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The 2005 Conference Races

Publication Date: May 10, 2005

Best of Breed

Why does this matter? How many teams are there in Division I? To how many of them is the conference title the only realistic aim for the season? Can you define rhetorical?

America East

                   W  L  Remaining

Northeastern      10  4  @Maine, Stony Brook
Maine             10  5  Northeastern, Binghamton
Vermont           10  5  Stony Brook, Albany
Binghamton         9  5  Hartford, @Maine

Got to do these in something other than alphabetical order one of these days. There's nothing wrong with the AmEast, I suppose; I just get tired of doing it first every time, and I'm sure the MAAC gets short shrift by the time I get there. Anyway, this is a nice, tight race at this point -- Maine's at home the rest of the way and has been the best of the bunch overall, Northeastern's got a slight lead, Vermont has an easier schedule, Binghamton could pull into a tie this weekend if Maine takes two. Enjoy the next couple of weeks if you're a fan of these guys.

ACC

                   W  L  Remaining

Georgia Tech      18  6  Virginia Tech, @UNC
Miami, Florida    17  6  @Virginia, @Clemson
North Carolina    15  6  @Florida State, Georgia Tech
Florida State     15  9  UNC, @NCSU
Clemson           15  9  @Wake Forest, Miami

Rainouts and the UNC-Miami "tie" make this slightly complicated (and I'm sure the Heels would love to have the two against Virginia Tech back). I'd say the schedule slightly favors Miami if they didn't have to go on the road (and who knows if the fact that this is the first time the Canes have left home in May since 1938 is a factor); with things as they are, I'll go with the Yellow Jackets to hang on. The FSU-UNC series this weekend has some fairly big postseason implications, I'd guess.

Atlantic Sun

                   W  L  Remaining

Troy              19  5  Stetson, @Jacksonville
Central Florida   16  8  Georgia State, @Mercer

This is what happens when teams don't pay attention to what they're supposed to do. Troy hasn't been better than UCF at any point in the season, except that they've won more games, including winning two of three from them at home last weekend, and they've built a nice little three game lead coming down the stretch, with neither team facing noticably different schedules. They presumably get the pennant, and we'll see what that does to the postseason.

Atlantic 10 East

                   W  L  Remaining

Rhode Island      17  4  @UMass

Atlantic 10 West

                   W  L  Remaining

George Washington 12  6  LaSalle, @Temple
Dayton            11  7  @Xavier, Richmond
Richmond          11  7  @Duquesne, @Dayton

URI has clinched. The West is more interesting, but GW would look to have a clear shot as the other two battle it out. Kudos to the league for making up rained out games.

Big East

                   W  L  Remaining

St. John's        16  4  @Villanova
Boston College    15  7  @UConn

BC needs a lot of help here, so just keep one eye on this one.

Big South

                            W  L  Remaining

Coastal Carolina           16  2  @UNC-Asheville, @Winthrop
Winthrop                   16  2  @BSC, Coastal Carolina
Birmingham-Southern        14  4  Winthrop, @UNC-Asheville

Great scheduling here. Coastal gets a slight edge from the schedule, but Winthrop gets to be at home if they can make it to that last weekend in range.

Big 10

                   W  L  Remaining           

Illinois          18  6  @Minnesota, Iowa
Iowa              15  9  @Purdue, @Illinois

Those are four-game series, so Iowa's still in range. The Illinois-Missouri game on the 18th is also interesting from a comparative basis.

Big 12

                   W  L  Remaining

Baylor            15  6  @Texas A&M, Missouri
Nebraska          14  7  @Texas Tech, Kansas State
Texas             14  9  Texas A&M
Missouri          12  9  Kansas, @Baylor

From the silver lining department, Texas probably ended A&M's chances of making the NCAA tournament by rolling over in Kansas last weekend. Nebraska is in interesting shape to steal another one with KState coming in to end up.

Big West

                      W  L  Remaining

Cal State Fullerton  13  2  Long Beach, @UC Riverside
Cal Poly              9  3  @Long Beach, UC Riverside, @UC Irvine
Long Beach State     11  4  Cal Poly, @Fullerton

There are no guarantees, but I'd assume that Fullerton will win this one. The battle for second will mostly be settled this weekend.

CAA

                            W  L  Remaining

North Carolina-Wilmington  15  3  VCU, @Old Dominion
Virginia Commonwealth      13  5  @UNC-Wilmington, Delaware

Line 'em up, let 'em play. If VCU can go into Wilmington this weekend and sweep, they take it. Otherwise (and most likely), the Seahawks win.

Conference USA

                       W  L  Remaining

Tulane                19  5  @St. Louis, TCU
Texas Christian       17  7  Louisville, @Tulane

See above. TCU has to stay in range this weekend (which won't be easy; St. Louis is not nearly as good as Louisville) and then go sweep in Turchin Field.

