[BigEasyCard]

Women's Swimming & Diving wins a second consecutive national championship in dominating fashion.  They earn 100 Cup points, bringing the Cardinal's unofficial total for twelve scoring sports to 784.50.  This is 40.25 points more than the same twelve sports earned last year.

Women's Swimming and Diving has earned 290 Cup points out of a potential 300 over the past three seasons.

Geaux Cardinal!

[BigEasyCard]

Women's Swimming & Diving wins a second consecutive national championship in dominating fashion.  They earn 100 Cup points, bringing the Cardinal's unofficial total for twelve scoring sports to 784.50.  This is 40.25 points more than the same twelve sports earned last year.

Women's Swimming and Diving has earned 290 Cup points out of a potential 300 over the past three seasons.

Geaux Cardinal!

[martyup]

The Learfield Director's Cup is not the only cup Stanford might win, again.  Stanford currently leads in the standings for both men and women in the race for the Capital One Cup.  ;D

http://www.capitalonecup.com/

[martyup]

The Learfield Director's Cup is not the only cup Stanford might win, again.  Stanford currently leads in the standings for both men and women in the race for the Capital One Cup.  ;D

http://www.capitalonecup.com/

[CompSci87]

The Learfield Director's Cup is not the only cup Stanford might win, again.  Stanford currently leads in the standings for both men and women in the race for the Capital One Cup.  ;D

http://www.capitalonecup.com/

Time to change the rules again. Triple points for ice hockey!

[CompSci87]

The Learfield Director's Cup is not the only cup Stanford might win, again.  Stanford currently leads in the standings for both men and women in the race for the Capital One Cup.  ;D

http://www.capitalonecup.com/

Time to change the rules again. Triple points for ice hockey!

[PalmTree]

Further to the discussion of the impact of required sports on our Cup prospects, the following table shows the current status of all four sports.  For the three sports in progress I have used Seed, Seed, and Rank respectively as a proxy for how well they are doing.  Apologies in advance for the poor formatting.

			Cup Points	Seed	Seed	Rank
	Standings	School	WVB	WBK	MBK	M Baseball
	1	Stanford	83	4	None	3
	2	Penn State	83	None	None	NR
	3	Wisconsin	64	None	None	NR
	4	UCLA	64	3	11	17
	5	Michigan	25	7	3	NR
	6	Michigan State	73	None	3	NR
	7	North Carolina State	50	4	9	24
	8	U$C	73	None	None	NR
	9	Colorado	64	None	None	NR
	10	Texas	73	2	10	NR
	11	Duke	0	5	2	21

The above information suggests that UCLA is the biggest threat to outscore Stanford in the four required sports.

A more complete analysis would look deeper into baseball rankings and possibly consider Ohio State and Florida since they have each finished second to Stanford within the past five years.  In any event, we'll have a much better feel for this in a few weeks after Final Fours have concluded and we have additional official Cup scores.  In the meanwhile, we can cheer on the Women's Basketball team and resurgent Baseball.

Geaux Cardinal!

A little update in re UCLA, NC State and Duke, which were the only schools with all 3 seeded/ranked teams on your list.

UCLA: MBK of course lost their tourney play-in game, WBK is still alive, playing Creighton for a Sweet 16 berth tomorrow and MBB took 2 games from WSU (NR) this weekend, with one more game today in progress.

NC State: MBK lost in the 1st round of the tourney.  Their WBK just beat Maryland to advance to the Sweet 16, and their MBB  just swept a 3 game home series with #2 Clemson this weekend

Duke:  MBK is in the Sweet 16 against Syracuse next week (ugh....Boeheim vs Krz-whatsisname - on second thought, make that double-ugh), WBK plays Georgia for a Sweet 16 berth tomorrow night and MBB took 2/3 from Miami (NR) this weekend.

Of the other 7 teams in the top 11, Michigan State MBK was bounced by Syracuse earlier today leaving Michigan and maybe Texas as having the best shots for scoring any significant Cup points in the 3 sports - Michigan, by virtue of their advancing to the Sweet 16 with their victory over Houston (coached by Kelvin Sampson, BTW) while Texas WBK needs to beat ASU to get to the Sweet 16.  OTOH, if Texas does win, they'd meet the winner of the UCLA/Creighton game - which works out vedy, vedy nicely for us...assuming we can get to the Sweet 16 as well.

