BREAKING:
This just in: Pool C is back to SIX at large bids for 2017. Potential to grow to 8 or 9 in 2018. Big time news for D3 tennis.
— D3 Central Tennis (@d3centraltennis) December 12, 2016
NCAA votes on the additional spots for 2018 in February
— D3 Central Tennis (@d3centraltennis) December 12, 2016
That’s right. In case you aren’t technologically savvy enough to follow us on twitter, where breaking news happens, it has been confirmed that Pool C will be expanding to 6 teams this year instead of the 5 slots we had last year. This means a lot of things. But first off, let me say this – HELL YEAH! This seriously has been a long time coming and should have been done 3 years ago when the rules changed. We’re back to a norm now. Finally. Since this is such big news, I’ve brought together three of your favorite writers (Me, The Guru, and D3Central aka AVZ) to provide our thoughts on the situation.
ASouth: I’m going to delve into what this means for this season, which I’m sure the Guru and Central will hit, but I want to focus directly on a couple of teams. Prior to the season, my prediction for Pool C was as follows – Middlebury, Chicago, Wash U, Amherst, and Wesleyan. This is assuming Emory and Bowdoin won the conferences, of course. That left the following teams out – Carnegie, Case, Williams, Pomona, Tufts, and Redlands. The first four teams of that list are the ones that we should really be focusing on. The race for those last two spots should be very, VERY interesting. Rewinding back to the last time we had 6 spots was the year of 2013, where the last spot went to UT-Tyler (after a loss to UT-Dallas). I remember writing a ton of articles about that last spot as it came down to UTT, CMU and Pomona. This was three years ago, when the landscape of DIII Tennis was not even close to as deep as it is now. We have Wesleyan, Williams, CMU, and Case competing for two spots potentially. It’s great for this year. .
I’m really looking forward to next year, where we SHOULD have a good argument that there should be two more Pool C spots. It wouldn’t make the end of the season any less interesting – it would just shift who we’re talking about in the rankings. Instead of talking about how CMU vs Wesleyan should be getting in, we’d be talking about maybe Case Western vs. Tufts vs. Williams, or something. That feels like a better argument when we’re talking about tournament participants. It gives top ranked juniors the chance to go to these programs and make some history. Hey, if we get two more slots we might be able to talk about Brandeis being in the conversation, making the UAA 5th/6th place match a big deal. From a media perspective, we want to talk about teams that we know about. That means those schools in the top 15-20. Adding more spots makes it that much more interesting. Honestly, a team with Top 10 talent like Wesleyan or CMU shouldn’t be sweating out selection day.
Guru: Besides being a small positive for D3 tennis, there have to be a few teams that are breathing a fairly large sigh of relief. It doesn’t materially change the big picture of the season, but it will change one team’s season drastically as I think there’s a pretty good chance that the #6 Pool C team could end up making the quarterfinals. Your most likely #1 seeds are UAA champ, NESCAC champ, CMS and then your Pool C teams. If Pomona-Pitzer ends up in the top 5 Pool C teams, then you have that #6 Pool C team as a likely #1 seed in NCAA regionals since the Hens would be grouped with CMS out in Cali. This could be a huge opening for a NESCAC or UAA team who would otherwise miss the tournament. One unfortunate thing I can foresee happening is that even with 6 pool spots last year, the #10 team in the country, Wesleyan, would have missed the tournament. Unless you have teams like Kenyon, Hopkins or Trinity (TX), in the top 8 in the country, this will likely happen again. Pay a lot of attention to the ITA rankings throughout the season because I’m predicting that the cutoff for the NCAA tournament will be #9 in the country. So while this is a step in the right direction, it’s ultimately not where we want to be and multiple teams will likely not get a deserved tournament berth.
Central: While I am extremely excited for this, I also am a bit hesitant to celebrate this just yet. The 6 at large bids for this season is a rectification for the mistake that was made for the last few years. It is great to have 6 Pool C bids back, but that is the way it should have always been. The more interesting news is the potential for an additional 2-3 more AQ bids in 2018. This is probably where there is the biggest cause for pause. The fact that it is even on the table is huge. The fact that it has to be passed by the NCAA BUDGET committee has me concerned. Without bashing the NCAA too much, when the notion of spending additional money on D3 athletics comes into play, I am not all that confident that it will be approved. Because I don’t know the ins and outs of the proposal in much depth, it is hard for me to discuss what kind of additional funding would be necessary, but it should be rather minimal. My hope is that whomever is bringing the proposal to the table has the information necessary to sway the committee as to why the current system is unjust in leaving out quality teams that just so happen to be in the two or three power conferences around the country. This could lead to an even more competitive tournament and no more walk over regions usually afforded to the likes of Wash U or Emory. I would like to caveat that this also relies on the NCAA’s current “restrictions” on only sending a certain amount of teams to fly somewhere, as this could potentially just make currently difficult regions that much harder. If we could send NE schools to other places, then we’d have much more even regions.
CONCLUSION
That’s all we got. Feel free to discuss in the comments. I know this reaction wasn’t as rapid as I thought it was, but this isn’t my full time job, bruh. ASouth, OUT.
Could you explain the travel rules that you refer to at the end of the article, and what the issues would be for changing them? (Maybe in a new article?)
Also, please explain exactly who approved the increase to 6, who would have to approve the increase to 8-9, and what their incentives are.
There is an unspoken “rule” that the NCAA only flies three teams to a region in the tournament. A team that is within 500 miles of a host school can drive to that school, anyone over 500 miles must fly. For example, Trinity TX is flown to Emory/Gustavus/some other host school pretty much every year. For more information on bracketology/NCAAs, please reference below articles:
http://www.division3tennis.com/bracketology-1/
http://www.division3tennis.com/the-bracketology-edition-1/
I do not know who approved the increase to 6 honestly, nor the increase to 8-9. I’ve been told that it probably “the membership,” whatever that means. Incentives I would assume are to make the field more indicative of the competitiveness of DIII Tennis, but that might be too idealistic.
I think it is naive to assume that the voters’ incentives are to improve the competitiveness of DIII Tennis. If, for example, the voters are all DIII coaches or AD’s nationally, their incentive would probably not be to allow more rich DIII powerhouse schools (e.g. Amherst, Williams, Middlebury, Bowdoin, Emory, CMU, WashU, CMS, PP) to have a greater chance of making the tournament. Rather, their incentive would be to allow their own poorer, under-resourced, weaker schools to make the tournament via their only realistic path – by winning their division. There might well be a “haves vs. have-nots” issue going on under the surface here.
Even if additional Pool C spots come by expanding the field (rather than excluding weak teams who happen to win a weak division), the voters might still prefer to see a smaller field if a larger field would cause their program to incur additional cost (by travel, for example).
I don’t know how hard it would be to determine, but it would be very helpful to understand exactly who votes to approve these changes and what their incentives are. It would also be helpful to understand whether adding more Pool C spots means expanding the total field or holding it constant, and what the cost implications of such changes might be.
For those of us new to D3 tennis, how many teams will now make it to the finals? Thanks
Two teams will be in the Finals. You’re welcome.
I am assuming you mean the NCAA Tournament, unlike the extremely annoying post above.
There were 43 teams that made the tournament last year. I am not sure what it is this year, but it would be 43 or 44 teams.
Yes I was. Thanks