seniors: 12) – With a very tough schedule and a couple of tough losses to Mines last year, NMHU couldn’t quite get into the playoffs. Mattyice expected as much at the beginning of last year with the OOC schedule that he laid out for himself. This year, things should be far different in that respect, as the OOC has one human coach to go against and only Mines to get through in conference. And this year may just have Highlands as the favorite or near favorite with Mines losing 20 seniors to Highlands 8. Though the offense may have a few more tools than Mines, I think the defense still has a bit more to be desired. It should still be a very close match between the rivals. All that being said, I think that Highlands chance at winning the conference may be better this year than any other due to the experience difference and resulted IQ formation deficit that Mines will undoubtedly face. I like the goal to be winning the conference and being okay with being knocked out in the 1st round of the playoffs. Anything better than that would be phenomenal, while not winning the conference wouldn’t be devastating in the least. They could also still likely find a spot in the playoffs while not winning the conference. A scenario that could keep them out would be to lose both the day 6 game against Mines and in the CCG and having a subsequently poor SOS that would keep an 11-2 team just short of getting in.
PSAC
Mansfield (Seniors Lost: 12/Current Seniors: 16) – Mansfield is coming off of two straight CCs in the toughest conference in Warner DII. Though I’m sure he’d trade this last CC victory against lyonzfan’s Indiana for the NC that lyonzfan captured from him at the end of the season. Nevertheless, the PSAC, both during the regular season and in the playoffs, feels like an unstoppable two-headed monster at times. Fotman is primed with another roster full of talent to have a great chance at another run for the NC this year as well. If there’s even remotely a weakness on this team, it would have to be at LB, but that’s really searching to be honest. There will be no Indiana during the regular season unless it’s yet another CCG matchup between the two rivals. The OOC is stocked full of human coaches, three of which come from teams that are certainly no slouches themselves. And yet, Mansfield will likely be the favorite in each of those games. The goal for the year and each year here on out is to finally give Mansfield a NC. They’ve been knocking on the door for several or more seasons now and have both the talent and the coach to give themselves the best chance. I think fotman would love to do it against lyonzfan but probably wouldn’t mind Indiana being knocked out of the playoffs a bit earlier to make the path a little less difficult. A third CC in a row would speak volumes, even if Mansfield falls short of the #1 prize of a NC. Fotman can’t forget about Millersville and ESUP but will still be one of the two clear favorites to be crowned PSAC champion.
ESUP (Seniors Lost: 11/Current Seniors: 14) – It’s the second season badaxe’s team has ended the year with 5 losses and yet still managed to advance to the fourth and third rounds the last two years. This is, of course, a byproduct of playing in the PSAC, especially the eastern division, where badaxe is forced to play Mansfield and Millersville every season. It never helps to draw Indiana or California either. Unless, of course, they end up winning one or both games. Then it ends up giving a nice boost to their WIS ranking. ESUP has proven to be able to hang with the big boys at times and always seems to give playoff opponents a nice run for their money, if not a nice upset. The OOC yearly rivalry game against SEO has seemed to become traditional. There is another tough game against Humboldt that should also be close. In addition, this will be one of those dreaded years where ESUP draws both the (PA)s, Indiana and California. In reality, ESUP could actually miss the playoffs this year. That is really saying something considering the talent they have. The two weakest areas on the team may be the WRs and the DBs. This will mean teams will want to pass against them but stop the run (or at least the RBs in the air/on the ground). Game scripts will be very important and could wildly vary from week to week. I count 6 serious potential losses. This is the type of schedule where even with 5 losses, they’d almost still be guaranteed to get in. That’s how ridiculous this schedule really is. The game against California will be huge, as will Millersville. But to start, winning against either Humboldt or SEO would be a huge start. If they take both, it will spell a likely playoff regardless of what happens in conference. I think the goal will be something like a 10-3 record and another spoiler role in the playoffs that will take them as far as they can go.
Millersville (Seniors Lost: 16/Current Seniors: 7) – Millersville had a little bit of a setback last year with only winning 11 games. It was their lowest win total since season 101. Mojolad decided to change some schemes and started practicing a new formation on offense. This resulted in some losses that, even though they could have possibly still been losses, certainly would have been closer games. I expect some better consistency over the next couple years. And mojo planned accordingly by setting up an all Sim OOC schedule and was lucky to not draw Indiana or California in the first few games of conference play. A little luck never hurts. The team still has some top caliber players, though they are thin at a couple positions. With two new additions to the PSAC, things are only going to get tougher for each team in a few seasons, so these next few for Millersville will be very important to stay at the 13+ win rate to make sure vision doesn’t start to create too many problems for the talent on the roster. I think a good goal for mojo will be to go 11-2 or possibly 12-1 with a good showing against ESUP. Then, follow that up with a couple wins in the postseason and get back to the more familiar area for Millersville to be in.
Kutztown (Seniors Lost: 15/Current Seniors: 10) – Kutztown has now missed the playoffs in six straight seasons. Things are starting to slip away a bit for jdtilt’s team. The good news is that SOS should get even better, but the bad news is that means there will be that many more potential quality teams to face. Last year’s 8-5 season wasn’t terrible but they’ll need to start acquiring at least one signature win each year to get closer and closer to bump that win total up. There’s only so much Kutztown can do to make sure that happens, but if they can avoid cross division draws against humans and set up OOC schedules that favor them, then a 10 win season and a playoff bid isn’t out of the question. But I don’t think the schedules that jdtilt has been giving himself in OOC is beneficial. Sure, he is putting himself in the situation of having a top 5 SOS, but at what cost. Vision cares only about wins and achievements. So, if you play a tough team well and still lose, you are only gaining potential ground in WIS ranking points. And recruiting better talent is more of what Kutztown needs to get back in the playoff picture. There are already enough really good teams to face in the PSAC that adding more uphill battle games is only going to do so much for the SOS. There are three OOC games against SEO, SDSU and GVSU that are likely all losses and on top of that they get to play California and Indiana. The California game pretty much becomes a must win and then there is still another must win upset game against either Mansfield, Millersville or ESUP. And that would leave them at 7-6 if they won all games against the rest of the schedule. We saw them finish 7-6 two seasons ago with a ridiculously high SOS that was miles above the second best SOS and that still left them directly on the bad side of the bubble. This year seems likely to go 6-7 or 5-8 and really put themselves back a notch. The talent certainly isn’t so bad that they can’t compete with some of these teams, but they will be underdogs in almost all of those games I mentioned, if not all of them. The top of the bar goal will be to finish 7-6 and pray that the bubble is kinder to them than it was two years ago. Then, get into the playoffs and likely lose against a #1 seed, but at least they would end their playoff drought.
