The NAIA has been growing for number of years now but there as always been one consistent road bump for the teams involved, being the lack of national coverage. The league currently only offers one ranking system which features a rating committee comprised of eight raters; two raters per conference/group. All of these rankings are handled on an NAIA level and release publicly every other week compared to once a week.
We decided we would take this into our own hands and contact every NAIA coach directly to get their thoughts on the top ten on a week-to-week basis. This way we can get a better understanding of what coaches across the league value in a national title caliber team and see how their thoughts relate to the NAIA polls.
Here is our latest Lacrosse All Stars NAIA Coaches’ Poll of the 2023 season.
Lacrosse All Stars NAIA Coaches’ Poll
Poll Methodology
Every coach in the NAIA was sent a poll early Monday morning and was given twenty-four hours to provide their top ten rankings. It was as simple as ranking teams one through ten. With this data, we then were able to tally the votes via a point system and comprise the final rankings which you see below.
How do these results compare the official NAIA rankings?
NAIA Men’s Lacrosse Preseason Poll (Last Updated March 22, 2023)
Poll Methodology
- The rating committee is comprised of eight raters – two raters per conference/group.
- Each conference/group produces a conference rating from which raters will use to compile their national ballot. Only teams represented on the conference rating are eligible for the national ballot.
- Each rater will submit a top 15 ballot, which will be used to produce the Top 10 national rating and a list of other teams receiving votes.
- Keiser
- Indiana Tech
- Reinhardt
- Cumberlands
- Webber
- Siena Heights
- Aquinas
- Mount Vernon Nazarene
- Lawrence Tech
- Concordia
What Does This Tell Us?
Concordia Can Compete
The Concordia Ann Arbor Cardinals are on a roll right now. Their only loss of the season came against Cumberlands in overtime in late February. Other than that, the Cardinals have been handedly beating everyone who crosses their path. The question is how will they handle WHAC play? The toughest part of the season is now.
Don’t Sleep on Siena Heights
Siena Heights opened their season with losses to Keiser and Reinhardt. The Saints competed throughout both games, but opening your season with those two games is a daunting task. Siena Heights is only going to get better as the year goes on, so I wouldn’t look too much into those early season losses. They took care of Benedictine and Ottawa with no issue. Similar to Concordia, how will Siena Heights handle WHAC conference play?
Reinhardt Lacrosse Never Left
The Reinhardt Men’s Lacrosse program suffered a midseason loss to Indiana Tech just a few weeks back. People love to overreact and say that their season is over, but that clearly isn’t the case. The Eagles definitely lack some depth coming off the bench, but they still have been able to compete all season long. Wins over Webber and Siena Heights are impressive, but wins over Cumberlands and Keiser in the coming weeks would truly speak volumes. Reinhardt is doing everything right for a high-level lacrosse program, so per usual, the Eagles certainly can still win it all this year.
