The Difference between Division A and B

[Ballaholic]

I am curisous to see how others feel about this topic. I know A teams will say it's "huge" and B teams will say that it's "small" but I think if you look without bias at the scores it tells a different story.

[cjwilhelmi]

Just going from personal experience:

Harding (#12B) v Lindenwood (#15 A) - LU 26 to 6
Harding (#12B) v St. Louis University (Unranked, A) - HU 8-6
Harding (#12B) v Oklahoma State (Unranked, A) - HU 16-6

I really don't know who is 25 - 50 in Div A, but I would venture a guess at a top Div B team could run and possibly beat some of them. To say that Div B's cant beat Div A is ridiculous but so is saying that a good Div B team can beat a 15 - 25 Div A team. It just won't happen, not this year anyway (and no one has to my knowledge). In the coming years as Div B gets stronger you might see a top B team knock off a #20 Div A or so. It just takes small schools more time to get things going, but once they do they may decide to go up to A (see Sonoma State, Lindenwood).

[Dan Wishengrad]

I am curisous to see how others feel about this topic. I know A teams will say it's "huge" and B teams will say that it's "small" but I think if you look without bias at the scores it tells a different story.

Ok, Fair enough Ballaholic, let's look: B-ranked Montana team played two A teams -- unranked Gonzaga (lost) and first-year Idaho (won). Other ranked B teams from our own conference are winless against the As.

PLU -- Lost to: SFU 10-2, UW 13-12, UO 23-3, OSU 18-12
Western Washington -- Lost to: SFU 15-3, UW 22-3
Whitman (was ranked earlier) -- Lost to: UW 15-6

I think if you "look without bias" it shows a pretty big disparity between the divisions. Unless you think one win by the top B team over a winless, first-year club forced to play up in "A" its first season is that significant a victory...

Just my two cents.

[beckner11]

having played in Div. B last year, and being on a top team in that division I feel confident saying that the top B teams could give a good game to a top 15-25 A team...which would say that I feel they could beat the 26-50 teams. Obviously this wouldn't be the case every game, but I think it is a good possibility.
We played a very good game with #19 Missouri (which btw was a completely different team from this year) last year, and beat unranked Southern Methodist and University of North Texas, and played a decent game with Lindenwood.

So based on this, I think the top B teams could give good games to the good A teams (not necessarily saying win).
Then again, it will also be very different depending on which 2 teams you put up against eachother.

[Dan Wishengrad]

When I worked in politics, there was always debate about "legislative intent" versus what was actually passed and signed into law.

The MDIA's "legislative intent" was to create a small college division. But when we made Division 1-A football the criteria for automatic classification to the A division we left the door open for some large public universities to opt to stay down in B. I'm not sure that was our intent. In the case of the PNCLL, a natural small-school division would have those schools which play each other in other sports grouped together -- PLU, UPS, Whitman, Linfield, Lewis & Clark, Willamette, etc...

An argument can be made that public schools with D1-AA (Montana) or DII football (Western Washington, Central Washington, etc.) should opt to play up in MDIA A Division rather than stay down with the small schools as we allowed them to. But we DID give teams a choice. Almost all the WCLL teams moved up to A. Almost all the PNCLL's stayed down, so thank heaven for Gonzaga and Simon Fraser for playing up and to Idaho for coming into the league, or we wouldn't even have an AQ this year.

[Choppy49er]

While I am still trying to discern the differnce between "run" and "play", The top B teams are a very viable force. I see some teams in "A" and i wonder while they are still there. Yes, I am on a "B" team I think anyone who voted that any A team could beat any B team, needs to stop and actually look at game reports and scores once in a while...

As I always say "On any given day, any given team can defeat another." That's why the NCAA tournaments are so much fun...

[Weberlax12]

I think that those Division B schools that have the players that know the game and played in high school, and are in the top of division B like UVSC can take it to just about any division A team. however I think you must be one of the top 10 in division B to have a chance really.

[Bluevelvet]

Relative strength between A & B division teams?
No need to speculate. There is a perfect example.
Claremont, the number 3 B team in the MDIA has played 7 games against mid to lower level WCLL A division teams.
Claremont is 8-5. They are 6-0 against B division opposition and 2-5 vs. A division teams.
They defeated UC Davis and St. Mary's (1st year A team) each by 1 goal. They lost to USC and D3 MIT in close games but were blown out by Cal, Santa Clara and Chapman.
Of their 7 games against A division teams, the games were close about half the time and they were blown out half the time.
Of their 7 A division games, they played only 2 playoff teams (SCU and Chapman) both of those games were blow outs. Chapman was their only top 25 ranked A division opponent and that was a blow out.
Remember, this is the number 3 B team in the entire MDIA, so adjust accordingly to reflect how your favorite B team would do against mediocre WCLL A division opposition.

[Anderson]

This is along the same lines but has any higher ranking (1-50ish) Div A team dropped to Div B because of the change in how the divisions are separated? I can't think of any off hand (and I know this would be the exception rather than the rule) but this may be the only way that you will find a Div B team that will compete with Div A 1-25.