Bloomsburg (Seniors Lost: 14/Current Seniors: 16) – Benzil is one of two coaches that has taken over a Sim in the PSAC this year. He is certainly giving himself a lot of work for this rebuild by joining the eastern division. This team has not had a winning season in 20 years and in that time, they have only accumulated 64 wins. Quite terrible. And even though the OOC looks manageable with no real humans to play, not only will Bloomsburg have to face all four humans in their own division, but drew Indiana and California among their cross division opponents. That’s not a good start with the luck side of things, but I guess benzil knew what he was getting into. For a team who has a combined 16 wins in the last 7 seasons, the talent doesn’t look irreversibly terrible. But a big part as to why they lose so many games is because they’re always playing the best of the best. Benzil should still be able to make that win total rise sometime soon as in the first five games of the year. I would expect at least three or four wins there, right off the bat. For goals, a 7-6 start would be phenomenal, and that would include starting 5-0 from beatable Sims in OOC, then beating the two remaining Sims in conference. A season of 5-8 or 6-7 wouldn’t be a disaster though. Playoffs are a pipe dream right now, but that will be the long goal. Who knows how long? That’s tough to say in this tough conference.
Indiana (PA) (Seniors Lost: 15/Current Seniors: 10) – Indiana has now made it three straight NCs and the game turns into who will be the first to take them down. Mansfield tried last year to no avail but that would probably be the team I see most likely to do so. The QB-RB combo is just insane this season. And then when you add in the monster O-Line that always seems to be there, you have another recipe for great offensive success. The WRs and TE are not shabby but not at the same level as the rest of the offense, that’s for sure. The defense is solid all around, highlighted by an amazing LB core. The secondary is still very good, but not as much so as in recent seasons past. This looks like the schedule of an unbeaten team going into the CCG. That’s not to say there aren’t teams who could potentially give Indiana a run for their money, but I’ll stick with the national champs against everybody right now. The schedule will still carry a strong enough SOS to put them in almost automatic position for a #1 seed heading into the playoffs if they do in fact win all their games. I would say even with a loss in the CCG that they may hold true. The goal this year is the same it has been for a while now, NC or bust.
California (PA) (Seniors Lost: 13/Current Seniors: 11) – Four of the last five season for Metcalf and California have been 10-4 finishes with a first round playoff exit. That is certainly consistency but I know Metcalf would like to start advancing to the next stage of improvement. There are some definite studs on this team but not so much at the skill positions like we’ve seen on past California teams. One of the best O-Lineman in all of DII will have to carry the load. Depth at LB will be an issue but Metcalf runs the 5-2, so maybe it won’t be quite so concerning. The schedule is easy until conference play begins. And even then, I still like California to win the first two and have a solid chance at the third game against ESUP. This looks as if it could shape up to be an 11-2 or 12-1 finish with the worst being a 10-3 finish. The goal this year will be to get out of the first round of the playoffs. It would be nice to get something like 13 wins when all is said and done but either would do.
Edinboro (Seniors Lost: 12/Current Seniors: 11) – Slowtospeak hopped ship from Glenville on a kamikaze mission to the PSAC. He settled on Edinboro who hasn’t been all that terrible for a decent amount of time. This team has some decent pieces of talent for a Sim who has no human recruited talent on the team. They probably have the best Sim recruited LB core I have ever seen on a team. It’s actually comparable to some decent top 25 teams. This probably won’t be enough to do too much damage with and it’s unfortunate that three of those players that make up the talent will all be leaving next year. I guess that means to get while the getting’s good. The OOC games are all winnable, even against the two humans. Then again, they could walk away from OOC at 2-3 as well if they have a bad game against a Sim and they can’t manage to wreak enough havoc against their human opposition. Of all of the two teams they had to draw in cross-division, Mansfield and Millersville wouldn’t have been their preference. Then they’ll have to face Indiana and California as they will every year from now on. This makes me think that in order to have a playoff bid kind of start, they will most likely have to sweep the OOC. I think that can still be the goal though. A 9-4 first season with a first round playoff exit would be a phenomenal start for Edinboro and slowtospeak. If they miss the playoffs, it wouldn’t be a failure at all as I think 9-4 and playoffs is at the top of the line for ambitions.
NSIC
Minnesota-Crookston (Seniors Lost: 20/Current Seniors: 3) – Nacorwin has been working his way back up to a more elite status the last few years after being bounced out in the 2nd round of the playoffs in back to back seasons. It was a semifinal finish last year in what ended with a 17-1 final record. There was some quality regular season wins and very competitive play in the playoffs that UMC will hope to ride into this season. It will be the more off year for UMC though, with only 3 seniors on the roster. It doesn’t make UMC a breeze to get through by any means, but it does make it more difficult for them to take down nearly as many equal caliber opponents. Those opponents this year will be Mansfield and SEO on days 4 and 5. I think a split of those two games would be a good accomplishment with the younger squad compared to a year ago. Then, in conference, ranger will get his chance to try to triumph over the long time conference champs. That matchup will probably happen twice. The first will be on day 7 and the next likely time they meet would be in the CCG. I’m sure ranger would prefer to win the 2nd of the two games if he could only choose one but both for him would be more than wonderful and a long-awaited relief. Nacorwin is going to make sure to do everything in his power to keep the UMC train rolling though and he’ll be the favorite in both games, regardless of the lopsided difference of the number of seniors on each team. The juniors will still be impressive for UMC, but the usual issue of depth will be the primary concern for a team with the roster setup of 3/19/6/22. I think the goal this year is to win the conference, then get to at least the 3rd round of the playoffs to try to set up a title run next year.
