The D1A rankings are going to be very important in the next couple of weeks as we look to the playoffs in April. 

Conference champions automatically qualify for the playoffs and host a game, but who else gets in, and who hosts games come down to the totality of their performances. Some of those totalities are clear and easy to track, some not so much.

Remember also that there is an Eastern and a Western bracket to the playoffs. So instead of looking for 12 teams from around the country, we’re actually looking for six teams from the East, and six teams from the West.

Now to the Top 10. Here's how we see it.

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Mid-South

As we detailed earlier, Lindenwood has, for the first time, clinched the Mid-South and will finally have a home playoff game in their opening round. The upcoming game between Lindenwood and Life won’t change the conference hierarchy any, but a win for Life (and remember it was close the last time they played) will help Life’s ranking and thus their playoff situation.

Despite losses, Arkansas State and Davenport are still held in high regard in the rankings. Davenport lost to Lindenwood, and Arkansas State lost to a very good Army team. We might see both of these teams in the playoffs still.

If Arkansas State can beat Davenport this coming weekend, they might solidify a place in the playoffs.

Red River

Texas A&M is your team. That’s settled.

Rugby East

Army is your championship team and that’s settled also. West Point has been preparing for the playoffs with some serious games, and with wins over Queens University Charlotte, Life, and, this past weekend, they’ve done so quite successfully. Army will play Central Washington this coming weekend.

Tries from Tiaan Mosconi, Michael Amberg, and Matt Meehan staked Army to a 19-5 first-half lead. Max Delay and Collin Grosse scored in the second half and Meehan got his second. 

“This was a tough game and great opponent today, and we knew we needed to continue our climb and have a never-satisfied mentality. We did just that today,” said scrumhalf David Mitchell.

Army’s march to the playoffs has signaled an intention to perform well, and they haven’t backed down from a challenge. Historically West Point hasn’t found playoff success, but Head Coach Matt Sherman has decided that won’t be because his team doesn’t have spring playing time.

Navy, meanwhile, is set to play Penn State this weekend. Navy is shooting for a playoff spot and this game should finalize that—remember, Penn State could win that and maybe that pushes out Navy or someone else.

California 

Saint Mary’s beat San Diego State 41-5 behind a solid showing from the forwards and now sit 4-0, tied in standings points with 4-1 Grand Canyon. Saint Mary’s has a game with UC Davis to potentially make up but, really, they should clinch the conference with a win over UC Santa Barbara April 2.

PAC

Cal shut out Utah 68-0 in a game where Cal led 49-0 at halftime. Cal Head Coach Jack Clark made note of the fact that Utah played hard throughout.

“We appreciate Utah for staying at the match,” head coach Jack Clark said. “Instead of packing it in, they got stuck into us in the second half and had their share of the run of play. Our boys dealt with same day airline travel about as well as could be hoped. It would have been easy for them to be flat, but they showed some real enthusiasm for the contest.”

Who else from the PAC/ See below.

Big 10

Champions Ohio State were in the middle of playing a preparation schedule when they saw the writing on the wall. Certainly able to be competitive in the playoffs, Ohio State rugby ran into a series of factors, mostly to do with stretched on-campus resources, that forced them to pull out of playoff contention. This is going to shift how the brackets will be organized, with the likely scenario being a team that was going to be in the West going to the East.

Rocky Mountain

The odd thing about the Rocky Mountain is that BYU won it and got themselves a home playoff berth, but it’s really been the out-of-conference play that has solidified the Cougars as a major contender. Yes they are “only” 3-3, but those three were competitive losses to Cal and Saint Mary’s. Not exactly a slipup.

Other Stuff

Cal Poly tied UCLA giving us once again a very tight hierarchy among teams in Southern California and Arizona. Consider: Arizona beat UCLA 39-36; Arizona and Grand Canyon tied 28-28; Grand Canyon beat Cal Poly 29-25; Cal Poly and UCLA tied.

So there’s very little between those four. All have also found themselves on the business end of a big loss or two (save for UCLA’s intriguing scaring of Saint Mary’s February 19).

Central Washington is the lone independent and seems to have done enough to be included in the playoff scenario. They beat Arizona 60-13, thus putting them in an echelon above not only UA but UCLA, GCU, and Cal Poly; they lost by only five to BYU and only three to Saint Mary’s. Their 48-19 loss to Cal was closer than anyone else save BYU. They play Army this week in a game that goes a long way toward figuring out the seeding.

So … as of this writing, who might we see?

Potential East Playoff Bracket:

Bye: Lindenwood
Bye: Army

Arkansas State or possibly Davenport at Texas A&M
Navy at Life

West Playoff Bracket

Bye: Cal
Bye: Saint Mary’s

TBD at BYU
TBD at Central Washington

The To Be Determined could be Arizona or Grand Canyon or UCLA or Cal Poly. Games among those four teams have resulted in two wins by a total of seven points, and two tries. We have not seen Arizona play Cal Poly nor Grand Canyon vs UCLA, but those games would likely be close as well. Arizona and Grand Canyon are both 1-0-1 in those games.