With fourteen teams punching their tickets to Boulder, all the focus will shift to where the teams will be seeded, and the path to the Golden Disc. Even though New England, which because of Brown has claimed as many trophies as any other Region, has yet to determine its representatives , the major questions about the 2008 UPA College Championships can be answered. Those questions might lead you to a familiar answer, with the top of Open Division forced to go through a pair of teams that will be very comfortable in their position.
Where will the National Champion come from?
Americans love an underdog, but College Ultimate isn’t very kind to these sorts. Only North Carolina State in 2003 and California-Santa Barbara in 2001 failed to make the National Final after claiming the top seed, while half of the Champions have come from the top spot. The rest of the representatives in the season finale have been seeded in the top 4, with the fourth seed claiming the second most Titles (2). The second and third seeds have identical results, with one Title and three Runners-Up.
Additionally, of the sixteen teams that have played for the National Title this decade, the most games any team had lost heading to the National Championship game was six, by 2002 and 2003 Wisconsin and 2004 Colorado, the latter two winning the Title. On the other end of the spectrum, four teams have lost just one game, 2002 Stanford, 2005 Colorado, 2005 Florida and 2007 Wisconsin, three of which went on to victory. Below are the seeds of both Finalists and their records heading into the UPA College Championships.
2007: Champion - #1 Wisconsin 49-1 (Runner-Up - #3 Colorado 30-4)
2006: #1 Florida 43-1 (#2 Wisconsin 43-2)
2005: #3 Brown 34-5 (#1 Colorado 26-1)
2004: #2 Colorado 29-6 (#1 Cal 43-4)
2003: #4 Wisconsin 30-6 (#2 Oregon 39-5)
2002: #1 Stanford 31-1 (#3 Wisconsin 26-6)
2001: #4 Carleton 24-4 (#2 Colorado 32-3)
2000: #1 Brown 27-3 (#3 Carleton 25-3)
How many teams should be considered contenders?
Given the history, the list of real contenders for the Title can be narrowed to a mere three teams, Florida, Wisconsin, and Michigan. Florida has locked up the top seed and boasts a record of 33-1. Defending Champion Wisconsin, in spite of its loss to Michigan, is the likely 2nd seed and has pushed its record to 40-3. Meanwhile, the season’s most surprising team, Michigan, with its record of 35-4, may slip behind Colorado to the fourth seed, but is the only other team that fits the profile.
Colorado, which will likely join Florida and Wisconsin in the top three seeds for the third consecutive season, may be starting to feel somewhat like tennis star Andy Roddick, perennially stuck behind the incomparable Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal. Colorado, in spite of what could be the most significant home-field advantage possible, dropped nine games while competing in all three Premier Events of the NCUS. If Colorado is to make its own history, it can look to a 22-2 record since the return of Martin Cochran. Outside of these teams, Texas and Georgia have dropped seven games, while Arizona and Carleton have piled up eleven losses, and will be seeded somewhere in the middle six.
Biggest surprise of the weekend?
It is not the first time a team has played in the Final at Centex and failed to make Nationals, but North Carolina dropping two games to Georgia tops the list of surprises from a weekend that ultimately went according to plan. Georgia had a string of results that put a fourth straight trip to the Championships in serious doubt, dropping a game to Harvard to fall out of the Top 8 at Centex followed by a disappointing, winless Sunday, and finally squeezing out a 14-13 victory over Georgia Tech in its first trip to Statesboro for Sectionals. North Carolina had dominated the Nation’s most difficult Section, and had its eyes squarely on defeating Florida, but never made it past the third-seeded ‘Dawgs. Instead, two heartbreaking losses leave North Carolina as the best team not to make Nationals.
The result that might have the greatest effect in Boulder was another shocking development on the East Coast, where Delaware (the MetroEast’s watered-down of Carleton) continued to peak at the appropriate time and notched its third Regional Title in four seasons. Nationally competitive Pittsburgh, which was in line for a seed in the top 8, has yet to finish atop the Region, and will be forced to the last seed in either the C or D Pool. If Delaware falls behind both teams from New England, the Pool of Death, with its fourth, fifth and ninth seeds, becomes the scariest starting point in the history of this format.
Finally, out West, Danny Karlinsky posted his program’s most significant achievement since players like Idris Nolan and Sammy Chatterton-Kirchmeier took up residence in Santa Cruz, upending Stanford for the third straight tournament en route to its first Regional Championship since 1995. While still having a losing record at 19-20, they will be representing one of the Nation’s deepest Regions, while British Columbia won’t be headed back to the US again this season. UBC fell to both Bay Area teams in back-to-back games on Sunday, sending Stanford back to Nationals, on the back of another extraordinary individual effort from Mark Sherwood. The results from Davis should put the Revolver teammates on the podium in Boulder.