Northern State (Seniors Lost: 7/Current Seniors: 22) – It was an interesting year last year for Northern State and ranger. He said he felt less motivated towards the game and a little less enthused to spend time trying to conquer it (certainly not a quote, just summing up my take of what I thought his attitude was at the time). And after what was appearing to be a mostly routine season that looked consistent to previous recent seasons, he had a very convincing win against a good, undefeated Humboldt team that went in as a #2 seed. The 2nd round they ran into NCCU, which was a tough one to pull off as another upset and they ended up falling short. But if my memory serves me right, it wasn’t by any means a blow out. I think that Northern State played them tough. A great O-Line will lead the way for a very good RB on offense. The big issue that could end up being detrimental (to what Northern State’s otherwise great chances at success this year may be) is the QB situation. The junior QBs honestly appear to be walk-ons. The redshirt freshmen will likely be a solid QB in his later years (and also very likely this year’s starter), but for now, his formation IQ will be low and may wreak havoc on the turnover margin. The defense will be able to hang with even some of the top teams at times, I imagine. That is going to be key for a team that will likely plan on relying on the run game themselves. I think the schedule looks very manageable for a solid record this year. Their playoff seed will be very dependent on how they end up faring against UMC in the presumptive two meetings between the two rivals. The shoot for the moon goal would be to beat UMC twice and finish as undefeated champs of the NSIC. That’s probably too ambitious but 12-2 or 13-1 is achievable and will hopefully set up a good spot to have a chance to win at least one, but maybe two games in the playoffs.
Charleston (Seniors Lost: 17/Current Seniors: 9) – Wizbang is in his second season with Charleston and will look to try to improve off the tails of a 4-9 finish last year. That won’t be easy based on how the talent on the team looks currently. I noticed something extremely strange last year that really doesn’t make much sense and may in fact end up being a glitch of sorts that, if I were wizbang, I would definitely be reporting to WIS. His team had zero formation growth in every formation except for a very small amount in special teams. I only noticed this because I played against him last year in OOC and checked what formations he was using. So, I figured if someone would put zero time into formations, that they’d have to put all their time into player development, but players were actually developing at a slower pace than pretty much all other teams, including Sims. I have no idea if you can purposely leave both formation practice and player practice times blank, but I have no interest in testing this theory. I don’t know why anyone would want to do such things. I guess maybe as some type of experiment to see how well you could finish with that kind of a weird challenge, but it seems unlikely. There are still some okay seniors on the roster but overall, this team isn’t going to be able to compete with any humans or even many of the Sims at this point. The good news is that there is only one human on the entire schedule. So, maybe there is hope yet. I’ll be paying close attention to see what happens with both formations and player improvement, if nothing more, for the sheer curiosity that I have. I guess the goal will be to have those practice areas utilized and find a way to beat half the Sims this year. I think that could result in a positive outcome to get the ball moving in the right direction.
NE-10
Long Island (Seniors Lost: 10/Current Seniors: 14) – It’s been a pretty consistent last several seasons for Long Island and it seems like they might be starting to turn a bit of a corner to the next level. If you look at the last four seasons compared to the previous three, they’re consistently advancing in the playoffs to at least the 2nd round, where as before, they were having one and done seasons. They’ve got pretty good talent across the board, but for a team in this kind of tier, you’d expect them to have a much better offensive line. It’s really not up to par with the rest of the roster. That is in part due to how young they are, but I think they’re still a little below the line for where I’d expect to see them. There will be some tough games on days 4 and 5. Indiana is the day 4 game that I doubt Long Island stands much chance against. Day 5 against Humboldt will be the game they will have the better chance in, and it would be a very big boost to their confidence and WIS ranking if they can find a way to win that one. Only Bryant will be on the docket for conference play and Long Island has been able to take care of them year in and year out for several seasons now so they should head into that game as the favorite. They shouldn’t sleep on it though as Bryant gave them a hell of a battle last year. I think the goal this year will be to win the conference, continue the advancement to at least the 2nd round of the playoffs and try to finish 13-1 on the regular season so they are in a good spot in whatever bracket they end up in to make things a little easier on themselves.
Bryant (Seniors Lost: 11/Current Seniors: 16) – Bribigdog looked like he was on his way to get back to the 2nd round of the playoffs last year, only to be halted by a younger Delta State team. The last couple seasons have still been showing more positives than negatives for bri and Bryant. They’ve got a decent crew of players on the roster, with the biggest strength probably being the line play and the biggest weakness probably being the back seven on defense. They will have a considerable amount of more human coaches on the schedule this year than in recent years’ past. I really like how the schedule is set up though. It will be challenging but gives them the opportunity to create a nice boost of SOS while still racking up wins. I think they have a very good opportunity to be in, if not win every game on their schedule this year. I think it’s unlikely that they pull that off, but it’s not out of the question by any means. Their toughest game should be against Long Island and they played them very tough last season. The game against Stonehill should also be very interesting to watch. I think there may be a range of goals this season. First, getting to the 2nd round should be a priority in terms of where bri wants his team by the end of the season. Second, accumulating as many wins as possible is obviously the ideal, but what’s most realistic? I’d say 12-1 is very realistic with a slight chance of 11-2 and maybe a little smaller chance of heading into the playoffs as an undefeated team. However, that would require finally beating Long Island, and then also beating Stonehill, not once, but probably twice. They could also go 13-1 with a loss in the title game and that would still be a fantastic upgrade of a record. Whatever they finish at, they’ll definitely be hoping for a good draw in the first round so they can taste a playoff win, which they haven’t done for eight seasons.
