Rankings/Polls/Seeds Matter

[fu77fan]

I think we all now realize the importance of rankings /polls and seeding .

Furman not seeded, did not get a bye , played Elon in the first round and had to go on the road to play a good Incarnate Word in the 2nd round.

Meanwhile , William and Mary, a seeded team, got a bye the first round and got to play GW at home in the 2nd round….. ie in my opinion somewhat of a free pass to the round of 8.

But better yet , what you really want is a high seed , where in the round of 8 or 4, instead of us going to Montana , North Dakota State , South Dakota State , or Sacramento State, those teams are going to Greenville.

So your ranking at the beginning of the season does matter. If not ranked early in the season , it is pretty difficult to work your way into being a top 2 or top 4 seed.

[paladinfan12]

Agreed, preseason polls do matter for that reason, but I don't think the preseason poll moves the needle very much and was not the reason we didn't get a first round bye.

All 8 teams ahead of us had better records except for ND State (who had an equal record and had more D1 wins). If Furman beats Samford they get a first round bye, no question.

[gofurman]

Agreed, preseason polls do matter for that reason, but I don't think the preseason poll moves the needle very much and was not the reason we didn't get a first round bye.

All 8 teams ahead of us had better records except for ND State (who had an equal record and had more D1 wins). If Furman beats Samford they get a first round bye, no question.

Right, polls matter A LOT. Mainly to get in the playoffs as you note.. not quite as much for seeding. They absolutely matter to get in the playoffs. However, and I don't want to be greedy as we had a GREAT SEASON, but if Samford was ranked higher early on like NDSU was maybe Samford has the NDSU seed or some such and Samford is still at home this week too. Samford got a seed. Yep. But now they are on their way to Fargo, ND I think... Had they been top 15 pre-season maybe they are home for another week.

And we see how much being home matters !! ALL EIGHT HOME SEEDED TEAMS (with some very close games including Furman and SELA and Richmond) are still playing. SEEDS MATTER. Home field matters A LOT

Credit to Furman for bidding to get Elon to Greenville !!

[The Jackal]

Being highly ranked is always better than not being. If nothing else, it raises the profile of the conference.

The SoCon has had an issue the last few years where the top teams struggle to stay consistently at the top. It's almost like every season the SoCon wipes the slate clean and you can't bank on anything you knew about last season.

For instance, the SoCon started with three teams ranked in the top 25 (UTC, ETSU, and Mercer). The two clear best teams - Furman and Samford - were not close to being ranked in the preseason. The three teams that were ranked all missed the post season (one didn't even have a winning record).

I think it will help Furman and the SoCon to (1) get good and (2) stay good. The MVFC raised its profile over the years because the top teams stayed the top teams and were always in the national conversation. The SoCon can't get any consistency from their top squads. They'll be 9-2 one season and 3-8 the next.