Selections and seedings for the NCAA Division I, II and III men’s tournaments will be made tonight.
With the influx of parity throughout all levels of lax, this year’s selections will be especially interesting.
There are plenty of interesting storylines to watch.
Johns Hopkins, which has made the tournament every year since 1971, beat Loyola (Md.) yesterday to end the regular season at .500 — the minimum requirement for an at-large bid. With an RPI of 10, with the Blue Jays sneak in?
Stay tuned.
You can watch the Division I Selection Show tonight at 8:30 p.m. on ESPNU.
For now, you can check out some projections on the field by checking out InsideLacrosse.com’s Division I bracketology.
To visit the NCAA men’s lacrosse championship site, click here.
You can check out past D-I champions by clicking here.
Be sure to weigh in with your thoughts on Selection Sunday and don’t forget to check out the latest poll question.
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Hopkins should get in and may put fear in a lot of the teams. They have nothing to lose and other teams have much to fear with the young guns they put on the field.
if Hop gets in, and I think they will, likely to have a very difficult first round game, either Va or ‘Cuse…but their new goalie looks like he is getting hot, as is their flame thrower, Kyle Wharton…
If Hopkins is the pivotal team then I think they have to get in just for credibility and tv ratings.
Delaware has to be out having lost to Hopkins, Hofstra and Georgetown.
Denver, ewwwww, not a good schedule.
Bryant is another independent that has a better record than Hop, but, ohhh, another shaky schedule with some shaky losses.
I say let’s go with Hop and open the tournament up to 32 teams next year so we can have the chance of a first round upset like basketball. (Remember Mouse Davis and Cleveland State?)
D1 tourney wont get any bigger until there are more schools playing. Better than 1 in 4 schools get in, better ratio than D1 basketball, also its a money thing. Gotta pay for the extra schools to travel.
Hop not just for credibility or tv (but that certainly doesn’t hurt)…they do have top 2 or 3 RPI and SOS,,just lacking a true big time win…and if they make the final 4 in Baltimore, will definitely add to the money taken in…
Hopkins will get in, and will certainly not play Cuse or UVA in the first round, CAA winner, Sienna/Mt. winner, etc. will be lower seeds.
– Delaware is already in, CAA AQ
– Bryant is not eligible for tourney, still a transition year for them.
In effect, Hopkins won an unofficial play-in game against Loyola yesterday. So they’re in. Be interesting who they get matched up with, although TV isn’t an issue for 1st torund games, can’t imagine the difference between a 0.4 share and 0.5 matters all that much. It’ll be interesting to see if there is any significant change in the viewership of ESPNU now that they’re on Cablevision in the NY Metro area.
Maybe they should award a spot in the tournament to an MCLA school that qualifies and aspires to enter the NCAA. Who are the schools starting up NCAA programs…Boston College? Florida State? Michigan? Nah, never mind the whole thing.
What will have to happen for the “football” schools to start playing in the NCAA? It seems to me that they would bring alor of eyeballs to the tv coverage throughout the season, right?
In the meantime, I say get Detroit in there.
No matter who Hop gets matched against in the first round it won’t be one of the top teams and they’ll have a chance to build ‘ol Mo.
and here I thought I was the only one following the MCLA…actually, I think what they have in mind is an alternative to the NCAA, which might seem far fetched at the moment…but may be a possibility in a couple of years, as the sport continues to grow at the High School level, and no new D1 programs get created…
Some say Loyola is on the bubble. I think theyre out bc they have no real quality wins other than Gtown (not huge) and bc they lost to Hop. So now if you take Loyola you gotta take Hop and Loyola bc Hop just beat Loyola the day before the selections are being made. I agree. Yesterday’s game was a playin game for the tournament. Hop in, Loyola out. I didn’t realize Hop is like 44-3 all time vs Loyola. Crazy.
No, Hop will still play a top team if they do get in the tourney. They will be the last team in the tourney. That doesn’t mean they will play UVA in the first round however. If Mt Saint Mary’s wins their final against Siena, then they will play UVA because they are down south and in the first round, the selection committee is only allowed to schedule two games that require flying more than 300 miles. If Siena wins, they will most likely play Syracuse, in what will be a rematch of last year’s first round game. If Mt St Marys wins, Syracuse will most likely draw Army who they beat earlier in the year. Johns Hopkins clearly will not be a top 8 seed, and will have to play their first round game on the road. A possible first round matchup for them might be UMD due to their proximity. Another option is Duke. As the other at large teams, I see Cornell, Georgetown, after coming off a win against Nova, Hofstra, and Notre Dame, leaving Loyola and Drexel out. However, I see Drexel over Loyola if any of them are to make it. Should be a good tourney.
