The MVC Season

[flyingMoose]

Pablo (the first ranking of the year, and frankly a little early for it, similar to RPI, or RKPI ...

I certainly agree, though by the end of the season, I think they can be useful. But I thought it might give us some sense of the effect of the SMU tournament and its results.

[JayJ79]

Steve Shondell has Creighton at #24 and no votes for UNI or WSU.
Mike Jordan has Creighton at #24 and no votes for UNI or WSU.
Jerritt Elliott has Creighton at #25 and no votes for UNI or WSU.
Lyndsey Oates has UNI at #19, Creighton at #25 and no votes for WSU.

Kirsten Bernthal-Booth has UNI at #23 and WSU at #25.

http://www.avca.org/includes/media/d...rs-Top-25.xlsx

coaches don't vote anyone "#26", they only submit a top 25. You were confused by the row listing on the spreadsheet, which is one greater than the actual position, as the first row contains the voting coach's name, while their #1 pick is on row 2, and so on. I corrected the numbers in the quote

[SpanglerFan316]

Thanks.

[WuDrWu]

I'm also a little disappointed that Coach Hilbert of Colorado State has his own team at 20 after the pasting he received in Witchata going 0-3.

[ShockTalk]

I'm also a little disappointed that Coach Hilbert of Colorado State has his own team at 20 after the pasting he received in Witchata going 0-3.

I saw what you did there.

[1972Shocker]

Northern Iowa wins in 4 sets over Northern Illinois in Cedar Falls. 25-19, 25-15, 11-25, 25-18. It was either a defensive battle or both teams struggled to get their offenses goings as UNI hit .090 for the match and NIU hit .089 for the match. Not sure what happened to the Panthers in that 3rd set. Must have relaxed a little after pretty much coasting to a 2-0 lead.

SIU pulls out a 5-set win over SEMO in Carbondale. 25-17, 22-25, 23-25, 27-25, 15-6.

[SpanglerFan316]

SEMO is a traditional WVB power. Right? ;)

[SpanglerFan316]

GoDaddy claims it was not hacked yesterday http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/09...ge_not_a_hack/.

However, goshockers.com is down again (at 2:00AM on Wednesday).

"AnonymousOwn3r himself maintains that he was solely responsible for the outage, and that GoDaddy is covering up his attack because it doesn't want to reveal how weak its security really is. At this juncture, he is reportedly mulling ways to prove his credibility."

[SpanglerFan316]

Here is a comment from MVCfans.com:

"Rich Kern's estimated RPI after last weekend:

Creighton 7
Wichita St 25
UNI 40
SIU 81
MSU 120
Ill St 124
Bradley 157"

If nothing else, it suggests that MSU is having problems this year.

[SpanglerFan316]

SIU does seem to be improved but they've played a terrible schedule. Their best win is a decent one against St. Louis and Jackie Church's younger sister Anna, but otherwise that schedule is awful.

SIU isn't finishing ahead of MSU.

Here are the rankings so far:

	Creighton	6-1	15-3
	Northern Iowa	6-1	14-6
	Wichita State	6-2	13-5
	Southern Illinois	5-2	15-3
	Missouri State	5-3	10-9
	Illinois State	4-3	10-7
	Evansville	2-5	7-13
	Indiana State	1-6	3-14
	Drake	1-6	2-15
	Bradley	0-7	6-12

SIU is the only team to beat CU so far. Illinois State went into SIU and lost but went into MSU and won. SIU lost at MSU. SIU still has to play UNI (twice) and at CU while MSU hosts CU and UNI later.

This is my guess as to the outcomes of the remaining MSU and/or SIU matches:

SIU@BU (WL) MSU 5-3, SIU 6-2
WSU@MSU (WL) MSU 5-4, SIU 6-2
SIU@UNI (LW) MSU 5-4, SIU 6-3

MSU@UE (WL) MSU 6-4, SIU 6-3
WSU@SIU (WL) MSU 6-4, SIU 6-4
MSU@SIU (LW) MSU 6-5, SIU 7-4

BU@MSU (LW) MSU 7-5, SIU 7-4
SIU@DU (WL) MSU 7-5, SIU 8-4
SIU@CU (LW) MSU 7-5, SIU 8-5
UNI@MSU (WL) MSU 7-6, SIU 8-5

MSU@ILSU (WL) MSU 8-6, SIU 8-5
SIU@UE (WL) MSU 8-6, SIU 9-5
MSU@INSU (WL) MSU 9-6, SIU 9-5

MSU@WSU (LW) MSU 9-7, SIU 9-5
UNI@SIU (WL) MSU 9-7, SIU 9-6
BU@SIU (LW) MSU 9-7, SIU 10-6

DU@MSU (LW) MSU 10-7, SIU 10-6
SIU@ILSU (WL) MSU 10-7, SIU 11-6
SIU@INSU (WL) MSU 10-7, SIU 12-6
CU@MSU (WL) MSU 10-8, SIU 12-6

The only thing that is (almost) certain is that the predictions above will not turn out to be (completely) correct. One could argue that MSU@ILSU will be a loss for MSU since ILSU won at MSU. WSU could lose @MSU and/or @SIU. ETC.

