Every Wednesday, we will post the College Power Rankings here on the front page to facilitate discussion in the comments and serve as a permalink for each week’s rankings.
UCLA ascends to #2, up from #16, winning Presidents’ Day and beating #3 Texas twice. California also performed very well, and they are UCLA’s only loss this season, back at Santa Barbara Invite.
Texas upset #1 Stanford, but their pair of losses to UCLA keep them from moving any higher.
Western Washington and Southern California take big drops, falling six and seven spots, respectively. WWU dropped games to UCLA and Cal and their two best wins were over USC, who went 3-3 themselves on the long weekend.
UC San Diego gains four spots to #21, passing the eye test at Prez Day and coming oh-so-close against Texas, Western Washington, and Carleton.
Speaking of Carleton, they go up to 16, notching a big win over Cal at Presidents’ Day, as well as a win over UCSD and a close loss to Texas. Their four losses this season are all to top 15 teams.
The results are in: Georgia Tech’s results from Luminous are going towards their A team. It’s an unusual situation, but with their depth and health in question, GT find themselves sliding down the top 25.
College D-I Men's Power Rankings:
Rank
Team
Change
Prior
Dropped from rankings:Western Washington (21), Richmond (24), Cincinnati (25)
A power move from Pittsburgh sends them shooting up to #2 from #13, earned by winning Florida Warm-Up, the season’s most competitive tournament so far, and looking damn good doing it.
Minnesota, the other Warm-Up finalist, leaps to #3 from #7, on the strength of intense defensive efforts and flashes of offensive efficiency that speak to their championship pedigree. They look deep, and even in the midst of their development process, scary.
Big names falling: Oregon drops from #1 to #7 after losing to UC Santa Barbara and getting no big wins, while Carleton and Wisconsin miss the Warm-Up bracket and fall to #6 and #10, respectively.
Welcome Northwestern to the rankings at #13 with a monster Warm-Up where they made it to the semifinals. They are in prime position to earn a strength bid for the Great Lakes if their defense can keep their level of play as high as it was in Tampa.
In addition, there’s no reason to deny entry to BYU, clocking in at #12 after bouncing back from a weak Santa Barbara Invite. Wins over Texas A&M and Texas look nice, and they came up just short against Minnesota at Warm-Up.
The last new team is Florida, claiming the #18 spot, after beating both Wisconsin and Carleton, and taking two losses to Texas A&M at Warm-Up.
Western Washington falls out after going 2-4 at Presidents’ Day and taking one on the chin in a loss to Chicago. Richmond and Cincinnati drop out from their spots at the back end of the list.
After a dominant, undefeated weekend at the Easterns Qualifier, NC State hops ahead of Virginia Tech, though losses to several teams ahead of them at Carolina Kickoff and Queen City prevent them from climbing any higher.
Grinnell gains four spots, moving to #17, after landing wins over Nebraska and John Brown while going 4-4 at Dust Bowl. They also played well against Truman State, losing 10-7.
Returning to the rankings after a week on the outside is John Brown, back at #25 after going 6-2 at Dust Bowl and coming with a point of upsetting Grinnell.
Colby has dropped out of the rankings altogether, remaining inactive thus far this spring. Owning a win over Bowdoin in the fall, they have flashed the potential to be a top 25 team and could earn their way back in when they start up play in 2017.
With only a couple D-III Men’s teams in action this past weekend, the rankings remain intact since the last update.
John Brown holds steady at #6, going 6-1 at Dust Bowl and losing in the final to Texas Tech. No major victories here, but they managed the second place finish without star Ethan Penner, which bodes well for their depth as they build for a run to Nationals.
Dust Bowl also saw Rice attempting to make a case for inclusion, but ultimately, they won and lost as we would have expected in a 4-4 weekend. Still, they are a team that merits attention moving forward.
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