Last year, I was following this whole scene pretty closely, what with Detroit making a surprising run toward the top of the conference. It hasn’t been quite so interesting this year: The Titans were expected to make the MAAC Tournament, and the regular season intrigue revolved more around whether or not they’d be able to take the top spot than anything else.
Anyway, with one weekend of conference play remaining, it’s a good time to take a look at scenarios for the MAAC Championships.
Locked in or Eliminated
Siena sits alone atop the conference at 5-0 with one game left to play. Every other MAAC team already has at least two conference losses, so the Saints will be the No. 1 seed.
Manhattan and VMI currently sit tied at the bottom of the MAAC standings with identical 1-4 records. There are already four teams that will end the conference season with fewer than four losses, regardless of this weekend’s results, so both of those teams are out of the hunt for a bid in the conference tournament.
The Gooey Middle
Jacksonville has already completed its regular season, and has a 3-3 record. That leaves three other teams within a half-game of exactly .500 with one game remaining. Time for a chart.
| Team | Record | To Play |
|---|---|---|
| Marist | 3-2 | Canisius |
| Detroit | 3-2 | @ VMI |
| Canisius | 2-3 | @ Marist |
A Detroit win over VMI clinches the No. 2 seed for Detroit regardless of other outcomes – they’ve earned the tiebreaker over Marist by virtue of an 8-7 overtime win in March. But for their epic letdown against Manhattan in the following game, the Titans would already have that 2-seed sewn up.
A Marist win over Canisius has two possible results, depending on what happens with the UDM-VMI game. If Detroit beats the Keydets (as they should), that makes Marist the No. 2 seed, eliminates Canisius from the tournament, and makes Jacksonville the No. 4 seed.
Chaos Theory
If Canisius upsets Marist (it should be pointed out how unlikely this is – Marist is at home, and by all accounts a much better team anyway), all hell can break loose. That makes a three-way tie for No. 3 in the conference, or a four-way tie for No. 2 if Detroit also loses to VMI.
In the instance of a four-way tie, Detroit would take the No. 2 seed, since they have victories over every other team involved in the tie (their only losses would be to the locked-in No. 1 Siena and the two eliminated teams). The race, then, would be for Nos. 3 and 4.
This is a tie that is not easily resolved. To the tie-breaking procedures! In our hypothetical, all three teams have identical 0-2 records against the top two teams in the MAAC (Siena and Detroit), and 1-1 records against each other. They also have identical 2-0 records against the bottom two teams in the league.
We’re dropping to super-extended tiebreakers now, and it comes down to goals allowed within the 3-team tie. Jacksonville allowed 17 to the two teams combined. They’re rooting for a high-scoring game. Canisius allowed nine goals to Jacksonville, and Marist allowed seven to the Dolphins. Breaking down possible scenarios there (remember, Canisius has to beat Marist, or all other points are moot and we go to the simple scenarios):
| Scenario | No. 3 | No. 4 | Eliminated |
|---|---|---|---|
| Canisius wins by 1 or 2, scores more than 10 | Jacksonville | Canisius | Marist |
| Canisius wins by 1 or 2, scores less than 10 | Marist | Jacksonville | Canisius |
| Canisius wins by more than 2, scores more than 10 | Jacksonville | Canisius | Marist |
| Canisius wins by more than 2, scores less than 10 | Canisius | Marist | Jacksonville |
We’re going pretty far down the rabbit hole here, but thankfully, since Jacksonville has allowed an odd number of goals and the differential between Canisius and Marist against the Dolphins is even, we won’t have to go even further into tiebreakers.
Disclaimer: it’s late and my brain is pretty much fried. It’s entirely possible that these goal differentials aren’t being worked out properly in my head. I’m confident, but not 100% so in these scenarios.
The Big Picture
I’ve just spent a loooong time discussing hypothetical scenarios that are unlikely to come true (as a side note, LaxPower already has Jacksonville penned in as the No. 4 seed, which is not correct, if my calculations are correct). The most likely outcomes of this weekend’s games are a Detroit win over VMI and a Marist win over Canisius. If that comes to fruition, your field goes:
- Jacksonville
- Detroit
- Marist
- Jacksonville
In the slightly more likely case of Marist pulling off the win and Detroit falling to VMI, the Titans and Red Foxes switch positions, but the outcome is the same: they’ll play in the 2/3 game while Siena and Jacksonville square off in the 1/4.
The sports fan in me is always rooting for chaos, but things should stay fairly vanilla as long as Marist wins.