Stonehill (Seniors Lost: 14/Current Seniors: 11) – It’s been a ‘great’ start for TheGreatJDP so far in Stonehill. Two 11 win seasons, both of them with playoff bids and even a playoff win thrown in there. And there have been games that certainly could have gone Stonehill’s way to tally a few more wins for them over the course of those two seasons. The offense and defense are similar in that both of them have a very good couple of players on each side of the ball but, as a whole, the depth of the team is on a bit of a different level. It will be interesting for what that produces for Stonehill as far as wins go. There will definitely be some challenging games for them, and some that they are likely to lose, but they will need to secure the wins that will be more 50/50 if they want another trip to the playoffs. Those are more the games against Findlay, Kentucky State and Concord. If they can pull off an upset against Bryant, Humboldt State or Valdosta State, then that would be a huge bonus, but I wouldn’t count on it. I think the goal will be to aim for a 10-3 record and hope they’ll still be on the right side of the bubble after a CCG loss. But it is possible that they’ll need to either win the conference outright or go into the game at 11-2 to have a chance for the playoffs if they were to lose the CCG.
Concord (Seniors Lost: 12/Current Seniors: 19) – Concord just barely inched their way into the playoffs last year by being the 32nd WIS ranked club. It’s been a slow improvement in bballc first three years there. The offense actually looks like it can compete with some of these teams in the conference but the O-Line looks vulnerable. On defense, the secondary is certainly the most vulnerable unit. They’ll be tested by Bryant and Stonehill in conference play. The Bryant game is likely to be a loss but the game against Stonehill should be very interesting. I think it is a very 50/50 kind of game. And if they do win that one, they should be heading to the CCG. That’s another game of growth for players, which is always important. They should be able to finish with a record of 11-2 or 12-2. I don’t think they’re ready to beat Long Island in the CCG yet, or if they faced Bryant, I still think they’d be a good underdog. So, I like the goal to be a solid 12-2 finish with a playoff appearance. I don’t know if they’re ready to win a playoff game but it’s always possible they’d have a favorable matchup and be able to eek one out.
NCC
SDSU (Seniors Lost: 14/Current Seniors: 16) – Jaylien left after four solid seasons, including a semifinal appearance two years ago. He got bounced out in the first round last year though, so maybe he had had enough. Ephi287 takes over and has a good squad to take advantage of. A very good offense from top to bottom and a defense that is a bit weaker but doesn’t have any huge liabilities. Besides the game against Mansfield in OOC play, things look very winnable otherwise. This should be a season to go 12-1 heading into the CCG against a likely Humboldt State team that has been a back and forth for several seasons. I think the goal should be to win the conference and find their way to the 2nd or 3rd round of the playoffs. It’ll be hard to know for sure if the expectations should change to be a little higher or a little lower with a new coach and all, but for now I’ll keep them as they are.
St. Cloud State (Seniors Lost: 11/Current Seniors: 24) – St. Cloud State has been a Sim that’s been on the rise the last couple seasons but these things come and go and fluctuate fairly frequently, so I don’t know how much stock to put in any of that. Josheast will be the coach and hasn’t been around very long in GD. He’ll be the first human coach in some 10 seasons at St. Cloud State. Besides a brief seven or eight season period, the school’s history has been quite flat to say the least. There are pieces here and there on both sides of the ball that can be considered bright spots, but they’ll most likely have a few too many weaknesses to make this too strong of a first season. And though the conference schedule is pretty weak for the most part, OOC is going to hurt to start things off. Four of the five games will likely be losses and this is a team that could end up losing some to some random Sims as well. Looking things over briefly has me feeling like a realistic goal will be 6 or 7 wins this first season, with the potential to end up a little worse than that but I like to look at things more optimistically. The biggest thing this team will have going for them is the insane amount of 24 seniors on the roster. However, that’s going to bite them big time next year if they can’t take advantage of it now.
Humboldt State (Seniors Lost: 15/Current Seniors: 9) – Tampafla had things looking like they were right on par with another substantial improvement in total wins and a good chance at a nice playoff run. That was wrecked pretty hard in the 1st round with a surprising loss to Northern State, a team who kind of snuck up and stole one against the favored #2 seed. At 14 wins, it ended up still being the most under tampa at head coach, but I’m sure he’s thinking it should have been more. They’ll be seeking to get back to where they were last year and in a good position to make a run again, but the talent has dropped off a tick this season. It’s by no means bad, but 6 less seniors and they lost some valuable ones. An humanless conference schedule will be preceded by four humans to fight against in OOC play. They are all potential wins with three games that could potentially go either way. I still think I like them to win at least 3 out of these 4. ESUP may be the toughest challenger, although Long Island may have something to say about that as well. It wouldn’t be a disaster if they walked away from OOC play with a 3-2 record but I think it would still be a disappointment. The goal should be to win the conference against a tough SDSU team while finishing with no more than 2 losses. If they finish with 3 losses, it would be understandable if that third loss was in the CCG, but probably not otherwise. Then, at least a second round appearance in the playoffs, to at least get the bad taste out of their mouths from last year’s 1st round upset exit.
MIAA
Truman State (Seniors Lost: 12/Current Seniors: 11) – Swampdragonz takes over Truman State, a team that has had Sim coaches two out of the last three years, but was steadily coached by a human for a good amount of time before that. There are still some decent upperclassmen on the roster right now, so swamp will want to take advantage of that over the next two years before there are too many walk-ons to crowd the roster. He can certainly do some cutting players of the next two years and hide as many as he can on the depth charts but it’s still going to potentially be a leaking issue. The OOC schedule doesn’t look too bad. There is a game against Northern State that will likely be a defeat but if they can walk away 4-1 into conference play, that’ll do just fine. Truman State is the only human coached team in the Northern division so that will give better opportunity to increase the win total in the early years if swamp decides to stick around. This year, in cross-division play, they get Lock Haven and SBS. LH will be a very tough defeat, but SBS is certainly a winnable game. I think a good first season goal will be to go 10-3 or 11-2 and hope it’s enough to make the playoffs. If they get in, they are likely to be a one and done team but that would still be a success considering their talent level at the moment.
