Women DI College Top 20: March 11, 2015

The big news in the Women’s DI College Top 20 is the fall of New Mexico, which played a devastating game against Women’s Cougar Rugby (BYU) last weekend. Yes, it was a pre-season friendly, and yes, the game was held on BYU’s home turf, but a 100-point difference is significant. Read more here.

We gave a lot of weight to the Lobos’ one-point win over the Cougars for the Mountain West title, but a solid performance from BYU’s two 7s teams at the LVI indicated that the team had been working hard since the season’s end. Having New Mexico slide to #17 also meant some teams moved around as a consequence.

But some teams deserved the bump. North Carolina ended with a 95-12 win over Virginia Tech (read more) and will take the top seed out of the South division. Two games needed to be played before the Mason Dixon quarterfinals were confirmed: Virginia Tech beat East Carolina 82-12, and the James Madison vs. Pittsburgh was canceled due to weather. Seeing as the latter two teams had identical records, points differential in the standings was used to determine seeds. The March 21 Mason Dixon conference quarterfinals are now confirmed:

Maryland @ North Carolina
NC State @ West Chester
Pittsburgh @ Virginia
Virginia Tech @ James Madison

The teams will play the final two rounds on March 28-29 at James Madison.

Life ticked up two spots after defeating Georgia Tech 46-3, surrendering its first points-against this matrix season. The loss removed Tech from Top 20 consideration (it had beaten UCF earlier in the season), and Florida fell off after its 42-7 loss to Central Florida. While tempted to return UCF to the Top 20, the team’s results aren’t consistent enough to warrant it.

Instead, Washington State snuck back onto the rankings after a gutsy performance against PMC North leader Central Washington (read more). CWU ended its first DI season 8-0 after a 115-0 win over Oregon State. The duo will head to the conference championships on March 28-29 at Stanford with six other Pacific Mountain teams.

The PMC playoffs are nearly set, with a couple more games needed to shake out the lineup. The conference’s West division is waiting for Chico State (1-4) and UC Davis (3-2) to compete, but that result will only affect the #3 and #4 finishes; Davis has already locked up #2 on standings points. Should Chico win, then the Aggies will overtake the Golden Bears for third. The odds are in Davis' favor, but Chico State did play Stanford to a 12-9 loss last weekend. Granted, the Cardinal had swapped out 10 of its starters from the previous Cal game (62-5 win to Stanford), but the Aggies got a nice confidence boost from Saturday. All four PMC West teams will advance to playoffs.

UC San Diego won PMC South with a 7-1 record, finishing its league season with a double-header. Saturday was a 48-12 win over UCLA, and Sunday, the Tritons fell 19-17 to UC Santa Barbara. Despite UCSB’s victory, Arizona State is gunning for that #2 seed. The Sun Devils play Arizona in its season-ender, and if all goes well, then ASU should be heading to playoffs.

A couple of other notes: Northern Iowa is losing long-time coach Steve Murra, who's been with the Panthers for 21 years; Indiana canceled a friendly against Lindenwood due to low numbers/injuries; weather canceled West Chester vs. D.C. Furies and the Virginia Women’s Invitational Tournament, keeping teams like UVA and Navy (which also has a new coach, New Zealander Ron Ram) dormant; and Penn State is tuning up on its Spain and France tour.