Women's at-large berth analysis and predictions

PART I

By Christan Shirk

The conference tournaments will wrap up Saturday and Sunday and 43 of the 64 berths in the NCAA women's tournament will have been claimed via automatic qualification (AQ). That leaves 21 at-large berths for the men's committee to award by selecting one team from Pool B and 20 from Pool C. (For a full explanation of the Pool B and Pool C classifications and the allocation of berths see the column AQ's, Pool B and Pool C? What does it all mean?) So who's in the running for the 20 Pool C and 1 Pool B at-large berths? Who will be dancing and who's season has come to a close?

Selection Criteria

Well, first let's quickly review the criteria the committee uses to evaluate teams and make the at-large selections. The selection criteria are found in Section 2.4 of the 2018 Division III Soccer Pre-Championships Manual (pg. 22). The criteria is divided between primary and secondary criteria, the latter only being considered if the former does not enable a distinction to be made between schools. Two changes were made prior to the 2017 season: non-conference strenth-of-schedule was added as a secondary criterion and what constitutes a ranked opponent for the results versus ranked teams primary criterion was modified. This year, non-Division III strength-of-schedule has been dropped as a secondary criterion after five years of use.

For further explanation of the criteria, including Strength of Schedule, results versus ranked teams, and a list of secondary criteria, go here or here.

Beyond the selection criteria, note the following principles concerning at-large selections.

• Teams are selected on a national basis, using in-region selection criteria.
• There will be be no predetermined regional allocations for Pools B and C.
• There will be no maximum or minimum number of berths from one region.

Selection Committee

The NCAA championship tournament is administrated by the eight-member NCAA Division III Women's Soccer Committee which is composed of the chairs of their respective regional advisory committees. These committees make the at-large selections to complete the tournament field, assisted in the evaluation of teams by the Regional Advisory Committees. These are the same national and regional committees which release the pre-tournament weekly NCAA Regional Rankings. The members of these committees can be found on pages 9-13 of the Pre-Championships Manual.

At-Large Selection Timeline and Process

The process of making the at-large berth selections for the NCAA tournament starts with weekly NCAA regional rankings mentioned above. These rankings are done following the fourth last, third last, second last and last week prior to the tournament selections being made. The first three of these weekly rankings are, by design, a direct foreshadowing of the at-large selections because they are (1) done by the same committee that makes the at-large tournament selections and (2) done by applying the at-large selection criteria. You can learn more about the NCAA Regional Rankings here or here.

Following the release of the third weekly regional rankings the process is as follows.

• Conference championships are completed by 6:00 p.m. ET, Sunday, November 5.
• The NCAA compiles the data corresponding to the at-large selection criteria (win-loss-tie percentage against Division III opponents, results versus ranked Division III teams, Division III Strength-of-schedule) and provides it to Regional Advisory Committees.
• The Regional Advisory Committees do their fourth regional rankings in the same manner as the previous three weeks. The results versus ranked Division III teams (RvR) criteria is based on who was ranked in the third regional rankings that were released on Wednesday, October 31.
• The national committee makes adjustments to the regional rankings as they see fit but does not publish them until after they have announced the tournament field (including the at-large berth selections).
• An updated RvR is developed based on opponents were ranked in either the third or the just completed fourth regional rankings. This is the RvR that the national committee will use when comparing teams across regions on a national basis.
• Pool B teams (independent institutions and institutions that are members of conferences that do not receive an automatic berth in the tournament) in the final regional rankings are identified.
• The highest ranked Pool B candidate from each region is placed "on the board", the teams are discussed, and one team is selected for the lone Pool B berth.
• Pool C teams (teams who were not awarded their conference's automatic berth and unselected Pool B teams) in the final regional rankings are identified.
• The highest ranked Pool C candidate from each region is placed "on the board", the eight teams discussed, and one team is selected. The next highest ranked Pool C candidate from the selected team's region is added to the board and the process repeats until all 20 Pool C at-large berths have been awarded.

The 21 at-large selections are added to the 43 teams who were awarded their conference's automatic berth, completing the 64-team field at which point the committee begins the process of grouping the teams and developing the tournament bracket with geographical proximity playing a major role. You can read more about that here.

Background: Observations from the Past

The third NCAA weekly regional rankings, the last rankings published prior to the tournament field being announced, will be used as the starting point to evaluate the Pool B and Pool C landscape. The reason for this is that these rankings are done by the same national and regional committees which make the at-large selections and are done by applying the same criteria that is used for making the at-large selections. Therefore, by design, the NCAA regional rankings are a direct foreshadowing of the at-large selections, providing a certain level of transparency to the at-large selection process. It is for this reason that these rankings are so important and insightful. (Note: A fourth ranking is done Sunday night after all conference championships are complete and serves as the basis for the at-large selections, but those rankings will only be published after the tournament field is announced.)

Furthermore, a comparison of the at-large selections and third weekly regional rankings over the past several years yields the following observations.  