Does anyone see a scenario where Loyola gets in???
Hound Dawg- Not at this point. If you were to ask that question a week or so ago it would have been completely different obviously. Even if there was one more week left, there would be scenarios where Loyola could get in, but with no games left in the season, it looks pretty bleak for them. You also have to remember, this isn’t basketball. Only 16 teams make it, and if you consider all the guaranteed at large’s and AQ’s, there are only 4 teams left to make it, with a lot of good teams left. Team’s like UMASS, who was in the top 10 at points this year isn’t even being considered. Also, since they lost to one of the teams who is also on the bubble yesterday(Hop), it would be pretty tough putting them in over Hopkins. I guess its possibly that the committee puts them in over ND, but that’s the only scenario i see.
Yo this is crazy ESPNU is showing a West Coast baseball game that’s 18-8 and running over and the seedings arent coming on!
Hopkins v Duke, Saturday noon
If you didn’t notice they didn’t cut off the Princeton win over Cornell in OT to cut to the women’s softball game at 2pm either.
Loyola in, Georgetown out
ncaa final our predict
#8 Stony Brook
#4 North Carolina
#2 Syracuse
#3 Maryland
I no call me crazy
Hey, some nice calls here guys…Hop/Duke, etc.
G’town out, Notre Dame in. Pavlechecko, whatever, te Bucknell chairman of the selection committee talked about G’town’s RPI not being good enough and sidestepped the whole issue of why Hop was in. It was ugly.
Anybody see Loyola upsetting in the first round?
We need some MCLA schools to step it up here so they can open this up. G’town deserves to be there.
I’m not very schooled in the MCLA/NCAA divide so help me out here guys.
Do they MCLA schools choose not to enter NCAA lax because if they do they also have to start a women’s program too because of Title 9? I would imagine that would add at least a million bucks to the bottom line if they did, right?
It seems to me that there is alot of lax being played already but just not on the same level as back east here. But wouldn’t it improve if the map was expanded and teams played tournaments and cross-conference games?
what_the
complicated topic, but generally you are right. Schools don’t need women’s lax per se, but they do need to equalize the money and number of participants. Generally, it’s the big football schools (Michigan, virtually all of the SEC) and smaller schools that join the MCLA. I have seen many MCLA games, and they do regularly play NCAA Div 1 and 3 teams all the time, and do well. But, I think the top 10 or so D1 teams, and perhpas the top 5 D3 teams would routinely beat the best of the MCLA. However, that is not a fair comparison, because if Michigan (say) decided to go NCAA, they would attract some of the best talent in the country right away.
The NCAA will NEVER agree to letting MCLA schools in their tourny
The notion that schools stay in the MCLA because they would have to add women’s lax as well is a lame excuse and has nothing to do with reality. The reality is that the schools would rather spend more money entertaining football recruits than adding lacrosse as a varsity sport. The current hot topic around the NCAA is the Big Ten adding even more schools to establish an even larger conference behemoth to ensure the maximum TV dollars, and other conferences are considering having to do the same to keep up. That’s one of the real issues why lax is having trouble growing on the D1 level, you think you’re going to join Conference A and next thing you know you’re in Conf. B that doesn’t have lacrosse and you’re back to the Great Western league.
Lax Novice
that may be true for the big football schools, but there are quite a few schools in the MCLA with no football team..mostly these are D3 schools in all other sports..I think another factor (besides Title IX) is that the concentration of schools that play is still predominantly northeastern…so if you are a small school (say, in Ga)..pretty tough to not only fund the teams, but to also pay for a very big travel budget
Bear, agreed.
I was speaking of the Michigans of the world in my rant. Chapman, who was in the MCLA D1 final against Michigan in Denver last year, fits the D3 scenario you’re speaking of. That’s the kind of school I think makes sense to stay in the MCLA, not the Michigans and Florida States.
Lax Novice:
Indeed..I think this could be a very interesting few years,,,MCLA actually has a TV contract with Fox Sports…Michigan has already a dedicated lacrosse facility..the other money factor is that the Michigan kids actually pay to play, to the tune of $3,000 or so per year (I think)…
The NCAA needs to be a bit more strategic in their thinking, or other wise they will be facing competition
You guys must spend alot of time working on this blog. im impressed