Each week we take a quick look at how the conferences in Division I Men’s lacrosse are stacking up to one another. It’s a D1 conference comparison, based on actual games, but all done by the numbers! This post, more than anything, is simply a fun thing to keep tabs on. Ultimately, it is the individual teams that matter the most. But with conference slate ramping up, it’s good to remember how they fared against each other during their run of out of conference play.
(Also don’t miss my Week 6 Top 20 Poll votes, Jim Fenzel’s Darth Beardsley cartoon, and keep an eye out for Stat Freaks!)
As teams start to play less and less out of conference games, these numbers will become a little more static, so in future weeks look for the Conference Comparison to morph a little bit, as I look at how each conference specifically did against other conferences in even more detail. When it comes to predicting NCAA tourney wins, this stuff is actually pretty darn helpful!
OK, let’s hit up Week 6…
NCAA D1 Conference Comparison – Week 6
| Conference | Record | % | +/- |
| ACC | 25-8 | 0.758 | -0.036 |
| Big Ten | 32-13 | 0.711 | 0.035 |
| Big East | 28-15 | 0.651 | -0.052 |
| Ivy League | 21-14 | 0.600 | -0.018 |
| Patriot | 21-16 | 0.568 | -0.021 |
| America East | 21-23 | 0.477 | -0.035 |
| NEC | 20-25 | 0.444 | 0.026 |
| CAA | 19-24 | 0.442 | 0.030 |
| MAAC | 16-27 | 0.372 | -0.018 |
| SoCon | 12-36 | 0.250 | 0.016 |
| Independent | 4-19 | 0.174 | 0.069 |
The ACC went .500 over the week, picking up two wins and two losses. Hovering like that wasn’t great with the Big Ten continuing their recent surge, especially with Rutgers beating Cuse and neither of Duke’s wins coming over a team from another major conference.
The Big Ten on the other hand went 7-1. They grabbed wins over The CAA, America East, Big East (2), and the ACC and only had Ohio State lose to Denver. Netting one more win over the Big East definitely helped leapfrog them a bit. Had just one of those games been reversed, the Big Ten would only be 1.5% ahead of the Big East. Check out Week 5’s Conference Comparison for reference.
The other big mover was the America East dropping below .500. This should not be too much of a shock as their two undefeated teams played each other, so that took away two big chances for non-conference wins this week. It will also be interesting to see how the Ivies and Patriot league shake out over the remainder of the season. Both leagues are pretty big, but also really close at the moment, and there are still enough out of conference games left to make a big difference.
