Men D2 College Rankings 2021 Week 2

We warned you that there would be major changes in the rankings in the opening weeks, and so, yes, this week, Week 2, we have major changes.

First off, we feel unhappy about having to drop out Shippensburg, UW-Platteville, Thomas More, and William Paterson. Their only crime, really, is not having played when others played. Expect to see these teams come back.

Who jumps in? Well we were on the fence about West Virginia, but they beat Alderson Broaddus, and the week before lost 17-15 to Kent State. So Kent State and WVU both jump in. Ferris State opened with a win, and that pushed them into the Top 40, and the same for Miami of Ohio.

Now, WVU and Miami bring up the issue of D1 colleges playing D2 rugby. Well, this year is a weird year and we're not going to get too caught up in it. Yes we'd rather see Villanova, Virginia, West Virginia, and Miami in D1, but they're not and right now we're not going to make much of stink about it.

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Varsity programs just starting out often start in D2, and this year is no exception. It kind of blows apart the whole point of D2, which is for colleges that aren't especially large that have club rugby programs (at least, that's how we look at it). We're going to have to work through all of that. Adrian and Marian are new to the arena, and it's reasonable that they compete in D2.

It's also not a surprise that they are good. We'll see how good as the season progresses, but because there were so few games in the last couple of weeks, and because both Adrian and Marian played high-profile teams, they jump up significantly. Belmont Abbey moves up but not as much because they played three 20-minute games. They did well, losing to Furman, tying South Carolina (!), and beating Citadel, but it's not enough to move a team to the Top 10.

St. Louis University also moves up and if they can get a consistent season in the Gateway, should do well.

Rank	Prev	Team	Conference	Notes
1	1	UW-Whitewater (WI)	Great MW
2	3	Furman (SC)	Southern
3	23	Adrian (MI)	Great Lakes	Beat Michigan State
4	16	Marian (IN)	MCRC	Close loss vs Iowa Central CC
5	4	Villanova (PA)	MARC
6	5	Vermont (VT)	New England-Wide
7	2	Norwich (VT)	Rugby Northeast	Lost to Brown
8	6	Illinois State (IL)	Great MW
9	7	UMS&T (MO)	Gateway	Forfeit win
10	8	Minnesota-Duluth (MI)	Northern Lights
11	9	MTSU (TN)	SCRC
12	10	UMass-Lowell (MA)	Rugby Northeast
13	11	Memphis (TN)	SCRC
14	12	Loyola-Chicago (IL)	Great MW
15	13	Boston University (MA)	New England-Wide
16	14	Bentley (MA)	Rugby Northeast
17	15	Marquette (WI)	Great MW
18	Unr	Kent State	Allegheny	Beat West Virginia
19	17	Montana State (MT)	Rocky Mountain
20	Unr	West Virginia	Allegheny	Lost to Kent State, Beat Alderson-Broaddus (20)
21	24	Belmont Abbey (NC)	Southern	1-1-1 in Furman kickoff tournament
22	20	Alderson Broaddus (WV)	Allegheny	Lost to West Virginia
23	28	SLU (MO)	Gateway	Beat Southern Illinois
24	18	Lehigh (PA)	MARC
25	19	Northern Colorado	Rocky Mountain
26	21	UNC (NC)	Southern
27	Unr	Miami (OH)	MCRC	Beat Xavier
28	Unr	Ferris State	Great Lakes	Beat Saginaw Valley State
29	37	Virginia (VA)	Cardinals	Beat William & Mary
30	32	Pitt State (KS)	Gateway	Beat John Brown
31	34	Central Michigan (MI)	Great Lakes
32	22	York (PA)	MARC
33	25	Coast Guard (CT)	New England-Wide
34	26	Marist (NY)	Tri-State
35	27	MSU-Moorhead (MN)	Northern Lights
36	29	Grand Valley State (MI)	Great Lakes	Game Ppd.
37	30	UNC-Charlotte (NC)	Southern
38	35	UNC-Wilmington (NC)	Southern	Beat NC State
39	31	Northern Michigan (MI)	Great MW
40	33	USMMA (NY)	Tri-State	Lost to Stony Brook