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NCR D1 Fall 2023 Rankings Week 2

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NCR D1 Fall 2023 Rankings Week 2

Dartmouth at Harvard. Alex Goff photo.

Wow what an interesting week in Men's college rugby.

While our top two were not in the thick of it—Brown played a preseason game where they were heavily favored, and St. Bonaventure played their alumni—many others were. This big game so far was Notre Dame College at Thomas More, and NDC came away with a quite impressive road win and they, of course, move up.

That isn't to say TMU is not good—they have plenty of opportunity to rebound. 

Belmont Abbey moves up significantly thanks to a win over Southern Virginia. This was after two losses, but competitive losses, to Mount St. Mary's and Mary Washington. Fairfield's dominant win over Northeastern moves them up nine spots.

Siena and Iona dropped down because they didn't play, but once they get on the field they will move up. 

Now, about dropping teams out. We dropped out Wheeling because they have depth issues that concerns us—going to uncontested scrums is a red flag. Again, it's early days. All Wheeling needs to do to bounce back into the Top 20 is to get players back ready to play and get on the field and perform. We also dropped out Principia because they haven't played yet and it's too much of a guess of how they will do—a Week 1 ranking is mostly guesswork, but guesswork carries less weight as we move on. So even though Michigan didn't play, Northeastern lost, Harvard lost, and Notre Dame lost, we're keeping them in the Top 20 right now. Northeastern does have a chance to rebound quite quickly so ... we keeping an eye on this.

Moving in are Nazareth and Syracuse because they played to a 29-28 recult. Might as well put both in the Top 20 and track their progress. 

Waiting in the wings, then, are Wheeling, Principia, Purdue, Southern Nazarene, and Fordham.

(Also, quick correction. We said when we took a break last week that we'd use last week's results in the rankings. Then we didn't do that. We were supposed to put Marian in there so ... the rankings below reflect that)

Next week? Oh man there are some really good matchups.

Fairfield (10) at Nazareth (15)
Syracuse (16) at Siena (14)
Northeastern (20) at Dartmouth (7)
Belmont Abbey (8) at Queens (3)
Adrian (D1A) at NDC (4)
Kutztown (6) at St. Bonaventure (2)
Harvard (19) at Brown (1)

So obviously if we're wrong, we'll find out.
 

Rk. Prev. College Team Conference Notes
1 1 Brown Liberty Beat Holy Cross
2 2 St. Bonaventure Rugby East  
3 3 Queens Rugby East Beat Wheeling (10)
4 6 Notre Dame College Rugby East Beat Thomas More (4)
5 5 Indiana Big 10 Beat Michigan State
6 7 Kutztown Rugby East Beat Adrian
7 8 Dartmouth Liberty Beat Harvard (20)
8 13 Belmont Abbey Southern Beat Southern Virginia
9 4 Thomas More Big Rivers Lost to Notre Dame College (6)
10 19 Fairfield Liberty Beat Northeastern (18)
11 11 Iowa Central Big Rivers Lost to Davenport
12 12 AIC Liberty Beat Babson
13 Unr Marian Big Rivers Beat Kentucky 9/2
14 9 Iona Liberty Lightning
15 17 Siena Liberty Lightning
16 Unr Nazareth Liberty Beat Syracuse
17 Unr Syracuse Liberty One-point loss to Nazareth
18 16 Univ. Notre Dame Big 10 Lost to Wisconsin
19 20 Harvard Liberty Lost to Dartmouth (8)
20 18 Northeastern Liberty Lost to Fairfield (19)