Code Orange

The final weekend of football in Division I-AA football is this weekend, as well as first round playoff games (playoffs!? what a concept!) in Division II and Division III.

In Division I-AA, there are still three undefeated teams who can qualify for the playoffs: #2 Northern Iowa, #3 Montana, and #4 McNeese State (#1 North Dakota State is still a Division I transitional and thus isn’t eligible for the playoffs, while #11 Yale can’t go because of an Ivy League policy prohibiting their football teams from going to the playoffs.)

We also have conference championships to be determined and the 8 other I-AA playoff wildcard spots to be filled.  That bracket will be announced tomorrow.

Eight conferences earn automatic bids into the I-AA tournament, 6 have already been decided:

Big Sky Conference - Montana
Gateway Conference - Northern Iowa
Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference - Delaware State
Ohio Valley Conference - Eastern Kentucky
Patriot League - Fordham
Southern Conference - Wofford

Meanwhile, two conference championships will be decided today:

Colonial Athletic Association

Four teams are still in contention for this conference title: #7 Massachusetts, #8 Richmond, #9 Delaware, and #13 James Madison.   And it can get messy in this conference.

Massachusetts and Richmond both sit with 6-1 conference records, yet they do not play each other.  Massachusetts plays at #22 Hofstra while Richmond plays at home against William and Mary.  If one of these teams wins and the other loses, then the winner will win the conference and earn the automatic bid.

If they both win, then they are technically co-champions, but the automatic bid will be determined by a majority vote by the conference’s Athletics Directors (excluding the ADs of the schools being voted on).

If both Massachsuetts and Richmond lose and James Madison wins, James Madison receives the automatic bid.

If Massachusetts, Richmond, and James Madison all lose and Delaware wins, then Delaware receives the automatic bid.

Southland Conference

The winner of the McNeeses State/Central Arkansas game will receive the automatic bid.

And then you have to start looking at possible at-large teams, and there are only 8 spots.

At the top of the list have to be #5 Southern Illinois, #6 Appalachian State, and the two teams in the Massachusetts, Richmond, and Delaware group who don’t the CAA automatic bid.  Even if these teams lose today, they are probably odds-on favorites for getting into the tournament (except for the CAA teams, since there are really 6 teams who are possibly in contention for bids, and getting more than 3 teams in may be asking a lot).

After that you get to #13 James Madison (can the CAA get 4 teams in the tournament? Has that ever happened before?), #15 Youngstown State, #15 Eastern Washington,  #17 Georgia Southern, #19 New Hampshire (another CAA team - it’s doubful that they’d get in ahead of JMU if the Dukes win, and I can’t see any conference getting 5 teams in), and #20 Eastern Illinois.

#18 Grambling can’t accept an invite since they already play a traditional game on Thanksgiving Day.

Meanwhile, in the Division II playoffs, here are the games on tap:

Ashland at Central Washington
Winona State at North Dakota
Mesa State at Abilene Christian
Washburn at West Texas A&M
Albany State at Catawba
Shaw at Delta State
Bryant at Southern Connecticut State
Indiana (PA) at West Chester

The top 8 seeds all get byes into the second round.  Also, this tournament is divided into 4 regions, with the four regional champions advancing to the semifinals.  In each region 6 teams go to the playoffs.

There was some controversy this year in the South Region where 10-1 Carson-Newman was ranked in the top 15 in the nation overall and #5 in the region, yet because of rules that allow any conference champion in the top 10 of the regional rankings to get a bid in to the tournament, Carson-Newman was left out.  Carson-Newman’s only loss was to Catawba.

Division III matchups today include the following:

Ithaca at Mount Union
TCNJ at Rensselaer
Hartwick at Curry
Hobart at St. John’s Fisher
Olivet at Central (IA)
Redlands at St. John’s (MN)
Wisconsin-Eau Claire at St. Norbert
Concordia (WI) at Bethel (MN)
North Carolina Wesleyan at Washington & Jefferson
Trinity (TX) [Yes, that Trinity] at Mary Hardin-Baylor
Salisbury at Muhlenberg
Hampden-Sydney at Wesley
Capital at Wisconsin-Whitewater
North Central (IL) at Franklin
Mt. St. Joseph at Wabash
Widener at Case Reserve

I’ll try to update these scores today if I can find them.