Lock Haven (Seniors Lost: 16/Current Seniors: 10) – Donbrenner was LH’s coach for the last four years but will be replaced by Rainman this season, who made a lateral move from Henderson State. Though it is an improvement over Henderson, LH took a big dip in talent in a sudden fashion, as they were looking good last season and the few seasons before that. I can understand why donbrenner left because this really was a big setback. There are definitely good upperclassmen here and there but there are still a considerable amount of walk-ons that will be hard to bury on the depth chart and ignore. And even some of those players are seniors, taking away from what would otherwise be good, experienced players. The southern division is starting to get more and more crowded. The thing is, the teams there haven’t really been much of a threat yet. Cheyney is probably the most viable threat to take Lock Haven down but I don’t know if they’re quite ready to be capable of doing it. There’s not much threat in the OOC schedule either. This should be a clear enough path for a solid season that will put them in good position to win the conference again and hopefully use that vision to get the roster back to looking the way it was. I think that winning the conference should be the goal and seeing if they can win a 1st round playoff match. I think it may be a little much to ask for but I tend to be wrong quite a bit, so who knows.
Southwest Baptist (Seniors Lost: 8/Current Seniors: 15) – Flippen has been going at it for more than 10 seasons now at SBS. There have only been three playoff trips and the last one was three seasons ago. It’s not like they are so far off their conference counterparts as far as talent on the field goes, so you’d think they’d be able to have some better results in a conference that isn’t so loaded. But the OOC is very loaded. So that makes it more likely that they need to do things like win the conference outright, which is something that’s a heck of a lot harder than to just take a couple games from humans in the conference as opposed to all of them. It’s going to be quite tough to near impossible to go better than 2-3 in OOC, then conference play has them playing all four other human coached teams in succession on days 8-11. If they can go 3-1 in those games, I think the playoffs may look likely. But a 2-2 record is more achievable and yet much more likely they’d be short of the bubble. They may sneak in with an 8-5 record but I know of some other teams who have some harder schedules that would probably be more impressive to finish 8-5. I think the goal will be 8 or 9 wins and see if the SOS holds up. MOV is also something that is a disadvantage for a team like this because I’ve never really seen SBS rolling over their opponents, even when they have been some of the lowlier Sims. I don’t think the playoffs are likely and would be a high bar to hit but every team should be aiming high.
Cheyney (Seniors Lost: 14/Current Seniors: 11) – Tmburton has been inching his way up the WIS rankings the last few years. It’s been slow but steady and things are starting to look more positive. There is definitely some lopsided talent going on when you look at the best and worst players at each position. And there aren’t really that many walk-ons on the roster so it’s an interesting thing to see. Maybe tmburton goes hard at a couple of recruits and settles for less with the rest, I don’t know. This seems like a team that is set up to go somewhere between 9-4 and 11-2 but regardless of where that number lands, they’ll fall short of making the playoffs due to a weaker SOS and a not so good MOV. If they can at least get close to the bubble, it will be a small success. I’m thinking 9-4 or 10-3 will be most likely and they will finish just inside the top 40. But I do like 10 wins as a goal as it’s not too ambitious yet very reachable. They’ll have to hope for the Sims they face to have better than average records and for the conference to outperform their expectations in order to have a chance at the playoffs with a 10-3 record.
Washburn-Topeka (Seniors Lost: 13/Current Seniors: 11) – Scottypup decided to give himself a very real challenge by making a lateral move from the LSC to the most consistently worst team in all of Warner DII of the last 10 years. Three wins total in the last 10 seasons and zero in the last seven seasons. That is some serious terribleness right there. For a team with this bad of a recent history, I would have expected a far worse group of players on the roster. Don’t get me wrong, they’re still very bad but more like 3 or 4 wins per season bad, even for a Sim. Nevertheless, winning more than 5 games doesn’t seem like a strong likelihood to start things off in Washburn-Topeka. There are a good number of Sims to go against on the schedule but it won’t matter as much as it would if they had some more solid talent. For this first season of a full rebuild, I’d say that a good goal would be somewhere in the 3-5 win range. I’ll be impressed if they can get higher than 5.
LSC
SEO (Seniors Lost: 9/Current Seniors: 17) – SEO was not rewarded last year in the 1st round as a #2 seed. They had to face a better than #7 seed Millersville team who you could say kind of sandbagged the year a bit with starting a new offensive formation and then reverting back to pro set for the playoffs. Obviously it’s not really sandbagging because they ended up with a tougher 1st round game themselves. But some tough luck for SEO, regardless. Since dachmann left, the wins have been slowly decreasing each season. This SEO team is still a force and has all the ability to be able to make a deep run in the playoffs but the circumstances have called for different outcomes thus far in dukers’ short career here so far. There are some very good WRs to go with an offense that is above average for sure, but not explosive in every way. The defense is a bit more evenly keeled but also not dominant. It’s a well rounded team overall and they won’t be exploited easily. The OOC has the yearly rivalry meeting between SEO and ESUP and they will also play UMC on day 5. This is a good year to play UMC with them only having 3 seniors, but UMC is still good enough to overcome that when they still have lots of good talent themselves. There hasn’t been anyone in the LSC who’s been capable of making a threat to SEO for quite some time now and this season will be no different. Abilene Christian has always been on the doorstep but they just haven’t been able to get to that next step to make things interesting enough. I think the goal this year will be to win the conference and make at least a 2nd round appearance in the playoffs, while making sure to go up in wins from a year ago, as opposed to the opposite direction, which has happened in three straight seasons now.
Northeastern State (Seniors Lost: 18/Current Seniors: 9) – After going 13-13 in the first two seasons, TechPhan turned things around last year by making the playoffs and after a 1st round loss, finishing with a respectable 10-4 record. Things, however, didn’t go the best during recruiting. He was only able to sign half of a recruiting class that totaled 18 players. So with 9 walk-ons, there will be some issues that are going to be annoying to deal with over the next few years. For now, things should be easy enough to hide players in the depth chart at most positions so that depth won’t haunt them. The offense’s biggest strength is definitely their O-Line, as it is right up there with some teams in the 10-20 range. But after that, the offense doesn’t have a whole lot to be proud of. The QB is decent, which is a relief. But the RBs are far less than average for a team that made the playoffs last year and the WRs are one of the positions that have very little depth. The D-Line will have some depth issues as well, where as the back seven looks alright for the most part. The schedule isn’t too terrible and though they may not be likely to get to 10 wins again so soon, they should be able to get very close. It doesn’t, however, look like the type of difficult schedule where anything less than 10 wins would get them a playoff bid. And even though they snuck in last year as an #8 seed, not making it this year wouldn’t actually be a huge setback. I think they over-performed last season and losing 18 seniors is another reason that it will be very hard to match last year’s accomplishment. I think an okay goal is to get to 9 wins and sneaking in again would be a huge bonus because it’s doubtful it would happen.
