NEW ORLEANS, LA --- The Moravian College men's & women's track & field teams are both ranked in the Mideast Region in the fourth NCAA Division III Regional Team Index of the 2012 indoor season released by the U S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association Wednesday. The Greyhound women moved up three spots to third while the men moved up three spots to second in the top-ten regional rankings.
Johns Hopkins University is currently first in the women's Mideast Region with 195.60 points while Misericordia University is second at 157.41. Moravian College is third with 155.94 points while Franklin & Marshall College is fourth with 125.85 points, and Ursinus College rounds out the top five with 119.90 points. Salisbury University, Elizabethtown College, Swarthmore College, Lebanon Valley College and Haverford College fill in spots six through ten, respectively.
The Greyhound men have a total of 186.83 points while sitting in second place. Haverford College leads the Mideast Region with 269.46 points while Widener University is third at 169.78 points. Gwynedd-Mercy College holds down the fourth spot at 164.98 points and is trailed by Elizabethtown College in fifth place with 146.68 points. Johns Hopkins University, Messiah College, Carnegie Mellon University, Keystone College and Muhlenberg College round out spots six through ten, repsectively.
Moravian will return to action on Friday, February 17th when they travel to the Susquehanna University Indoor Open. The meet is scheduled for 4 p.m.
About the Rankings
For more on the national team rankings and links to guideline and rationale information, click here.
Rankings are determined by a mathematical formula, which is based on current national descending order lists. This is what's used to compile a team's ranking. The purpose and methodology of the rankings is to create an index that showcases the teams that have the best potential of achieving the top spots in the national-title race.
The Regional Index is determined using a similar method as national rankings, but on a smaller scale, comparing teams versus others within the same region. The result is a ranking that showcases squads with better all-around team potential — a group makeup critical for conference or similar team-scored events. A team may achieve a better regional ranking than a counterpart that has a better national ranking. Historically, some teams are better national-championship teams than conference-championship teams, having a few elite athletes that score very well in a diverse environment where teams do not have entries in more than a few events. Some teams are better at conference championships or similar team-scored events where they enter, and are competitive, in many of the events.
How a team fares in a national championship, conference championship, or scored meet with only a couple or few teams (like a dual or triangular) can be very different, given the number of events, competition, scoring, and makeup of entries — thus the rationale behind each of the ranking systems. Similar arguments about team makeup and rankings can also be found in swimming & diving and wrestling as their sports also have a similar trichotomy when it comes to team theory.
