Well done, Bob. I don't know if I ever posted this, but I just didn't see the road to 14 for Mount Ida after you "only" went 6-4 in non-conference. I thought you might set some record for lowest RPI in the PIT.
Conference play has mostly been a pleasant surprise. The North has played just about as well as one could hope. I never took Elms seriously for the NT since they are just too young but they look to be a lock for the PIT and that's a pretty significant accomplishment since I thought there was a non-zero chance they would go 0-16. I thought Husson would do a bit better than they have but I think I underestimated the negative effect of the poor IQ's of the youngsters and even if I did overestimate how they would fare, they are making it to the dance with no worries. I was pretty worried about Becker making the NT and made a post about it in the regular forum when I was boasting about our 101-19 non-conference mark. I thought like Mount Ida, 7-3 for Becker was going to be the kiss of death for getting a NT bid. With two to go against Elms and UMF, Becker has a real good chance of going 10-6 and I just didn't see that coming. I also didn't see Johnson State being this good. I thought they were the perfect example of why you wanted to go 10-0 in non-conference if you are in the NAC because I thought the conference road would be a bumpy one for them. I think my general point is still valid about how you want to go 10-0 to be safe, but with Johnson State sitting at 9-5 right now they never had that bumpy ride. I think Johnson State is a dark horse for next season when they return 10 players. Maybe not even that dark since they aren’t exactly hiding this season.
The South hasn’t worked out as well as it has for the North. I think that is somewhat to be expected since the North is the power division this season (and actually has for maybe 2-3 seasons now … hmm). Mount Ida is maybe the biggest positive for me. I’m not sure I ever posted this, but for a while I’ve been thinking that Mount Ida was a lost cause for the NT after “just” going 6-4 in non-conference play because I didn’t think a team that young could win the 8 games necessary in the NAC to get to the NT. It is a feather in Bob’s cap to have made it to 14. If not Ida, Salem State is also a huge positive, especially based on my preseason expectations. They really took me by surprise this season. By the time non-conference was finished and they were 10-0, I expected them to get to the NT. Now, I’m not so sure, they really seem to be on the bubble right now. I think one more win and Salem State is in. Without it, they might be sweating it. Biggest disappointment has to be UMPI. I really don’t think there was anything wrong with my preseason prediction that they were team 1a in the South this season. If I had to guess, they are on the outside looking. If they beat Salem State tomorrow to get to 13, they still need to beat Becker to get to 14. I’m not sure what the odds are but I think it’s less than 50/50 that UMPI wins both and it really would be a shame to have them miss the dance. Preseason I thought MMA would be 1b and they’ve been a tad on the disappointing side too. I expected better than 6-10 out of them and unfortunately the NT committee is going to feel the same way with a RPI of 63. I think MMA probably needs two wins in the CT to get a NT bid and thus far MMA hasn’t been able to pull off a win against a top 10 RPI and that would likely be the second round CT opponent. UMPI has been enough of a disappointment and when you throw in MMA as well, it’s made UMF’s struggles an afterthought. I admit to being pretty disappointed to seeing UMF at 0-15 although for the good of the conference, the NAC is grateful that UMF isn’t taking wins away from teams that desperately need them to stay in the NT mix. While UMF looks to be the worst team in the NAC, that 0-15 mark really does surprise me. There is decent talent in the backcourt with Byrd, Matsuda, and Bui. Jantzen is a well-balanced SF. And in the frontcourt Oscar Flores is setting UMF records and has a couple of solid running mates in Francis and Witmer. I compare that team to my own and I don’t see *that* many differences. Seems odd that Thomas is 14-0 and UMF is 0-15.
Speaking of Thomas, my preseason prediction looks a bit silly but I’m still having a hard time coming to terms with the 14-0. Thomas is better than I thought but I don’t believe the Terriers are this good. I don’t think I fully understood that you don’t need all-stars at every spot in order to have a really good team. The last time that I had a team this shallow was season 30 and that also happens to be the last time I missed the NT. That team had a lot of similarities to this one. There were four really good players, I signed two transfer players that I didn’t really want (both had WE = 1) but signed because I was attempting to balance out my classes, and the rest of the roster was pretty shallow and/or young. This Thomas team had three really good players (Edgar, Hager, Dunkley), one JUCO that I didn’t want but signed to balance classes (Kelley), and the rest of the roster that was pretty shallow and/or young. I thought gloom and doom because that is what happened in season 30. What I didn’t take into consideration was that you can lean on players much more heavily now than you could then both in terms of distribution and minutes. It’s also worth mentioning that while those four were good players (combined six all-conference mentions), two of my current three are elite. Donald Dunkley is a pretty good center but he doesn’t match up with the best of the best in the D3 world. My player evaluation formula says that Edward Hager is the best SF in D3 and while that is debatable, the fact that he is one of the best is hard to argue. And I’m willing to argue that Keith Edgar is the best player in the D3 world. I’ve been able to get tons more out of these three than I expected; I have never before had a reason to try and squeeze so much out of so few since I typically have a more loaded roster. This time I didn’t and I’ve been blown away with the success this season. Preseason I would have been thrilled with a NT bid and a win in the first round. I’m still not expecting that much more but I do hope there is at least a Sweet 16 showing and I won’t be jaw-hits-the-floor shocked if Thomas makes it farther.
Although for next season … I think it is yours to have, Bob. You will probably be battling Castleton (and Johnson!) for class of the NAC next season but I don’t think you need to worry about me. I won’t be as gloom and doom as I was prior to this season, but I don’t think there is any way that I’m going to be able to lose this much talent and not suffer next season. Especially since there isn’t a lot to really like out of the juniors and sophomores. I really love the freshman class I have but next season I’m effectively going to only have one senior since Kelly was signed only to balance classes and the juniors don’t look too promising: Dustin Wills still has loads of potential but might not be ready to start, Arthur Leininger hopefully has potential but right now looks to be a bit away from getting minutes, and Martin Paiz is a perfectly acceptable player but isn’t ever going to be a star. I think as my current freshman mature, Thomas is going to be scary good, but I’m guessing I might have to wait until the year after before they really take the world by storm.