College Rugby Association of America (CRAA) has released its D1A Power Rankings for February.
We are starting to get into the meat of the pre-playoff season, and these rankings have a direct effect on playoff places and seedings. Goff Rugby Report's own D1A rankings are used, in part, to produce these rankings, but coach votes have a heavy influence, as well.
That's why there are some differences.
Here are the CRAA Power Rankings:
Compare this to the Goff Rugby Report Rankings.
The studious among you will see that we have the exact same group of 20 teams. There is no team that's in GRR's Top 20 that isn't in CRAA's Top 20. Of course, GRR gives you a Top 25, so we're 25% more rank ... ermm ... more value-added.
Anyway, vice-versa it's also true, no team that's in CRAA's Top 20 is absent of SGRR's Top 20.
In addition, three rankings agree exactly: #1 (Navy), #10 (Arizona), and #20 (Utah). Every other ranking is different. However, they're not that different. Of the 17 teams left, seven see a disagreement of just one spot.
That would be: Life, Army, BYU, Arkansas State, Cal Poly, Davenport, and St. Thomas. Those differences will likely not have much effect in the the playoff seedings.
But what about the other 10? Let's look at that.
San Diego. CRAA has the Toreros at #19 and GRR at #17. This is just a case of GRR having a West Coast team ranked ahead of two Eastern teams (Davenport and St. Thomas). That's because we know Davenport and St. Thomas will be playing more this spring and will show whether they should move up in those games.
Also, we've watched San Diego and we think they are just a shade better than those other two, at the moment.
Next up, Grand Canyon and Penn State. This is definitely a West Coast vs East Coast dichotomy. GRR has the Western team GCU ranked #13 while CRAA has the 'Lopes at #16. It's an exactly reverse with Penn State (!6 for GRR and 13 for CRAA). This again is a function of recent results. Grand Canyon's close loss to BYU and their win over Trinity Western prompts GRR's decision.
Coming up, GCU will play UCLA this coming weekend and Cal the week after, which will tell us a lot. They wrap up their pre-playoff season with Utah and Utah Valley. Penn State has a full March, with games against Lindenwood, Arkansas State, St. Thomas, and Mary Washington.
So we're not too worried about this difference in rankings. PSU, if they produce good results in March, could easily move up on GRR's rankings.
GRR has Colorado State ranked higher than does CRAA, and we do think the CRAA voters are missing the boat on Colorado State. Not by much ... GRR has the Rams at #12 and CRAA has CSU at #15. But that means, probably, that everyone else voting in the CRAA rankings think CSU should be #16 or maybe lower. Probably a happy medium at #14 or #13 might be better.
See? We're willing to compromise.
Mary Washington is in the opposite situation. GRR has the Eagles at #14 and CRAA has them at #11. For GRR there are two factors that drive the #14 ranking. The first is that UMW beat Penn State 24-22. This, to us, links both teams fairly closely. We have UMW at #14 and PSU at #16. CRAA thinks the same way, but has those two at #11 and #13.
OK ... but for us Mary Washington is a very good team but hasn't challenged the big dogs. Big loss vs Navy, big loss vs Life, relatively big loss to Army. They lost to Mount St. Mary's also, 33-20. Next up, their wins have all been close—SVU, PSU, St. Thomas, Ohio State. So it's clear both rankings consider Mary Washington ahead of those 15-20 teams and below those 1-10 teams. GRR thinks the close wins and more lopsided losses puts them at the bottom edge of that region; CRAA says they should be at the top end.
Once again, results can change this. Once again, GRR has ranked an Eastern team lower than the CRAA votes do because we know the Eastern teams will play some key games in March. UMW will play Lindenwood, Mount St. Mary's, and Penn State.
A couple of the other differences are minimal. Mount St. Mary's two spots lower with GRR. Saint Mary's two spots higher with GRR (which we freely say is more of a gestalt feeling than anything else). Lindenwood two spots lower with GRR. Once again, Lindenwood's main season hasn't started yet. They've played some tough games, but the spring is their main time.
So that leaves two teams with really notable difference UCLA is #9 with GRR and #12 with CRAA. We've looked at it all and basically think CRAA is probably more correct. But we're not worried. Between now and February 28 the Bruins play Grand Canyon, BYU, San Diego, and Arizona. Since GRR has UCLA at #9 and Arizona at #10, that game will show us who's right.
And, finally, Cal. Cal is #2 with GRR and we are very, very close to putting them at #1. Cal is the defending D1A champs and they won that title with a bunch of freshmen and some, but not many, seniors. CRAA's #4 ranking for Cal is, frankly, baffling.
Well, we'll find out March 7 when Cal plays Navy.
De La Salle HS
Saint Mary's (Rudy Scholz Finalist)
USA U20s (Captain)
USA Men's National 15s Team (Debut vs Georgia 2023 at age 20)
As a 17-year-old Spencer Huntley required a waiver to play for the USA U20s, an indication of how he was rated in the USA age-grade pathway. He got that waiver and impressed for the USA U20s, and then moved up to the USA U23s. He led the San Diego Mustangs to a national HS Club championship in 2024.
He also played in the SoCal single-school league for Cathedral Catholic.
Hope Rogers began playing rugby at age 16 in high school and continued to compete during her time at Penn State University. There, she won four National Championships, was crowned MVP on two occasions, was named to the USA Under-20s and earned Collegiate All-American honors for four years. Rogers was also an impressive discus player during her senior year in high school where she broke a school record and won Gold at Districts for the sport.
Mike played for Life College, Philly-Whitemarsh and played for the USA National 7s and 15s teams in the 1980s and 1990s.
He was also part of the Atlantis touring side, playing 7s for the team in several around the world.
