Women's soccer shut out by NCAA
Campus Times
November 7, 1997
Sports, since the beginning of time, have been competition among teams
fighting for first place. But nowadays, the second place team almost always
participates in some form of playoffs.
In Major League Baseball (MLB), there is the wildcard berth for the
best second place team. The NFL takes the best six teams from both leagues.
The NBA takes the top eight teams from its divisions.
High school sports send the top three teams in each league to the playoffs.
Even in Division I-A college football, the best 25-30 teams go to a major
bowl game.
But the NCAA Division III women's soccer selection committee seems to
have a different way of selecting its playoff participants.
The University of La Verne women's soccer team finished with a record
of 14-4 overall and 10-2 in SCIAC. But for some reason, the NCAA did not
select this second place team. Why?
R. Wayne Burrow, assistant director of championships for the NCAA, and
the rest of the NCAA Selection Committee were not available for comment,
but the truth about why the Leopards did not get selected to the 40 team
tournament may come down to which teams were or were not on their schedule.
The NCAA thinks that a team's schedule is more important to the selection
than the record that team produces during the season. So with that theory
in mind, a team can schedule a number of tough schools and lose nearly all
of them, or at least half, and still make the playoffs. But didn't the Leopards
have Cal Lutheran on the schedule, losing twice? So why did they not make
the cut?
ULV's record, although not up to standards with the NCAA scheduling
tips, was outstanding at 14-4. The Leopards had a better season record than
playoff teams like Colby (8-5), Bates (9-5), Emory (11-7-1), Wilmington
(12-6-1), Chicago (12-4-2), Gettysburg (14-5) and Richard Stockton (11-4-1).
Obviously those teams had to have the No. 1 team in the nation scheduled
this season or they had to play an abundance of nationally ranked teams.
Speaking of ranked teams, the Leopards were ranked in the NCAA Division
III Top 25 poll. In mid-October, ULV was ranked as high as 23rd in the poll,
and they finished fifth in the West Region. Clearly, the Leopards are among
Division III's top 40 teams.
The West Region has two teams representing it, the University of California,
San Diego, which was the 1996 national champion and has appeared in all
12 championships and Cal Lu, which was the SCIAC champion. ULV did not make
the cut because the selections are made over the entire country, and all
regions, except the West Region, have four or more teams representing them,
with the vast majority of the schools selected coming from east of the Mississippi
River.
The trend has been, however, that teams being picked from the West Region
is rare. The NCAA had many teams to choose from out here in the West but
elected to pick only the two teams. Even if it did not pick ULV, the NCAA
could have picked other great soccer teams such as Chapman (12-4-2), ranked
third in the West Region, or UC Santa Cruz.
It would be easy to take the selection with a grain of salt and wait
until next year, but the women's soccer team should get the credit it deserves.
Since the NCAA cannot recognize a quality ranked, second-place team, I will.
Congratulations to all of the players on the women's soccer team for a great
season, and remember, sometimes the journey is more important than the destination.
Greg MacDonald, a sophomore journalism major, is editorial assistant
of the Campus Times. He can be reached by e-mail at gmacdona@ulv.edu.