Tarleton State (Seniors Lost: 11/Current Seniors: 16) – There haven’t been a whole lot of coaches very interested in taking on Tarleton State in the school’s history. Miwright decided to choose them though, for whatever reason. Maybe it’s a hometown thing or an alma mater. It doesn’t really matter as he’ll still have his work cut out for him. There is probably more need for improvement on the offensive side of the ball, but it’s not a whole lot better on the defensive side. It is really just an all around needs improvement kind of team. They are not a bottom of the barrel team, more of a middle of the pack. But out of 144 teams, that’s a whole lot of spots they can move up. Things will be tough to start but there are some winnable games on the schedule and eight Sims to play. It’s hard to tell what that will equate to, especially with a coach that is quite new to GD. I think a safe, middle of the ground goal would be to win 6 or 7 games this first year. Focusing on recruiting and setting up a beatable schedule is what the two most important keys to getting better will be for a Tarleton team without much of a history of winning.
Abilene Christian (Seniors Lost: 13/Current Seniors: 10) – Gus McCrae and ACU finished just short of the bubble and ACU missed the playoffs for the first time in 16 seasons. It was Gus’ first season at ACU and things were kind of heading in a southward direction the couple years prior. ACU could have just as easily made it and it wouldn’t be hugely different news. They look like they may still be a team on the outside looking in but they have some good players, including a nice looking O-Line and a few select players on defense that are admirable. It will more than likely come down to if they can win the games that could go either way this year. There are already three games that look unlikely to walk away from with a victory, so that’s not the most promising start. It’s not an incredibly difficult schedule either, so a fourth loss would probably spell another playoff vacation. Even with a 10-3 record, they’d most likely be looking at a CCG that they would also lose and 10-4 looks a lot worse with the schedule they have. They may need a signature upset to get in. Bryant may be the closest chance they have. The goal should be to get to 10 wins and hope they luck out with some stellar OOC records from their Sim conference mates.
West Texas A&M (Seniors Lost: 5/Current Seniors: 14) – Things took a disastrous turn for WTAM last season after a promising start for dmac’s first few seasons. A 2-11 finish is about as bad as it gets and that’s a real slap in the face after starting with 28 wins in the first three seasons, including two playoff trips. This seems to stem from a problem with recruiting. And it’s hard to tell much from this year’s recruiting as there were only 5 spots to fill. Only 3 of them were filled but for all I know, dmac is trying to start setting up his roster how he wants. One thing that this year’s recruiting won’t do is turn around what looks to be quite an abysmal looking roster. It’s not a surprise that two victories were all that WTAM could muster last year with just how lowly a lot of the players look on this team. I doubt it will get a whole lot better than last season but even 3 or 4 wins would be nice. Only three humans to play against is a good start, but there will likely be issues with finding ways to win against almost all Sims just the same. I think the goal to aim for is 4 wins, maybe 5. Then, next year will be all about recruiting and at least avoiding spots filled by walk-ons.
GSC
West Alabama (Seniors Lost: 17/Current Seniors: 11) – From 0-13 to 12-2 to 14-1 with a conference championship. Quite the quick turnaround for West Alabama under nitros’ reign. I still don’t think that this team is ready to compete in the playoffs quite yet. But the recruiting classes should start to get consistently better and in two or three years, they should be able to convert good regular season records to deeper playoff runs. Right now the talent is still scattered a bit but it’s starting to look like a top 25 team. The biggest area for concern has got to be the secondary, which is still a step behind the rest of the team in terms of improvement. There is really only one player to be excited about in a couple years, and that’s nothing super special. Besides the Valdosta State game on day 6, this looks like a very open schedule, ripe for a good amount of victories. There are 10 Sims to take advantage of and I expect a final record of 12-2 or there about. In season four of the rebuild, I think nitros has to be thrilled with where his team is at. I still wouldn’t expect a playoff victory this season but maybe next year or the year after. I think the goal will be to win all games against teams not named Valdosta State and see where it lands them in the playoffs. It probably won’t be a top #5 playoff seed but you never know. If it is, maybe they can pull out a win with the right bracket draw.
Valdosta State (Seniors Lost: 12/Current Seniors: 11) – It was disappointing for superv to lose in the CCG last year to West Alabama. The dreaded ‘forgetting to change the depth chart’ cost him big enough in the first half to not be able to make a game of it in the 2nd. Props to nitros for being able to take advantage, but I imagine Valdosta would have been able to take care of business enough to clinch it had those starters been in for the first two quarters. Superv bounced back with a convincing win against SDSU in the first round but fell victim to Mansfield in the following game for the second time of the season. Superv said he was abandoning a couple teams and would have more time to dedicate to Valdosta in Warner so I doubt we’ll see any repeat depth chart mishaps any time soon. The offense is still a powerhouse with great stars at the skill positions. The defense has their talent but let’s face it, this team is most certainly more about scoring points than it is about shutting opponents down. On the schedule, there aren’t really any teams that should threaten Valdosta much. Delta State will close things out on day 13 and while they are on the rise, I don’t think they are good enough to take down a team of Valdosta’s caliber just quite yet. West Alabama will be a cross-division foe and while they were able to sneak away with the conference, I imagine some good old revenge will take place on day 6 for superv. Stonehill is the only human during OOC that is also a decent opponent, but may even be the weakest of those three teams. This looks like it’s set up for an undefeated run going into the playoffs. If so, seeding probably won’t be as high as a #1, but a #2 or #3 still seems possible. I think the goal will be to run the table and take back the conference crown, then make a nice run in the playoffs. Round three or better sounds about right, and though Valdosta has the potential for a NC, this year will be a tougher year to do so with all of the surrounding talented teams that are emerging.