[PalmTree]

Further to the discussion of the impact of required sports on our Cup prospects, the following table shows the current status of all four sports.  For the three sports in progress I have used Seed, Seed, and Rank respectively as a proxy for how well they are doing.  Apologies in advance for the poor formatting.

			Cup Points	Seed	Seed	Rank
	Standings	School	WVB	WBK	MBK	M Baseball
	1	Stanford	83	4	None	3
	2	Penn State	83	None	None	NR
	3	Wisconsin	64	None	None	NR
	4	UCLA	64	3	11	17
	5	Michigan	25	7	3	NR
	6	Michigan State	73	None	3	NR
	7	North Carolina State	50	4	9	24
	8	U$C	73	None	None	NR
	9	Colorado	64	None	None	NR
	10	Texas	73	2	10	NR
	11	Duke	0	5	2	21

The above information suggests that UCLA is the biggest threat to outscore Stanford in the four required sports.

A more complete analysis would look deeper into baseball rankings and possibly consider Ohio State and Florida since they have each finished second to Stanford within the past five years.  In any event, we'll have a much better feel for this in a few weeks after Final Fours have concluded and we have additional official Cup scores.  In the meanwhile, we can cheer on the Women's Basketball team and resurgent Baseball.

Geaux Cardinal!

A little update in re UCLA, NC State and Duke, which were the only schools with all 3 seeded/ranked teams on your list.

UCLA: MBK of course lost their tourney play-in game, WBK is still alive, playing Creighton for a Sweet 16 berth tomorrow and MBB took 2 games from WSU (NR) this weekend, with one more game today in progress.

NC State: MBK lost in the 1st round of the tourney.  Their WBK just beat Maryland to advance to the Sweet 16, and their MBB  just swept a 3 game home series with #2 Clemson this weekend

Duke:  MBK is in the Sweet 16 against Syracuse next week (ugh....Boeheim vs Krz-whatsisname - on second thought, make that double-ugh), WBK plays Georgia for a Sweet 16 berth tomorrow night and MBB took 2/3 from Miami (NR) this weekend.

Of the other 7 teams in the top 11, Michigan State MBK was bounced by Syracuse earlier today leaving Michigan and maybe Texas as having the best shots for scoring any significant Cup points in the 3 sports - Michigan, by virtue of their advancing to the Sweet 16 with their victory over Houston (coached by Kelvin Sampson, BTW) while Texas WBK needs to beat ASU to get to the Sweet 16.  OTOH, if Texas does win, they'd meet the winner of the UCLA/Creighton game - which works out vedy, vedy nicely for us...assuming we can get to the Sweet 16 as well.

[BigEasyCard]

[quote author=BigEasyCard link=topic=18258.msg225844#msg225844 date=1520962989]
Further to the discussion of the impact of required sports on our Cup prospects, the following table shows the current status of all four sports.  For the three sports in progress I have used Seed, Seed, and Rank respectively as a proxy for how well they are doing.  Apologies in advance for the poor formatting.

			Cup Points	Seed	Seed	Rank
	Standings	School	WVB	WBK	MBK	M Baseball
	1	Stanford	83	4	None	3
	2	Penn State	83	None	None	NR
	3	Wisconsin	64	None	None	NR
	4	UCLA	64	3	11	17
	5	Michigan	25	7	3	NR
	6	Michigan State	73	None	3	NR
	7	North Carolina State	50	4	9	24
	8	U$C	73	None	None	NR
	9	Colorado	64	None	None	NR
	10	Texas	73	2	10	NR
	11	Duke	0	5	2	21

The above information suggests that UCLA is the biggest threat to outscore Stanford in the four required sports.

A more complete analysis would look deeper into baseball rankings and possibly consider Ohio State and Florida since they have each finished second to Stanford within the past five years.  In any event, we'll have a much better feel for this in a few weeks after Final Fours have concluded and we have additional official Cup scores.  In the meanwhile, we can cheer on the Women's Basketball team and resurgent Baseball.

Geaux Cardinal!

