The final ballot

We're about five hours from kickoff of the Division I national championship game between Massachusetts and Appalachian State. You can watch the game on ESPN2. From what I've seen, Appy State is the best team in the tournament and should roll to its second straight championship. The I-AA season-ending awards are also out, and UC Davis fans should be pretty familiar with the winners. Cal Poly's Kyle Shotwell won the Buck Buchanan award for best defensive player. New Hampshire QB Ricky Santos (who led a last-minute scoring drive to beat the Aggies in 2005's season opener) took the Walter Payton Award as best offensive player. San Diego won The Sports Network Cup, which goes to the top I-AA "mid-major" program.

Here's my final Top 25: 1. Championship game winner; 2. NC loser; 3. NDSU 4. Montana; 5. Youngstown; 6. James Madison; 7. Illinois State; 8. Southern Illinois; 9. New Hampshire; 10. Eastern Illinois; 11. Montana State; 12. Furman; 13. Portland State; 14. Tennessee-Martin; 15. Hampton; 16. Northern Iowa; 17. South Dakota State; 18. Cal Poly; 19. Coastal; 20. Wofford; 21. Central Ark.; 22. McNeese; 23. UC Davis; 24. San Diego; 25. Towson.

Nader, err, Stig for Coach of the Year

The Division I-AA awards ballot arrived this week. The ballots come with a watch list. The only Great West representative on the watch list for The Eddie Robinson Award, named for the legendary Grambling coach, is North Dakota State coach Craig Bohl. And you can make a pretty convincing argument for him. His transitional team went 10-1 and might have been the best in I-AA. But I’m tempted to place my vote a little bit further south in the Upper Midwest. I’m talking about South Dakota State coach John Stigelmeier. I’m worried that I’d be throwing away my vote. What I’m wrestling with is whether principle matters more.

Here’s my case for Stigelmeier:

He rallied his team from the depths of despair and had it playing for the conference title in the toughest I-AA conference in the country. The Rabbits opened the season with a home loss to a D-III team, a rout at Montana and a collapse at Northern Iowa. And then SDSU rallied to win seven straight. And these weren’t seven easy routs (there was just one, William Penn). The Rabbits staged dramatic comebacks at Cal Poly and at home against UC Davis, and they were within a possession fairly late against a North Dakota State team that was drastically more talented.

Stig got the most out of his team, which was not necessarily physically gifted, but that had great belief that it was never out of a game. Stig said all year that it was in the players, but some of that has to go down to coaching. But he’s not on the watch list, so he’s not going to win. The ballot is due Wednesday, which should give me a little time to think.

Here’s how I voted in my final regular season ballot in the Sports Network’s Top 25: 1. Appalachian St.; 2. NDSU; 3. Montana 4. Youngstown; 5. Umass; 6. James Madison; 7. Furman; 8. Southern Ill.; 9. Tenn-Martin; 10. Eastern Ill.; 11. Illinois St; 12. Hampton; 13. New Hampshire; 14. Portland St.; 15. Northern Iowa; 16. South Dakota St.; 17. Cal Poly; 18. Coastal Carolina; 19. Wofford; 20 Central Ark.; 21 McNeese; 22 Montana St.; 23 San Diego; 24 Towson; 25 Princeton

Torero trouble, again

Sports Network Director of I-AA Football Matt Dougherty has posted his weekly playoff forecast, suggesting that San Diego’s playoff hopes are not as high as Toreros Jim Harbaugh would have every one believe. This is a side issue at the moment, but UCD (assuming, and this is no longer a safe assumption, it takes care of business against Sac State) needs San Diego not to be invited in order to have shot at continuing its 36-year winning-season streak. I quoted Dougherty earlier this week in a piece about San Diego’s chances. He seems to be echoing the company line that holds San Diego simply has not been tested enough this year to have earned a playoff spot.

Here’s the argument for San Diego: The Toreros went 10-0 and killed everyone on their schedule. The average score in their games was 46-11.

Here’s the argument against San Diego: The Toreros went 10-0 and killed everyone on their schedule. Their average score in their games was 46-11, because they played nobody. San Diego’s non-conference slate included such powers as Dixie State (one year removed from being a junior college) and Azuza Pacific (which is in the NAIA and went 3-7) this year. Its conference is basically glorified Division III football. Non-scholarship I-AA football exists because D-I basketball schools must play at D-I in all sports. The choice for schools like San Diego, Valparaiso and Dayton is not between scholarship I-AA and non-scholarship. It’s between dropping the sport or keeping it and playing on the cheap.

There are some things that would hurt the Toreros chances: Montana is a lock for the postseason, but if it loses to Montana State Saturday, it would take one of those at-large slots. There’s a three-way tie in the Ohio Valley Conference, there are a lot of scenarios and possible auto bid winners, and only one team, Tennessee-Martin, that looks like a pretty good at-large chance. The at-large spots taken, the fewer there are for San Diego. The field will be announced Sunday at 10 a.m. PT

Here’s how I voted in these week’s Top 25 poll: 1. Appalachian St. 2. NDSU; 3. Montana; 4. Youngstown; 5. Umass; 6. Illinois St; 7. Furman; 8. James Madison; 9. Southern Ill.; 10. Hampton; 11. Eastern Ill; 12. Tenn-Martin; 13. New Hampshire; 14. Portland St.; 15. Cal Poly; 16. South Dakota St.; 17. Northern Iowa; 18. Coastal Carolina; 19. Montana St.; 20. Alabama A&M; 21. Towson; 22. Delaware St.; 23. Wofford; 24. San Diego; 25. Central Ark.