[JayJ79]

did a writeup on PantherNation about how the conference standings were looking going into the final few weekends (actually, wrote it tonight, so it includes tonight's results). Might be a hint of UNI-centricity in my commentary, but I tried to keep it fairly unbiased. Will paste it here in case the info proves useful for anyone (and if not, the mods can delete it. haha).
---------------------------------------------

We're coming down to the final few weekends of regular season play for volleyball. All MVC teams have either 4 or 5 matches left. So I figured I'd do a rundown of how the conference standings look, and the remaining slate for all the teams. RPI is from last Monday's report.

1. Creighton (12-1 MVC, 21-3 O'all. RPI 32, Pablo 32): @UNI, INS, ILS,@ WSU,@MSU
The Bluejays have clinched a spot in the conference tourney and a good chance at a first-round bye. Though they do have a bit of a gauntlet to run to finish out the season, with road matches against the Panthers, Shockers, and Bears (oh my). CU also currently has the highest RPI and Pablo ratings in the conference, which could help their resume for an at-large bid to the NCAAs.

2. UNI (12-2 MVC, 21-7 O'all. RPI 45, Pablo 40): CU, @SIU, @ UE, BU
The Panthers have also clinched a spot in the MVC tourney and a decent shot at a first-round bye. Their match tommorrow night (vs. Creighton) could very well determine the regular season conference championship, though they also face a road trip to SIU, which has proven a tough match for many teams. UNI has decent RPI and Pablo ratings, but not quite good enough to avoid uncertainty on Selection Sunday if they aren't able to snag the auto-bid.

3. Wichita State (11-3 MVC, 18-6 O'all. RPI 39, Pablo 49): @ILS, MSU, CU, DU
The Shockers have their trip to Springfield, Mo. secured for the MVC tourney, and have a chance for a bye, but are currently on the short side of the tiebreaker scenario with both UNI and CU. There are still a few tough matches left for them, but they have the luxury of home court in two of them. They are in roughly the same boat as UNI in terms of RPI and Pablo, and would face the same uncertainty for at-large selection.

4. Southern Illinois (9-5 MVC, 19-6 O'all. RPI 78, Pablo 86): UNI, BU, @ILS, @INS
The Salukis also have a seat reserved at the MVC tourney table. They can be a dangerous opponent, especially at home (as CU and MSU can attest). They do (currently) hold top-100 rankings in Pablo and RPI, but don't really have a shot at an at-large tourney selection.

5. Missouri State (8-6 MVC, 14-12 O'all. RPI 96): @INS,@ WSU, DU, CU
While the Bears haven't mathematically clinched a top-6 spot, their place at the conference tournament is secured thanks to a clause in the conference regs that assure the host school of a spot (although that rule is being discontinued after this season). But more than likely that will prove moot anyway. MSU has had their struggles this season, but have started to play better of late, and they got a confidence boost with their upset win over UNI last week. With the Bears having homecourt advantage in the conference tournament, they could prove to be a wildcard for the MVC autobid, or at least a spoiler.

6. Illinois State (7-6 MVC, 13-10 O'all. RPI 102): WSU, @DU, @CU, SIU, UE
The Redbirds haven't secured their tourney spot with 100% certainty, but barring a total collapse, they'll make it.

7. Drake (3-10 MVC, 4-20 O'all. RPI 239): @ BU, ILS, INS,@MSU,@ WSU
The Bulldogs are still mathematically alive, for a conference tournament spot, but it's not very likely. They're a young team this season, and had a slow start to the season. But could be more of a contender next season.

8. Evansville (3-11 MVC, 8-19 O'all. RPI 227): BU, UNI, @INS, @ILS
9. Bradley (2-12 MVC, 8-17 O'all. RPI 232): DU, @ UE, @SIU,@UNI
10. Indiana State (1-12 MVC, 3-20 O'all. RPI 287): MSU, @CU, @DU, UE, SIU