Delta State (Seniors Lost: 9/Current Seniors: 12) – Ftbeaglesfan has things moving in a good direction for Delta State. Last year finished on a very good note with a nice upset over Bryant in the first round of the playoffs. They lost in the 2nd round but really weren’t expected to win that first game, so it was already a success. And considering the fact that the team was still very young, it’s a good sign for things to come. Then, this year already starts off with a bang with a very high quality recruit class. It was only 9 players but they will still make a difference when the time comes all the same. The current talent still has a ways to go but there’s a lot to be happy about already. And even though this team isn’t ready to go very far in the playoffs yet, each position on the roster doesn’t really have a lot of very weak spots. I’d say the quality players are evenly distributed throughout the team. The schedule doesn’t look great for them. They should be able to go 11-2 but there aren’t going to be any signature wins without either an upset against NCCU or Valdosta State and both of those things will prove to be difficult. And besides that, the majority of the rest of the opponents on the schedule will be Sims. It just seems the SOS will be weak and this will probably cause Delta State to get a lower seed than they may have the potential for. I think the goal will be to go 11-2 and really try to ride up the score in all of their wins to hope MOV makes a big enough difference to at least land them a #6 seed. Then they can hope for a good enough draw to maybe pull of another first round upset.
Southern Arkansas (Seniors Lost: 12/Current Seniors: 12) – Genuvar is the new coach for Southern Arkansas. He will have a very challenging career ahead of him with this club. No coach has lasted more than two seasons at Southern Arkansas and out of the 108 previous seasons, human coaches only make up 12 of those seasons. He won’t have a lot to work with right away. The best thing I can say about the roster is maybe a tolerable offensive line. Maybe. The back seven on defense looks pretty bad and quite easy to exploit. There will only be 4 human coaches on the schedule to be able to exploit such holes this year, but each of them are quality opponents, coaching for teams who all made the playoffs a year ago and who are all probable to do so again this year. We’ll see how quickly genuvar can turn these guys around. Nitros has proven with West Alabama that it’s not so easy to predict just how bad a team is and just how much potential they can give right away. Obviously a lot of it has to do with game planning skills (even routine stuff against Sims can make a difference if you do or don’t know what you’re doing) and dealing with recruiting to the best of one’s abilities in order to land some players who will end up making enough of a difference to secure those vital extra wins that are so important. I think the goal for now will be about a 7 win season. More than that would be nice but it won’t be super upsetting if it doesn’t happen.
GLIAC
GVSU (Seniors Lost: 11/Current Seniors: 9) – Realist has done a fantastic job at GVSU but has just not been able to get over the NC hump yet. He still hasn’t appeared in a NCG as well, but it seems like an appearance is right on the surface. The tools are there with a really well rounded offense in every way. The defense isn’t quite so high powered but are still very, very good. In particular, the back seven are right up there with the top teams. The schedule is filled with a good amount of human coaches that still all look like fairly easy wins against. Indianapolis probably has the best chance at an upset and that would surely be the worst team for GVSU to lose to as it would likely keep them from attending the CCG, a game realist has played in all seven seasons he’s been there. Still, I think the goal will be to finish 14-0 with another GLIAC crown and look to make a serious NC run this season. I think a semifinal appearance would probably feel alright, but at least making the NCG would probably feel very good for realist.
Indianapolis (Seniors Lost: 12/Current Seniors: 11) – Sethstorer has had back to back 11-3 seasons and the team is starting to climb the WIS rankings. There have been a couple of 1st round playoff losses to go with those seasons but they should get a good bracket draw sooner or later that would give them a good shot at starting to advance further. Every position on the team seems to have a familiar feel of 1-3 above average players with a nice looking star player every once in a while. And there doesn’t seem to be any obvious weaknesses that will stand out enough to blow games against teams that they should beat. But overall, they don’t have the kind of talent to beat too many teams who are looking down on them from above either. So, teams on the schedule like Indiana and GVSU are highly likely to be losing efforts. There are, however, a couple very interesting matches with teams of similar talent. Both will be OOC games; the first against Northern State and the second against Bryant. They do have the potential to win both these games and yet they also have the potential to lose both. I’m sure seth would settle for a split, be thrilled with winning both, and be a little disappointed to be at the wrong end twice. And a lot could end up riding based on the possibility of all three outcomes. Playoffs are not a guarantee with even losing one of those two games and it’s definitely going to be scary if they lose both. But I think winning both would look great on a resume and probably seal the deal for the playoffs. I think the goal is to go at least 10-3 and see where that lands them when it comes selection time. I imagine it would be enough to get them in, but there might be a sweat. This will depend a lot on how the GLIAC does in OOC. For the playoffs (if they do get in), the hope will be to draw a beatable opponent and take that next step in getting to the 2nd round.
Findlay (Seniors Lost: 13/Current Seniors: 15) – Mgoblue swapped coaching positions with Alanmr, who took over mgo’s last year squad, Lenoir-Rhyne. Findlay actually used to be a very successful team and has a very good history of winning. Thirty eight CCs to only 1 NC has been the school’s result over the course of the 108 seasons that Warner has been involved in. But those times ended a little over 15 seasons ago and there hasn’t been a conference winner since then. There are some bright sides emerging recently, however, as the last 6 seasons have all been winning seasons and the last two have gone 10-3, then 11-3, with last season finally getting back to the playoffs. There are still mostly just average to above average players on the roster, with the exception of a couple of very good players on the lines. The secondary is what looks most troublesome, with not a lot of good depth and the starters aren’t that solid either. It also doesn’t help when the skill position players don’t really stand out much. They won’t spark many big plays in games that matter. Those games that matter will mostly be against Bryant and Stonehill. I don’t like their chances with Bryant and although I see Findlay going in as underdogs against Stonehill, they should certainly have better chances in that one. The rest of the schedule is a bunch of Sims and GVSU, a game they should lose. So, 10-3 might not be good enough, depending on just how bad the SOS is. I imagine 11-2 would put them over the top to make it in but even that wouldn’t be automatic. I think the realistic goal will be to go 10-3 and hope the playoff selection gods are on their side this year. Playoffs would most likely be a one and done but that would be no sweat at this point.
