Leaderboard

Softball won two more yesterday and are now 19-4 in the MAC with 4 conference games left. 2nd and 3rd place both have 14 wins but have more games remaining so I don't think we've quite clinched the regular season title but are getting very close.

Personally, I think this season will be unlike any other and damn near impossible to predict. Of the 15 players named as All-MAC 1st-3rd teams, I believe Luke Skaljac is the only one with eligibility remaining returning to his school. With so much turnover everywhere, I think it's damn near impossible to project who will do what next season. This level of universal turnover is unprecedented in the MAC. Now, that doesn't mean there isn't talent, or there won't be good teams. I just don't think we'll know who that will be until we see every team on the floor for 8-10 games.

Right now, I've seen two of the current Zips who combined played 20 minutes a game last year. I've never seen Dustin Ford be a head coach. There are still roster spots to be filled. As such, I'm not quite ready to make predictions.

I received mine yesterday as well. I plan to get a case and display it in my home office. There have been some talks here about how the success of the program warrants our attention, but it's also great seeing Ford, Bud, and the assistants engage the fan base. In a day and age where college athletics has become more transactional, it's great to still see the sense of community they're trying to instill in the program. They genuinely seem to want to be here and do great things.

UMass finishes the MAC regular season 7-0 to win the regular season title. Akron is currently beating CMU and looks like we'll finish 6-1 to get the #2 seed. The tournament is only the top 4 seeds. so a rematch might be in the cards very soon.

I don't even think 8-10 games will be a good measuring stick. Buffalo was a different team in MAC play, even with Freitag, than what they looked like early. Ohio was a disaster early, then became MAC-average. Toledo was also under-whelming, but improved down the stretch. UMass didn't wake up until the MAC Tournament.

Time will tell. I'm just not seeing where the improvements are happening when viewing unbiasededly. Then again UB came out of nowhere last year before injuries made them irrelevant. But you're probably asking half the league to replicate that UB type overachievement to offset the MAC being weaker at the top. What really needs to happen for the bottom half of the MAC to improve is WMU, CMU, and EMU need to invest more, but that's not happening. Only Ball State has stepped up. It just seemed last year in the MAC there was a much more solid foundation to build off of. Existing players that people knew you could build a team around. This year more and more teams are relying on unproven players. There will be some hits, but also a lot of misses. Edit: Also, it does matter that the rest of the league went a combined 0-34 against Miami/Akron. That means every other team would have had to go 9-5 or 9-6 in non Miami/Akron games just to get to .500 in conference play.

This is so cool.

Was just about to post this to call that out. First hint we've seen at the style. Looks like we'll be getting a bigger, more physical version of All Gas No Brakes?