Initial 2015 regional rankings released

As expected, Washington-St. Louis and UW-Whitewater are the top teams in the Central and Midwest regions, respectively, in the first regional rankings of the 2015 season.

Commentary, if any, to follow later this evening. However, my votes in the Central and Midwest regions were fairly similar to the respective committees.

UPDATE: Agree to disagree on Northwestern’s omission in the Central. I see what the Midwest committee did, and I don’t mind where we have divergent opinions on teams’ relative criteria.

The first rankings are reliant on everything but record vs. ranked opponents out of necessity. Curious to see how record vs. RR changes things, if at all, in the weeks to come.

Central Region 1. Washington-St. Louis 2. Wartburg 3. Gustavus Adolphus 4. Augsburg 5. Saint Benedict 6. Coe 7. Saint Mary’s (Minn.) 8. Bethel

Midwest Region 1. UW-Whitewater 2. Carthage 3. UW-Oshkosh 4. UW-Eau Claire 5. Illinois Wesleyan 6. UW-Stevens Point 7. Elmhurst 8. Chicago

The top four teams in other regions:Great Lakes Region: 1. Calvin; 2. Wittenberg; 3. Hope; 4. Ohio Northern. Mid-Atlantic Region: 1. Juniata; 2. Christopher Newport; 3. Eastern; 4. Mary Washington. New England Region: 1. MIT; 2. Amherst; 3. Tufts; 4. Springfield. New York Region: 1. Clarkson; 2. Stockton; 3. Union; 4. SUNY Brockport. South Region: 1. Emory; 2. Randolph-Macon; 3. Hendrix; 4. Birmingham-Southern. West Region: 1. Colorado College; 2. Cal Lutheran; 3. Southwestern; 4. Claremont-Mudd-Scripps.

-Ricky Nelson