December 20, 2022: 2 Top 25 matchups today + The Week 4 D3hoops.com Top 25 Poll
Welcome back to The Scoop on D3 Women’s Hoops. There is a new Top 25 out! And we have a new #1! If you missed my breakdown of my Top 25 ballot yesterday, here’s the link:
But now for some quick thoughts on the new D3hoops.com Top 25 Poll…
That new #1 is NYU, who rightfully received 22 of the 25 first-place votes. This is something we saw coming, considering Hope’s loss to Trine this past Saturday. I like the way NYU is playing as of late, and I’m looking forward to the duel with Bowdoin on Dec. 30. They were an easy #1 for me, just considering their overall dominance in the first half of this season.
Along those same lines, I was fairly surprised Hope fell to #5. That’s just silly, in my opinion, considering Hope has wins over UW-Eau Claire, Calvin, and Illinois Wesleyan. Transylvania, one spot ahead, could easily finish the year 0-0 vs RROs, and while I did have Transy at #3 this week, Trinity will be moving up for me heading into this next ballot. A loss to Trine isn’t great, but Trine is a Top 10 team now too. Hope did have a first-place vote, but the fact that the Flying Dutch had a first-place vote and fell to 5th makes me think some voters had them as high as #7 or #8, possibly.
Biggest riser: Chicago: 21 to 14: Chicago’s win over Whitewater paid great dividends for the Maroons, who remain undefeated. They haven’t played a super strong schedule, but it has been decent, and there is little doubt they will pick up a handful of resume-building wins playing in the UAA against the likes of Rochester, NYU, Emory and WashU.
Biggest fall: Whitewater: 13 to 21: Chicago moved up and Whitewater fell back right into that #21 spot, which honestly, I believe is a little too high. Wins over La Crosse, Illinois Wesleyan and Millikin will look really good come tournament time, and while I get that a 7-3 record is not worthy of a spot in the Top 10, you have to weigh that 7-3 mark against who they have played. And let’s remember the Warhawks were beating Chicago for three quarters, so it’s not like last week’s matchup was a run-over of any sort.
Ohio Northern jumped into the poll at #25. I had voted for ONU a couple weeks back, but had Gustavus Adolphus in my ballot once again this week, so ONU ended up at #27 for me as I ranked past #25. I think ONU’s win over Trine really gets a boost with Trine beating Hope, especially considering ONU took down Trine on its home court. The margin between the teams in the bottom half of the ballot appears very thin at this point.
Not a ton of other especially notable movement in this poll. I will say that it seems Augustana and Gustavus Adolphus are getting overlooked. Augustana has 5 wins over Massey Top 100 teams already, though losses to Carthage and UW-Oshkosh don’t look very good right now. Gustavus Adolphus is going to continue to see its stock rise if Augsburg and St. Benedict continue to play well as those wins are looking more and more impressive.
A couple games to tune into today:
Loras and Babson are playing as I wrap up this post, with Babson leading by just 5 at the half. That’s going to be a really good finish and I’d add Loras to that list of potentially overlooked teams at this point. They shoot the ball fairly well, and are hard to stop with the balance they have offensively. Loras could very well be your ARC champion this season.
#18 UC Santa Cruz hosts #21 UW-Whitewater tonight in a late west coast battle. 9 pm EST tip in that one. Both teams enter this game needing a win, as UCSC hasn’t yet taken down a Top 50 team, and Whitewater is looking to make a statement with a road win against a fellow Top 25 team, especially after the loss to Chicago. I really think it’s going to come down to the post play and how effective each team can be with taking advantage of second-chance scoring opportunities.
#16 Mary Hardin-Baylor battles #20 Puget Sound on a neutral court in San Antonio tonight. UMHB struggled throughout the entire first quarter for the second straight game last night against Trinity, and though the Cru had a strong third-quarter run, the damage had already been done. Trinity is an elite team. Still, this is a critical position for UMHB, as it is Puget Sound. Picking up a win over a very likely RRO would be huge especially considering neither is a lock to win their conference.
I’ll end it here as we approach the afternoon. It’s great having college hoops going all day long and as we saw yesterday, I anticipate some more surprising results today. Keep up with all the latest scores on D3hoops.com, by visiting this link: https://www.d3hoops.com/seasons/women/2022-23/schedule
What are your top 35 rankings?