Horizon

                     W  L  Remaining

Youngstown State     7  1  @UIC, UWM
Wisconsin-Milwaukee 11  5  @YSU
Illinois-Chicago    10  6  YSU

YSU's series against Butler was rained out, which leaves us with this mess. On the other hand, if they had played, there's no reason to think they wouldn't have swept them, which would leave us in more or less the same state. I don't have a clue who will win this, which is nice.

Ivy League Gehrig

                   W  L

Cornell           11  9

Ivy League Rolfe

                   W  L

Harvard           15  5

This one's already done (one of the hazards of this column; there is no good time to publish it with the MEAC and Pac-10 finishing over a month apart). Harvard has already won the championship series.

MAAC

                   W  L  Remaining

Siena             15  3  Marist, @LeMoyne
Marist            17  4  @Siena, @Iona
LeMoyne           13  6  @Manhattan, Siena

These three are quite close together in actual quality, as far as I can tell, so this should be fun. That gives Siena the toughest schedule. On the other hand, the head-to-head this weekend makes it hard for LeMoyne to get back in range.

MAC Eastern

                   W  L  Remaining 

Miami, Ohio       12  3  @Northern Illinois, @Kent State
Akron              8  5  @EMU, Ohio

MAC Western

                   W  L  Remaining

Ball State        15  4  @Marshall
Western Michigan  11  5  @Kent State, Bowling Green
Central Michigan  12  6  @Buffalo, EMU

Wow. How hard do you have to work at it to make sure that absolutely none of the contenders play each other anywhere close to the end of the season? Take the current leaders if you're guessing, I suppose.

Mid-Continent

                   W  L  Remaining

Oral Roberts      15  1  @Western Illinois, @Chicago State
Western Illinois  12  4  Oral Roberts, @Southern Utah

Stop me if you've heard this one before.

MEAC

                     W  L

North Carolina A&T  12  6

They also won the tournament, so the MEAC will have a new representative this year.

Missouri Valley

                    W  L  Remaining

Creighton          15  6  @Evansville
Wichita State      12  6  Indiana State, @Bradley
Southern Illinois  13  8  Illinois State

The three-game series have been a nice change this year. Having two of the three leaders playing South Dakota State instead of each other isn't particularly, although you could excuse Creighton and SIU if they're a bit surprised to be here. SIU's probably out, but Wichita has a shot, since Bradley isn't nearly as good as Evansville. By the way, Creighton and Nebraska pulled in over 20,000 at Rosenblatt Tuesday night.

Mountain West

                   W  L  Remaining

Nevada-Las Vegas  19  5  @BYU, Utah
Brigham Young     17  7  UNLV, @SDSU

They'll settle this one this weekend, mostly. BYU is at home and slightly better, but they really need a sweep, so there's some good dramatic tension here.

NEC

                   W  L  Remaining

Quinnipiac        15  5  Monmouth
Sacred Heart      15  6  @CCSU
Monmouth          14  6  @Quinnipiac

Well, they're all really bad, but they're well-matched, and that's worth something. Today's Quinnipiac-Monmouth doubleheader will go most of the way toward settling it, unless it doesn't.

OVC

                     W  L  Remaining

Morehead State      14  6  Eastern Illinois, @Eastern Kentucky
Austin Peay State   14  7  Eastern Kentucky, Jacksonville State
Jacksonville State  14  7  @Murray State, @APSU
Murray State        12  9  Jacksonville State, @Samford
Eastern Kentucky    11  9  @APSU, Morehead State

Now, that's really good scheduling. I haven't worked out the math, but I think any of the five could still legitimately come out on top.

Pac-10

                      W  L  Remaining

Arizona              12  3  @ASU, @Stanford, California
Oregon State         14  4  @Washington, USC
Arizona State        10  5  Arizona, @Washington, Washington State
Southern California   9  6  Washington State, @Oregon State, Stanford

USC West is still in it because there are three weeks left. The schedule probably favors OSU, although there may be a minor lame duck problem with them finishing a week before the others.

Patriot

               W  L  

Army          17  3  

The regular season is over; the championship round this weekend has Lehigh and Bucknell playing for the right to challenge Army for the automatic bid.

SEC Eastern

                   W  L  Remaining

Tennessee         15  8  @LSU, Georgia
Florida           15  9  Mississippi State, @Vanderbilt

SEC Western

                   W  L  Remaining

Alabama           14 10  Arkansas, @Auburn
Louisiana State   14 10  Tennessee, @Mississippi State
Mississippi       13 11  South Carolina, @Arkansas
Mississippi State 11 12  @Florida, LSU
Arkansas          11 13  @Alabama, Mississippi
Auburn            11 13  @Georgia, Alabama

This is what happens when you have tons of good teams and no great teams. It's really unlikely that the bottom three in the West could play their way through the thicket, but they're all within my three-games-with-six-left radius, so here they are. It's an oddity that the division leaders (with the exception of LSU) aren't that close to being the best teams in the league, but that may be forgotten one way or the other over the next couple of weeks.