A little update in re UCLA, NC State and Duke, which were the only schools with all 3 seeded/ranked teams on your list.

UCLA: MBK of course lost their tourney play-in game, WBK is still alive, playing Creighton for a Sweet 16 berth tomorrow and MBB took 2 games from WSU (NR) this weekend, with one more game today in progress.

NC State: MBK lost in the 1st round of the tourney.  Their WBK just beat Maryland to advance to the Sweet 16, and their MBB  just swept a 3 game home series with #2 Clemson this weekend

Duke:  MBK is in the Sweet 16 against Syracuse next week (ugh....Boeheim vs Krz-whatsisname - on second thought, make that double-ugh), WBK plays Georgia for a Sweet 16 berth tomorrow night and MBB took 2/3 from Miami (NR) this weekend.

Of the other 7 teams in the top 11, Michigan State MBK was bounced by Syracuse earlier today leaving Michigan and maybe Texas as having the best shots for scoring any significant Cup points in the 3 sports - Michigan, by virtue of their advancing to the Sweet 16 with their victory over Houston (coached by Kelvin Sampson, BTW) while Texas WBK needs to beat ASU to get to the Sweet 16.  OTOH, if Texas does win, they'd meet the winner of the UCLA/Creighton game - which works out vedy, vedy nicely for us...assuming we can get to the Sweet 16 as well.
[/quote]

Thanks for the detailed update PalmTree.  I've been updating the above table offline as teams finish up.  In MBK, unofficially UCLA has earned 5 more Cup points, NC State and Texas have earned 25,  and Michigan State has earned 50 more.  Michigan and Duke are guaranteed at least 64 Cup points for making the Sweet 16.

It looks like we'll have plenty of competitive baseball to follow for Cup impact after basketball finishes up.

Geaux Cardinal!

[BigEasyCard]

[quote author=BigEasyCard link=topic=18258.msg225844#msg225844 date=1520962989]
Further to the discussion of the impact of required sports on our Cup prospects, the following table shows the current status of all four sports.  For the three sports in progress I have used Seed, Seed, and Rank respectively as a proxy for how well they are doing.  Apologies in advance for the poor formatting.

			Cup Points	Seed	Seed	Rank
	Standings	School	WVB	WBK	MBK	M Baseball
	1	Stanford	83	4	None	3
	2	Penn State	83	None	None	NR
	3	Wisconsin	64	None	None	NR
	4	UCLA	64	3	11	17
	5	Michigan	25	7	3	NR
	6	Michigan State	73	None	3	NR
	7	North Carolina State	50	4	9	24
	8	U$C	73	None	None	NR
	9	Colorado	64	None	None	NR
	10	Texas	73	2	10	NR
	11	Duke	0	5	2	21

The above information suggests that UCLA is the biggest threat to outscore Stanford in the four required sports.

A more complete analysis would look deeper into baseball rankings and possibly consider Ohio State and Florida since they have each finished second to Stanford within the past five years.  In any event, we'll have a much better feel for this in a few weeks after Final Fours have concluded and we have additional official Cup scores.  In the meanwhile, we can cheer on the Women's Basketball team and resurgent Baseball.

Geaux Cardinal!

A little update in re UCLA, NC State and Duke, which were the only schools with all 3 seeded/ranked teams on your list.

UCLA: MBK of course lost their tourney play-in game, WBK is still alive, playing Creighton for a Sweet 16 berth tomorrow and MBB took 2 games from WSU (NR) this weekend, with one more game today in progress.

NC State: MBK lost in the 1st round of the tourney.  Their WBK just beat Maryland to advance to the Sweet 16, and their MBB  just swept a 3 game home series with #2 Clemson this weekend

Duke:  MBK is in the Sweet 16 against Syracuse next week (ugh....Boeheim vs Krz-whatsisname - on second thought, make that double-ugh), WBK plays Georgia for a Sweet 16 berth tomorrow night and MBB took 2/3 from Miami (NR) this weekend.

