The Unofficial Furman Football Page

Ken Pom updated 2019 rankings are out.

After finishing the year at #95 last year, our highest national ranking of the modern era, we start this year at #147. He forecasts a 20-10 record overall, 12-6 in the SoCon

Here is how he has the SoCon

UNCG 14-4 #93
Wofford 13-5 #121
Furman 12-6 #147
ETSU 11-7 #163
Mercer 9-9 #248
Citadel 8-10 #260
VMI 6-12 #305
Chatt 6-12 #314
Samford 5-13 #320
Western Car 5-13 #322

We need to get to a point where the bottom teams in the SoCon are in the 200’s.....but I’ll take 12-6 in the SoCon this year.

Interesting that they have Citadel in #6 spot--higher than they have finished in years---and consistent with my earlier post in another thread.

There were 351 D1 teams last year, not sure if that number has increased, decreased or stayed the same, but having four teams below 300 is killing the conference. I can't imagine us ever being considered for an at-large berth in the NCAAs or even NIT with almost 50% of the league in the bottom 15% of the country and over 50% in the bottom 30%.

The SoCon will never get at-large consideration, maybe once in 30 years it could happen, but it's so unlikely as to be irrelevant. The selection rules are tweaked as needed to ensure that they favor the power conferences (recent changes have only increased this trend). There are around a dozen conferences in which it's feasible, and several of those are still tough.

Since the SoCon is not going to surpass C-USA, the Missouri Valley, etc., even substantial improvement (e.g., consistently reaching MAC/Colonial mid-major level) would not yield at-large bids. It would help the SoCon winner get better seeding, however, and would help with non-NCAA tournament post-season events, though of course those are of minimal relevance to the sport in general.

The KenPom ranking, for its part, is of course purely algorithmic, so while it makes a lot of sense overall, subjective judgment can outperform the pre-season projection.

The SoCon may not get at-large consideration but individual teams in the SoCon can. Put together an excellent pre-conference record and combine that with a nearly flawless conference record and there would be a real shot at an at-large bid. That is what Gonzaga does, for example.

Last year the Mountain West Conference was the #8 ranked conference by Sagarin but got two NCAA teams only because Nevada was upset in the conference tournament and earned an at-large bid. San Diego State would not have been an at-large if they hadn't won the tournament. The #9 Missouri Valley Conference only had one bid despite being higher ranked than the A10, which got three bids. The A10 had two teams highly ranked - Rhode Island and St. Bonaventure - and Davidson upset their way to the conference tournament title to be the third A10 team in the NCAAs.