Who are the best teams sitting this Nationals out?
Even with two bids on the line in every Region , the line-up for Boulder is not the strongest sixteen teams in the country. North Carolina tops an impressive list of teams that will carry the mantle of 2007 California-Santa Barbara and 2006 Carleton in the long-standing debate over the best way to distribute the UPA’s most coveted sixteen bids. The next three teams in the Atlantic Coast Region, Central Florida, North Carolina-Wilmington and North Carolina State, all would have been happy to be competing for the third bid that went the way of the South Region, or possibly in any other Region outside of the Central and Wisconsin and Carelton’s long-standing domination.
From the Central Region, Minnesota is the second team from the Top 8 at Centex that will be sitting home in May. Seeing the top two spots controlled by familiar foes, the two losses to Carleton by scores of 15-3 And 15-4 put an exclamation mark on the difficulty of competing in the Central Region. Minnesota had its program’s best team, but was still uncompetitive in its most important games.
British Columbia was one of two teams to lose in two chances to qualify for Nationals, and is the third highest ranked team in the latest UPA Rankings, (12th) that will not be playing in Boulder. Just behind them sits the season’s most disappointing team, Oregon, who lost two games before either game-to-go in Davis. California-Santa Barbara was also supposed to contend this season, starting at 6th in the Preseason NUMP, but finished with a whimper, losing by five and four to the Southwest Regional Qualifiers Colorado and Arizona. From the UPA Rankings, these are the best teams:
#4 North Carolina
#10 Minnesota
#12 British Columbia
#14 Oregon
#18 Central Florida
(#19 North Carolina State and #20 North Carolina-Wilmington)
Quick Take on Full Seedings
With all the parity this season has seen, the seedings for the Championships are as difficult as any year in recent memory. Still, upon closer inspection, most of the difficulty in the middle of the pack. Florida at number one is a given. Wisconsin is likely still the favorite, and has the resume to claim the second seed in spite of the loss to Michigan. Colorado has been impressive since the return of Cochran, and defeated Michigan for 3rd place at Centex. Michigan, though some will have them at second, is the natural fourth seed.
Had Texas claimed their Sectional Title, they would have been the fifth seed, but a closer look reveals their profile isn’t quite that strong. Arizona is the other team that would rise this high, and could jump Texas in spite of two head-to-head losses. Carleton played The Stanford Invite without its young stars who were trying out for Vancouver and may get pulled down the ladder in spite of advancing to the Semi-Finals of Trouble In Vegas and finishing 10th at Centex. Georgia also has a strong profile save for Sunday at Centex. Illinois has inflated RRI and UPA Rankings, but does have several quality wins.
After that grouping, the rest of the seeds are well-defined. Delaware will have the worst profile of any team, barring a major upset in New England, which would put the second team from this region at sixteenth, a possibility even if it is Brown, Dartmouth or Williams. Pittsburgh will shift between either fifteenth or sixteenth based on this second team. Harvard and Dartmouth both have enough quality wins to move ahead of Delaware. North Texas, with their only relevant results in Vegas would have been among this discussion if not for one win over Texas, and will sit in the 12/13 slot with the New England winner. California-Santa Cruz has played a great schedule, but has lost a majority of its games, including to Arizona, Texas, and Illinois. Stanford’s profile isn’t much better, with only a win over Texas. Their win over Harvard puts them just above the New England winner at 11th.
Taking all of that into account, a quick rundown:
1. Florida
2. Wisconsin
3. Colorado
4. Michigan
5. Arizona
6. Georgia
7. Carleton
8. Texas
9. Illinois
10. UC-Santa Cruz
11. Stanford
12. NE #1 (Harvard or Dartmouth)
13. North Texas
14. NE #2
15. Delaware
16. Pittsburgh
Hardest to Believe?
From the Women’s Division, Defending National Champion Stanford failed to qualify for the first time since 2000, a span that has seen them play for all but one National Championship, winning four of those six opportunities, including the last three. Seeded fourth in the impossible Northwest Region, behind Washington, British Columbia, and Oregon, Superfly failed to play in a single game-to-go, falling 13-9 to California and 13-12 to Oregon one round short both days. The Northwest is still a good bet to claim its thirteenth National Title, as British Columbia and Washington are the top two teams in the latest UPA Rankings, and could play a third straight Final in the Series in Boulder.