Southern

                         W  L

College of Charleston   23  2

Finally, we get a runaway (although Army would have qualified if I had done this a week earlier). Georgia Southern is actually a quite decent team, but they're 6.5 back already.

Southland

                      W  L

Northwestern State   17  4

And another. In this case, they're four up on Texas State and Arlington, and that should be enough.

SWAC East

                           W  L

Mississippi Valley State  18  6

SWAC West

                           W  L

Southern                  17  7
Texas Southern            17  7

The regular season's over; the tournament is next week.

Sun Belt

                      W  L  Remaining

Louisiana-Lafayette  13  5  MTSU, @Western Kentucky
South Alabama        14  7  @Arkansas State
New Mexico State     10  8  UALR, @MTSU

ULL would basically have to give this away at this point.

West Coast Coast

                   W  L  Remaining

Gonzaga           13 10  @St. Mary's, @Loyola Marymount
San Diego         15 12  Loyola Marymount
Loyola Marymount  12 11  @San Diego, Gonzaga

West Coast West

                   W  L  Remaining

San Francisco     17  7  Portland, @Pepperdine
Pepperdine        16  7  Santa Clara, USF

These are two really nice races that actually mean something because of the WCC's two-team championship round. San Diego can make a big move this weekend, while the West will come down to the last weekend at Pepperdine. USF has been quietly excellent this year, and I hope that news is getting out enough to get the into the tournament despite an unfairly bad RPI.

WAC

                   W  L  Remaining

Rice              13  8  @Nevada, Hawaii, SJSU
Hawaii            12 10  Fresno State, @Rice, @Louisiana Tech
Nevada            11 10  Rice, @SJSU, Fresno State
Fresno State      11 11  @Hawaii, Louisiana Tech, @Nevada
San Jose State    11 13  Nevada, @Rice

OK, but Louisiana Tech is definitely out. This is probably Rice's to lose, but it's not the runaway that you would have expected, and there are still three weeks left.

Tournament Watch

This means absolutely nothing, ignore it.

This is one generic layman's predictions for who gets in the tournament. I'm not going to bother picking a team from the one-bid conferences, since the conference tournament will just be a crapshoot, but if I only list one team from a conference, they'll get an at large bid if they don't get the automatic bid.

America East    Florida State         Cal State Fullerton  Mississippi State
A10             North Carolina        Cal Poly             Northwestern State
Big East        North Carolina State  Oregon State         Wichita State
CAA             Georgia Tech          Stanford             Creighton
Horizon         Clemson               Arizona State        East Carolina
MAAC            Troy                  Arizona              Tulane
MAC             Central Florida       Southern California  Southern Mississippi
Mid-Continent   Texas                 Louisiana State      Texas Christian
NEC             Nebraska              Mississippi          College of Charleston
OVC             Texas Tech            South Carolina       Georgia Southern
Patriot         Baylor                Florida              Pepperdine
SWAC            Oklahoma State        Arkansas             San Francisco
Rice            Missouri              Alabama              Louisiana-Lafayette
Illinois        Winthrop              Auburn               South Alabama
Brigham Young   Coastal Carolina      Vanderbilt           North Carolina A&T
Miami, Florida  Long Beach State      Tennessee            Harvard

Pitch Count Watch

Rather than keep returning to the subject of pitch counts and pitcher usage in general too often for my main theme, I'm just going to run a standard feature down here where I point out potential problems; feel free to stop reading above this if the subject doesn't interest you. This will just be a quick listing of questionable starts that have caught my eye -- the general threshold for listing is 120 actual pitches or 130 estimated, although short rest will also get a pitcher listed if I catch it. Don't blame me; I'm just the messenger.

