I wanted to get this up yesterday but got kind of busy with things. In any event, the first Regional Rankings of the season were released on Wednesday (2-8) and here's a look at how things stand in the all-important West Region:
It was more or less expected that UST would be the king of the hill here with its unblemished overall and conference record but Puget Sound out of the Northwest Conference, GAC, and Wartburg all look to be in pretty good shape at the moment. Wartburg, in fact, sewed up the number one seed and the regular season championship in the IIAC by virtue of its big home win over arch-rival Luther on Wednesday night and it's tough to envision them getting knocked off in the IIAC tournament. Whitman, out of the Northwest Conference, looks pretty solid as well with its 19-2 overall record and 10-2 record in conference play. Both Bethel and George Fox are tricky situations right now. On paper anyway, Bethel should win out for the rest of the regular season to snare the number three seed in the MIAC Playoffs and, assuming that they win their quarterfinal playoff game that would give them 22 wins on the year, that seemingly SHOULD be enough to get them into the Big Dance. On the other hand, the thing hurting Bethel right now is the number of wins over teams over .500 so just getting to 22 wins on the year may or may not be enough (see SMU from last year). Perennial powerhouse George Fox is in a similar situation. They've already lost twice to Puget Sound and once already to Whitman although they get another crack at the latter in the regular season finale.
No comments:
Post a Comment