2008 Lax World MCLA Division 1 Top 25 Poll (4/9/08) is out

[bullhighutewoozgriffclam]

cu lost to the u fyi. i called it too. a roaring 19. good luck boys. win out and we'll see you in texas.

[UkraineNotWeak]

I'll refrain from stating all the opinions that come to my head right now...

FSU and UF have both played a very tough schedule including one of your precious little west coast teams. In addition, FSU handily beat Utah who showed some game against CSU last week. Georgia has also played a good scheudle with a win over BC, who played very well out west. The fact of the matter is UCSB came east and lost, and is losing to teams in their league. As other people have already posted, Sonoma hasnt done anything either to put them ahead. The only thing keeping SB and Sonoma at 8 & 9 right now is history.

You west coasters always complained about east coast teams not playing strong schedules and not belonging. Now they are and they do. Get over it

Bitter Betty, UCSB is not losing to "teams" in their league. They lost to ASU, a top 10 team, by 1. They have not lost to an unranked team. Sonoma has lost to 2 top 10 teams and nobody else. Not every poll voter is from the west coast so you may want to rethink your belief that people are voting UCSB and Sonoma so high because of their history. If they were ranked in the top 5 to start the season, how far down should they drop?

Give me a break. Make it to the semifinals one year and maybe the voters will start giving you an automatic spot in the top 10.

[StrykerFSU]

Bitter Betty, UCSB is not losing to "teams" in their league. They lost to ASU, a top 10 team, by 1. They have not lost to an unranked team. Sonoma has lost to 2 top 10 teams and nobody else. Not every poll voter is from the west coast so you may want to rethink your belief that people are voting UCSB and Sonoma so high because of their history. If they were ranked in the top 5 to start the season, how far down should they drop?

Give me a break. Make it to the semifinals one year and maybe the voters will start giving you an automatic spot in the top 10.

Now this one is "reeeediculous". Evan's contention that UCSB and Noma (and Oregon) have their ranking based on history has nothing to do with the location of the voters. Whether you live in Washington or Maine you know that those two teams have a strong MCLA pedigree and a pollster sitting in Boston is just as easily swayed by that history when evaluating teams that he might not have seen play. THIS year there is certainly ample evidence to support a debate as to their relative worthiness of being ranked as highly as they are. I'm not saying it's a slam dunk but I think it certainly warrants debate.

And your point about their rankings being high at the start of the season only serves to prove the point that some of us are making about the inertia in these polls, especially among the traditionally strong teams. Who cares where you are ranked at the start of the season? You don't take care of business and win games you are "supposed" to, you should drop.

As flave has been saying, the goal posts keep moving when it comes to teams that are performing well outside of the WCLL and RMLC.

[More Cowbell]

Back to the poll for a second....I'm still scratching my head at how UCSB can lose 2 games to 2 lower ranked teams and move UP two spots...I think UCSB is a great program, but at some point their losses have to count for something....Any pollsters want to comment on why they put them where they did?

Please back this up. Who would you put there?

I would put SB around 14 or 15 and move the rest of the field up. It makes no sense that a team loses 3 out of 4 games since the last poll (2 coming to lower ranked teams) and moves up the poll. Something like this would NEVER happen to a team without the history of UCSB. Just as an example...when BC lost to Duluth and CSU (both ranked ahead of them) earlier this year, they dropped from #12 to #15. So when BC loses to 2 teams ranked ahead of them, they drop 3, but when SB loses to 2 teams ranked BEHIND them they rise 2? hmm......

[westcoastlax]

Last time I checked no team outside the WCLL/RMLC has ever won the national championship. Until someone besides BYU, CSU, UCSB, SSU (Michigan gets historical respect too eventhough they have trouble in the tournament) make the Final 4 on a consistent basis, they won't get the same respect.

[More Cowbell]

Last time I checked no team outside the WCLL/RMLC has ever won the national championship. Until someone besides BYU, CSU, UCSB, SSU (Michigan gets historical respect too eventhough they have trouble in the tournament) make the Final 4 on a consistent basis, they won't get the same respect.