Date   Team   Pitcher   Opponent   IP   H   R   ER   BB   SO   AB   BF   Pitches
May 06 Cal Poly Garrett Olson Cal State Fullerton 9.0 5 3 2 1 7 31 36 133
May 06 Coastal Carolina Ricky Shefka Charleston Southern 9.0 5 2 2 2 9 30 36 121
May 06 Bradley Brandon Magee Evansville 8.0 7 1 0 2 4 30 35 122
May 06 Arkansas Nick Schmidt Florida 9.0 7 1 1 1 7 33 34 139
May 06 Louisiana-Monroe Matt Green Southwest Missouri State 7.0 8 4 3 4 10 30 36 153(*)
May 06 Missouri Max Scherzer Nebraska 9.0 4 1 1 2 9 29 34 133
May 06 New Mexico Danny Ray Herrera Brigham Young 9.0 3 1 1 3 8 30 33 125
May 06 North Carolina-Greensboro Chris Mason Wofford 9.0 8 0 0 3 7 33 37 125
May 06 UCLA Hector Ambriz Oregon State 7.0 5 0 0 2 7 23 27 130
May 06 Pepperdine P. Coleman Portland 7.2 4 0 0 4 7 24 29 128
May 06 San Francisco Pereira Santa Clara 9.0 4 2 2 3 12 31 34 143(*)
May 06 UC Irvine Chris Nicoll Pacific 7.0 4 3 3 3 9 24 29 130
May 06 Troy Landon Brazell Central Florida 6.1 11 12 11 3 6 28 34 123
May 06 Southern Illinois Tyler Norrick Wichita State 7.2 9 4 3 1 5 30 31 124
May 07 Alabama Wade LeBlanc Mississippi State 8.0 7 3 2 3 6 31 35 133
May 07 Alabama-Birmingham Jeff Brown Southern Mississippi 6.1 8 5 5 2 2 23 28 122
May 07 Miami, Ohio Graham Taylor Bowling Green State 9.0 5 1 1 2 2 32 35 122
May 07 Coastal Carolina Jake Hurry Charleston Southern 7.0 5 2 1 6 9 23 32 129
May 07 Florida Alan Horne Arkansas 9.0 4 2 2 5 12 28 33 130
May 07 Vermont Derek Miller Maryland-Baltimore County 9.0 5 1 1 5 8 30 35 139(*)
May 07 New Mexico Darren Coltrinari Brigham Young 7.0 10 6 5 2 5 29 32 127
May 07 Wofford Andrew Hewitt North Carolina-Greensboro 8.2 10 6 6 4 6 31 37 132(*)
May 07 Utah Josh Cooper San Diego State 6.0 10 8 7 5 7 24 34 121
May 07 Utah Matt Crockett San Diego State 7.2 7 5 5 7 3 29 36 135
May 07 San Jose State Branden Dewing Fresno State 8.2 12 5 5 4 5 35 41 146(*)
May 07 West Virginia Fagler Seton Hall 8.0 11 1 1 1 7 32 34 126
May 07 St. Louis Ryan Bird Houston 9.0 5 1 1 6 9 29 36 135
May 07 Loyola Marymount Stephen Kahn St. Mary's 9.0 6 3 3 3 7 35 38 152(*)
May 07 Troy Brent Adcock Central Florida 9.0 7 5 4 3 5 31 37 134
May 07 Central Michigan Josh Collmenter Western Michigan 8.2 11 2 2 2 9 34 39 146(*)
May 07 Southern Illinois P. J. Finigan Wichita State 9.0 2 1 0 5 6 31 36 125
May 08 Murray State Billy Fares Austin Peay State 8.2 9 4 2 1 7 34 36 151
May 08 Miami, Ohio John Ely Bowling Green State 9.0 8 1 1 1 9 31 34 128
May 08 Charleston Southern Ryan Sowers Coastal Carolina 8.0 8 3 2 2 7 28 33 134
May 08 Eastern Illinois Chris Vaculik Eastern Kentucky 8.2 9 3 1 5 5 33 38 140(*)
May 08 George Washington Josh Wilkie Xavier 8.0 6 3 1 3 7 31 34 121
May 08 Louisiana Tech Matt Lacy Nevada 8.2 8 1 1 5 10 31 37 144(*)
May 08 Southeast Missouri State Derek Herbig Morehead State 8.0 8 2 2 5 6 30 37 124
May 08 Kansas State Adam Cowart Oklahoma 8.1 8 5 4 3 8 33 36 134
May 08 Old Dominion Hunter Hall Virginia Commonwealth 6.1 9 8 4 2 3 30 35 122
May 08 Utah Jason Price San Diego State 9.0 10 8 8 4 5 32 40 143
May 08 Southern Utah Jeff Oliverson Northern Colorado 6.1 10 6 2 1 7 30 32 126
May 08 Tennessee-Martin Massey Jacksonville State 9.0 6 3 3 2 4 34 36 122
May 09 Harvard Frank Herrmann Cornell 9.0 8 0 0 1 6 30 32 121
May 10 Northern Colorado Ayers Wichita State 9.0 6 5 2 5 4 32 41 143(*)
May 10 West Virginia Kenny Durst Akron 9.0 6 4 3 2 4 32 36 124
May 11 South Dakota State Tyson Bothof Northern Iowa 7.1 9 5 5 4 10 31 36 135
May 12 Georgia Southern Everett Teaford College of Charleston 6.1 16 9 5 2 4 32 34 124
May 12 New Mexico Karsten Gaarder San Diego State 9.0 4 0 0 3 6 29 34 139

(*) Pitch count is estimated.

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Boyd's World-> Breadcrumbs Back to Omaha-> The 2005 Conference Races About the author, Boyd Nation