Scanning the SoCon - Week #4

Scanning the SoCon - Week #4

Power Rankings
1. Elon
2. Western Carolina
3. Davidson
4. UNCG
5. UTC
6. Furman
7. Citadel
8. Ga Southern
9. Samford
10. App State
11. Wofford

Game of the Week
UNCG- LA Tech

Player of the Week
Trey Sumler

The SoCon has not been good. The RPI currently ranks at #33. Why is the SoCon so bad?
I honestly think the SoCon has been better than it appears. RPI and conference rankings are always a little bit screwy this early in the season. Use Davidson as an example ... RealtimeRPI.com lists their loss to Virginia as a "bad loss". Their win against Georgia (currently a 300+ team) is not a good one. By the end of the season, Virginia will be at least a top 40 team and Georgia will be in the top 150. I think when we look again later in the season, the numbers will be quite different. However, this league is going to have to win games against D1 competition. That's not happened frequently so far this season.

What your thoughts on exempt tournaments, both that allow winners to advance in true tournament fashion or like the Las Vegas Invitational with teams playing road games against the best teams and then a tournament against the lesser teams at a location, etc?
I wish that, like the MVC, the SoCon made every team in it's league participate in one of these per year. We all complain about the scheduling of our current teams. These exempt tournaments give our teams a chance to play multiple D1 teams. I know that sometimes these tournaments have predetermined brackets, and I think that's fine too. Those tournaments are trying to sell tickets and get their teams on TV. Selling match ups is what it's all about. As long as our teams get to play in winnable brackets of their own, it seems fine to me.