Why should that matter? A team's history has no bearing on how well they are playing in any given season. That is like making an argument that Notre Dame football should have been ranked all last season, or that syracuse lacrosse should have been granted an at large in last year's tournament. Completely ridiculous argument.

[UkraineNotWeak]

And your point about their rankings being high at the start of the season only serves to prove the point that some of us are making about the inertia in these polls, especially among the traditionally strong teams. Who cares where you are ranked at the start of the season? You don't take care of business and win games you are "supposed" to, you should drop.

Johns Hopkins is 3-5 and ranked 15th right now. They have lost 5 in a row and 3 in OT. If one were looking solely at record, would they be deserving of a top 15 team? Where would you rank them? Should they be dropped below Hofstra since they lost to them? The sample size is smaller in D1, but...

I am not saying that polls are perfect, but the constant bickering from teams outside of the WCLL and RMLC is pretty hilarious. Nobody respects us, wah wah.

[UkraineNotWeak]

Why should that matter? A team's history has no bearing on how well they are playing in any given season. That is like making an argument that Notre Dame football should have been ranked all last season, or that syracuse lacrosse should have been granted an at large in last year's tournament. Completely ridiculous argument.

Auburn 2002. That's why it matters.

[freddoi]

both losses in florida for UCSB were by a small amount, 1 and 2 goals. both of those florida teams have moved up several spots in the poll throughout the year. is it possible that location of those games, being across the country (not just a 3 hour drive), is a factor for the pollsters that some of you floridians agree with. pollsters may just think that more often than not on a neutral site, ucsb wins those games and therefore they vote them just a little ahead. i have great confidence in the pollsters when i say that they put time, effort, experience and logic into their decision making, and to say that they vote any tema THIS year based on that teams previous seasons is to discredit the voters. i don't agree with that line of thought.

[benji]

Does anyone think that adding a computer rating as a factor (i.e. Voters + computer poll = total poll) would help out the polling scenario?

There's a lot of good arguments here for certain teams, going in both directions. I think that maybe we (the MCLA) should consider reducing SOME, not all, of the human component of the poll process (to eliminate any claims of bias or ignorance).

I'm not sure where all the components would be derived from ... but maybe having a computer poll/rating system that factors strength of schedule, conference play, home/away, and score differential (NOT laxpower), as a supplement to the human poll could be of potential benefit.

Thoughts?

[freddoi]

ranks via laxpower computer ranking:

michigan, byu, chapman, asu, umd, sfu, oregon, ssu, fsu, csu, ucsb, georgia, new hampshire, vt, bc, texas am, florida, lindenwood, cu, illinois, claremont, calpoly, lmu, auburn, ucf

matches game scores, sos, power ratings, and home field advantage

something to think about

[Zamboni_Driver]

Everyone also needs to remember that pollsters can all agree on a rank of a certain team A but then differ significantly on who (B,C,D,G ??)is above team A causing team A to be higher ranked than the average of the pollsters rank for them.

someone with more math skills can help me out with this explanation...

[CATLAX MAN]

Does anyone think that adding a computer rating as a factor (i.e. Voters + computer poll = total poll) would help out the polling scenario?

NO.........a resounding NO.

If you think you have bickering now, just wait if you introduce a formulaic approach to polling. Have you ever been on the Laxpower forums after a poll comes out?

[Laxbum]

In the WDIA, each poll voter has access to see how the other poll voters voted but this is not released to the public

I am a poll voter for the WDIA and this works very well. However, there are only about 10 of us voting. I'm not sure how many MCLA voters there are, but i believe its at least 25. Anyways, I think there should at least be two people at the top, a rankings chairman and maybe a second person that get to see everyone's poll and they have the right to challenge the thought process of a particular pollster's positioning of a certain team. This helps to eliminate some biased opinions so that no one skews the poll.

The WDIA has a rankings chair and he does an excellent job of making sure everyone is as fair/objective as possible.

If the MCLA does not have one of these, then they need to. It works!

[onpoint]

What's wrong about Laxpower having 1 single vote in the poll? I believe that it did earlier and I wouldn't be opposed to it. While I don't think that Laxpower is always EXACTLY right (and I don't share the same contempt for it that Catlax has), it IS completely unbiased and worthy of possibly one vote in the poll.