Muddling through the Top 25

As he walked off the field Saturday afternoon his team’s 22-21 victory a South Dakota State player said -- sort of to the surrounding fans and teammates, but really to no one in particular -- “No way (UC Davis) is the No. 16 team in the country.” It’s a silly statement to make for two reasons. The first is by denigrating the opponent, he was really trashing his own team's victory. And second, how does he know? Not even the most expert pollster could look at a team and say, “Oh, that’s the 16th best team in the country.” And if you think you can, you’re just being contrarian for the sake of it. And good for you. We definitely need more contrarianism in the world.

UC Davis coach Bob Biggs said today on the Great West conference call that his team’s 4-4 record doesn’t represent how good it actually is. Given the team's talent, and the fact two of its losses are to top 10 teams, he can make a convincing case. This isn’t the NFL where, as Bill Parcells says, you are what your record says you are. In college, schools set their own slates. They have the ability to challenge themselves or they design a schedule for success (at least out of conference). In truth, UCD probably went too far in testing itself, although it beats the alternative. Here’s how I voted the Sports Network’s Top 25 poll. You may call me a homer for leaving Davis in if you like, but I’m simply not prepared to believe that non-scholarship San Diego belongs above the Aggies on this list.

1. Appalachian St.; 2. Montana; 3. NDSU; 4. Umass; 5. James Madison; 6. Youngstown; 7. Cal Poly; 8. Illinois St; 9. New Hampshire; 10. Tenn-Martin; 11. Northern Iowa; 12. Southern Illinois; 13. Richmond; 14. Furman; 15. Hampton; 16. Eastern Ill.; 17. Portland St.; 18. Coastal Carolina; 19. Montana St.; 20. Towson; 21. South Dakota St.; 22. UCD; 23. Charleston Southern; 24. San Diego; 25. Harvard.

Coming up tomorrow in the print edition: Biggs politely lights up San Diego’s Jim Harbaugh, the nuptials of Davis High’s field hockey coach and Pacific coach Bob Thomason reflecting on his team’s recent success.

Just the picks

Here’s my ballot in The Sports Network’s Top 25: 1. Appalachian St.; 2. Illinois St.; 3. Montana; 4. North Dakota State; 5. Massachusetts; 6. James Madison; 7. Northern Iowa; 8. Youngstown St; 9. Cal Poly; 10. Furman; 11. New Hampshire; 12. Eastern Ill.; 13. Tennessee-Martin; 14. Richmond; 15. UCD; 16. Southern Illinois; 17. Portland State; 18. Hampton; 19. Maine; 20. Coastal Carolina; 21. Montana St. 22. Towson; 23. Charleston Southern; 24. San Diego; 25. Harvard.

How I vote

There are plenty of things wrong with The Sports Network’s I-AA poll. Too many Sports Information Directors vote in it, so conflicts of interest abound. There aren’t enough games on television, so often you’re evaluating teams on record and reputation as much as anything. And, also, I’m not sure people take their voting responsibilities all that seriously. Back east, No. 13 James Madison drilled No. 1 New Hampshire in Durham, N.H. last week. But in this week’s poll, New Hampshire was still ahead of James Madison. What’s up with that?

So in the interest of full disclosure, here's how I vote. Some voters I know simply make their changes against the previous week's poll. I don't. I keep my own Top-25 in an Excel spreadsheet. So the first thing I do on Sunday morning is enter in the weekend's results. If there’s something that seems strange or surprising to me, I’ll go up on the Internet and try to find out more. For instance, in the above-referenced game, it turns out that James Madison shut down New Hampshire’s offense from the middle of the second quarter well into the fourth. I've seen that New Hampshire offense, and know more than a little about that personnel. So it was a solid beating, not a fluke.

After I know who won and who lost, I start ranking the teams. When I vote I’m trying to balance four questions: 1. Who beat whom?; 2. How good is their schedule really? 3. Who deserves to be rewarded? 4. Who deserves to be punished? And usually that get me my list.

The most important thing to keep in mind is that you can’t trust records.

Take Hampton, which is 7-0 this year. Last year I totally overvalued the Pirates, voting them No. 1 for much of the year because they were 11-0. But I didn’t take into account their strength of their schedule. So I bet Jeff Kolpack, who covers North Dakota State for the Fargo Forum, that Hampton would win a round in the I-AA postseason. The Pirates were blown out at home. So when Kolpack hits town in three weeks, the first round of drinks is on me. Hampton may have a perfect record. But I don’t trust the Pirates’ conference; and I have seen them on television win an overtime game against less-than-impressive Grambling. That’s why I have Hampton 12th.

The whole process takes about 45 minutes.

Here is my full ballot in this week’s poll:

1. Appalachian State; 2. Cal Poly; 3. Illinois State; 4. Montana; 5. Youngstown St.; 6. North Dakota State; 7. UMass; 8. James Madison; 9. New Hampshire; 10. Northern Iowa; 11. Richmond; 12. Hampton; 13. Furman; 14. Eastern Illinois; 15. Southern Illinois; 16. Tennessee-Martin; 17. Harvard; 18. Alabama A&M; 19. UCD; 20. Portland State; 21. Maine; 22. Jackson State. 23. Coastal Carolina; 24. Jacksonville State; 25. San Diego.

Kolpack, also votes. To see his ballot, you can check out http://www.areavoices.com/bisonmedia/”?> his blog.