CIAA
Virginia State (Seniors Lost: 15/Current Seniors: 16) – Virginia State had a stellar season last year, surprising several teams along their way. It finally ended when they hit a brick wall in Indiana in the quarterfinals. The offense started to play even more efficiently last season and the defense -- which had been a huge liability the first two seasons of pistol’s reign -- really started to make a difference and disrupted a lot of offenses with consistent pressure. This all shotgun offense isn’t the kind of team anyone wants to go up against. Even when you know exactly what’s coming, it doesn’t usually make it much easier to stop. The defense has really improved in the back seven, which is exactly where they needed improvement. But the surprise from last year was the D-Line playing so well with seemingly so little. It was really the younger players that stood out and with another year under their belt, they have to be scarier. There really aren’t any threats on the schedule, so this looks like an unblemished record going into the CCG against the presumptive NCCU. It took a thrilling 7 OTs for Virginia State to win the CCG last year, so I can’t wait what this year’s will have to bring. I think VSU really has enough firepower to have high hopes and expectations going into the season. I think the goal will be to defend the conference and regain the title. That’ll be no easy task against NCCU but we all hope it’s just as exciting as last year. After that, I think a 3rd or 4th round playoff appearance is a very realistic possibility. It’s tough to say if this team is a NC contender. I’d say they’re falling just short of that right now, but at the same time, I didn’t think they were capable of what they ended up doing last year either, so it’s hard to say.
Bowie State (Seniors Lost: 10/Current Seniors: 10) – Brbhn just hasn’t been able to do a whole lot at Bowie State. The first couple years went okay, each with a finishing record of 8-5. Then, the last two seasons have both finished with sub-.500 records at 6-7. I think a big part of this has been due to very challenging OOC schedules if my memory serves me correctly. This season’s OOC schedule has been set up to be much more manageable. Only one game against a human coach and that one has the potential to add one to the win column. It was unlucky to draw both humans in cross-division and it might be the bad kind of luck to keep Bowie State from having realistic playoff hopes. Then again, it may just boost the SOS enough to get them into the playoffs. In order to make the playoffs, they’ll most likely have to go 11-2 with their only two losses being to very quality opponents, Virginia State and NCCU. Where the majority of the offense is subpar, there is a standout RB who will steal the show. And he’ll need to steal the show if they’re going to be able to put up enough points on the board in order to get back to 8 wins or better. The defense isn’t a whole lot better and unlike the semi-star RB, there isn’t anybody to take over the game defensively speaking. This is what will likely be their biggest issue in keeping games close. Though it would look very nice to come away with 11 wins this year, I don’t think it’s practical. I think a more realistic goal will be to get back to 8-5 or maybe hope for 9-4 and continue to orchestrate that OOC schedule to benefit their long term chances. They won’t draw NCCU and St. Augustine’s every year in cross-division so it’s just a matter of time. And until then, recruit well and grow that young talent.
Elizabeth City (Seniors Lost: 14/Current Seniors: 10) – Aside from that first year of recruiting, Paco has managed to sink this team deep into the ground. Usually ghost ships have had their teams around for a little longer but there was just that first season in Elizabeth City that was paid attention to. It’s confusing to me but the end result is that this is a team full of walk-ons minus maybe a handful of players. Next year they will be fully absent of signed players and potential playmakers. The crazy thing is how they’ve managed to finish 7-6 in the last two seasons with the nothing that they’ve had. So much more so this season is the nothingness that it would shock me if they can manage to win more than a few games. Even that wouldn’t make sense. The goal will be to relinquish the team or start recruiting. If there is no recruiting next season, I’ll be adding Elizabeth City to the realm that WSCC currently sits in. Paco and gliatta can enjoy coffee together some time. But it won’t be while reading their teams’ chances at success in the Warner blogs.
NCCU (Seniors Lost: 9/Current Seniors: 12) – Kevinbigham came just short of reaching the NCG with a semifinal loss to Mansfield. It was still a great effort overall and it had some crazy excitement to it along the way. The offense will be led by a terrific and very deep O-Line, a great group of WRs and a top notch RB. The RB depth, however, is very shallow. One senior is backed up by two true freshmen. The QB situation is also weaker than usual, as a RS sophomore will be starting at the helm. He’ll be great in a couple seasons and even very good next year, but there may be some kinks this year. The defense is all around great and deep with talent. The schedule doesn’t really have any scary games. Delta State is up and coming but isn’t ready to compete on the same level that NCCU is at right now. This should be an undefeated vs. undefeated in the CCG with NCCU and Virginia State hopefully having an epic rematch to what was an epic finish to the regular season last year. I think the goal this year will be to retain bragging rights as the conference champion, then prove why by making a deep run in the playoffs, hoping to get to and win the NC. They are capable, but the biggest thing standing in their way might be the younger QB. He’s got a lot of great talent around him, though, so maybe that will be enough to avoid key mistakes at key moments in big games. We’ll see.
St. Augustine’s (Seniors Lost: 14/Current Seniors: 15) – It was a great start for veejay last year at St. Augustine’s by going 10-3 to just miss the bubble by a few teams. He did it last year with less than quality talent and he’ll have to do the same this season. There is not a whole lot on the roster that screams ‘I’m good’. But the roster may be even more wide open with beatable teams than last year. This is a good recipe to keep inching up in total wins and improving vision, then likewise talent. Usually, if someone can turn a bad program around in a hurry with the win total, it’s a good sign for the long term as well. Or I could just be missing something. I’ve been known to be wrong about lots of things before. Veejay hopes I’m not in this case. I think a good goal will be to win 11 or 12 games and find a spot as a #7 or #8 seed and accept a first round defeat as a stepping stone to success in later seasons.
6/22/2016 10:12 PM (edited)