• It's been five years since the last rare selection of a women's team that was unranked in the third weekly regional rankings (those released the Wednesday before the selections).
• There will probably be twice as many Pool C candidates in the rankings as available berths. For example, last year there were 41 Pool C men's teams in the third rankings but only 20 Pool C berths available.  In the five years before that, the ratio was 40/20, 43/20, 43/20, 39/20, and 42/20.
• Regions generally have two or three ranked teams not selected, maybe one more or one less for the weakest and strongest regions in that particular year.
• Within a region, rarely does a lower ranked team in the third weekly rankings get selected ahead of a higher ranked team. In fact there have been no instances of this happeneing in three of the last four years with two cases in 2015 and just one occurrence in 2012 and 2013. These instances are explained by what occured in the final week before the at-large selections.
• Most of the at-large selections come from the top half of each region's rankings.
• There has been no indication that that conference tournament results are weighted extra because they are the most recent results nor because they may be considered "big" games, and they shouldn't as the primary and secondary selection criteria makes no such allowance.

This leads to the following conclusions:  

• A team that is not ranked in the third regional rankings has virtually no shot at a Pool C berth.
• Many ranked teams will not be participating in the tournament.  It isn't good enough to simply be ranked to gain an at-large berth.
• In fact, a team usually needs to be in the top half to two-thirds of their regional rankings to be selected for an at-large berth.
• Do not expect big jumps or falls due to the final week's results (mostly conference tournaments), which makes sense as one week only represents about 10% of the total schedule and conference tournament results are not weighted extra. Furthermore, any team in need of an at-large berth presumably lost or tied in the final week minimizing chances they would climb the rankings.

PART II

By Christan Shirk

Using the Regional Rankings as a Guide

Well, that was quite the introduction. Let's now take a look at the teams that were ranked this year as well as a few others that we think may be ranked in the fourth regional rankings. We'll list the teams as ranked in the third published rankings followed by previously ranked teams and the additional teams we think may be ranked in the fourth rankings. The teams are color-coded according to their Pool: Pool A (AQ), Pool B, and Pool C. The Division III record, winning percentage, and record versus ranked teams have been updated to account for the results this past week that were not accounted for in the third weekly rankings. The Strength-of-Schedule (SoS) value is an approximate updated value that should be within a few percentage points.

SoS - Division III Strength of Schedule (weighted OWP-OOWP)
RvR - Record versus Ranked Opponents (opponents ranked in the third weekly rankings released November 1.)
(for further explanation of how Strength of Schedule is calulated and Record versus Ranked Opponents is determined, read this or the Pre-Championships Manual, pgs. 22, 45.)

The Pool B Candidates

The third published NCAA regional rankings did not contain any of this season's 19 Pool B teams, most of which come from the newly formed Atlantic East Conference (AEC) and the geographically disjointed American Collegiate Athletic Association (ACAA) which do not receive automatic berths to the tournaments. For comparison and discussion, the top eight Pool B candidates by winning percentage are listed in the following table.

The Pool C Candidates

The third published NCAA regional rankings contained 43 Pool C teams which is in the normal range. More improtantly, it is more than double the 20 available Pool C berths. So, which 20 of the 43 ranked teams in blue above will the NCAA committee select? Let's start by grouping those 43 Pool C candidates in the table below. In all likelihood the 20 at-large selections will come from this list.

PART III

By D3soccer.com Contributor

Pool B At-Large Berth Analysis and Prediction

Cabrini (10-5-1) - Of the eight teams listed in the table of leading Pool B candidates in Part II above, only Cabrini and Wesley had both a winning percentage above .600 and a SOS over .400. On both marks, the Cavaliers' had the slighty better numbers and they won the head-to-head match-up with the Wolverines in AEC regular season play.

Pool C At-Large Berth Predictions

POOL C LOCKS (2)

1. Williams (15-1-2)

2. Johns Hopkins (17-2-0)

SAFE, NO WORRIES (5)

3. Amherst (13-2-2)

4. Wheaton (Ill.) (16-3-1)

5. Brandeis (12-4-0)

6. Emory (13-4-1)

7. New York University (10-5-3)

IN GOOD SHAPE (4)

8. Tufts (10-5-2)

9. Scranton (15-1-3)

10. Hope (14-2-2)

11. Ithaca (13-2-3)

PROBABLY OKAY, BUT STILL NERVOUS (6)

12. Chicago (13-4-1)

13. Virginia Wesleyan (11-4-4)

14. RIT (11-5-3)

13. Augsburg (14-7-0)

15. Wartburg (13-5-1)

16. Bridgewater (Va.) (15-3-2)

ON THE BUBBLE – PICK ’EM (3 of 7)

Hamilton (8-5-3)

Arcadia (12-5-3)

Springfield (14-5-1)

Pacific Lutheran (13-3-4)

Rowan (13-3-2)

Randolph-Macon (11-2-3)

Ohio Northern (14-4-1)

WRONG SIDE OF THE BUBBLE (6)

UW-Stevens Point (12-2-4)

Dubuque (14-4-1)

Cal Lutheran (10-3-5)

Denison (12-3-2)

Augustana (13-3-3)

Hanover (17-2-0)

Comments or feedback for the authors?  Email Christan Shirk and D3soccer.com Contributor.