Of the other 7 teams in the top 11, Michigan State MBK was bounced by Syracuse earlier today leaving Michigan and maybe Texas as having the best shots for scoring any significant Cup points in the 3 sports - Michigan, by virtue of their advancing to the Sweet 16 with their victory over Houston (coached by Kelvin Sampson, BTW) while Texas WBK needs to beat ASU to get to the Sweet 16.  OTOH, if Texas does win, they'd meet the winner of the UCLA/Creighton game - which works out vedy, vedy nicely for us...assuming we can get to the Sweet 16 as well.
[/quote]

Thanks for the detailed update PalmTree.  I've been updating the above table offline as teams finish up.  In MBK, unofficially UCLA has earned 5 more Cup points, NC State and Texas have earned 25,  and Michigan State has earned 50 more.  Michigan and Duke are guaranteed at least 64 Cup points for making the Sweet 16.

It looks like we'll have plenty of competitive baseball to follow for Cup impact after basketball finishes up.

Geaux Cardinal!

[Mick]

They won't be getting points from Men's VB, now 4-17.  Two more losses to #3 UC Irvine and U$C.  They really need a setter.

[Mick]

They won't be getting points from Men's VB, now 4-17.  Two more losses to #3 UC Irvine and U$C.  They really need a setter.

[BigEasyCard]

They won't be getting points from Men's VB, now 4-17.  Two more losses to #3 UC Irvine and U$C.  They really need a setter.

MVB is one of five sports which have not earned any Cup points over the previous two years.  The others are Men's Basketball, Men's Water Polo, Women's Softball, and Beach Volleyball.  Our weakness in these sports offers relatively easy Cup scoring opportunities to two of our top 10 Cup rivals: UCLA and USC.

Fortunately, Men's Basketball and Women's Softball are becoming more competitive.  I'm not familiar enough with the other three sports to assess their turnaround prospects.  It seems that in MVB, a single player can make a brobdingnagian difference.

Geaux Cardinal!

[BigEasyCard]

They won't be getting points from Men's VB, now 4-17.  Two more losses to #3 UC Irvine and U$C.  They really need a setter.

MVB is one of five sports which have not earned any Cup points over the previous two years.  The others are Men's Basketball, Men's Water Polo, Women's Softball, and Beach Volleyball.  Our weakness in these sports offers relatively easy Cup scoring opportunities to two of our top 10 Cup rivals: UCLA and USC.

Fortunately, Men's Basketball and Women's Softball are becoming more competitive.  I'm not familiar enough with the other three sports to assess their turnaround prospects.  It seems that in MVB, a single player can make a brobdingnagian difference.

Geaux Cardinal!

[BobK]

Beach may have scholarship players for Beach only for the first time now.    And some more coming in.  Plus  indoor Player of the year Plummer is an awesome beach player.  Beach has played quite well thus far.    Will they be top 10?  Maybe 

[BobK]

Beach may have scholarship players for Beach only for the first time now.    And some more coming in.  Plus  indoor Player of the year Plummer is an awesome beach player.  Beach has played quite well thus far.    Will they be top 10?  Maybe 

[M T]

Beach may have scholarship players for Beach only for the first time now.    And some more coming in.  Plus  indoor Player of the year Plummer is an awesome beach player.  Beach has played quite well thus far.    Will they be top 10?  Maybe

I don't know how Beach NCAA tournament & various cup scoring is set up, but in water polo, the men can be the #4 team in the country and not get to Nationals.  If we've scored no points, it must be that the NCAA tournament is the only factor in scoring.  (Yep, on Dec 17,  Stanford MWP was ranked #4 in the NCAA.)  For these cups, the most important game of the year is the MPSF tournament consolation game.

Hmmm....  If MPSF split into two leagues (north & south), then maybe the top 4 teams would get to Nationals.

[M T]

Beach may have scholarship players for Beach only for the first time now.    And some more coming in.  Plus  indoor Player of the year Plummer is an awesome beach player.  Beach has played quite well thus far.    Will they be top 10?  Maybe

I don't know how Beach NCAA tournament & various cup scoring is set up, but in water polo, the men can be the #4 team in the country and not get to Nationals.  If we've scored no points, it must be that the NCAA tournament is the only factor in scoring.  (Yep, on Dec 17,  Stanford MWP was ranked #4 in the NCAA.)  For these cups, the most important game of the year is the MPSF tournament consolation game.

Hmmm....  If MPSF split into two leagues (north & south), then maybe the top 4 teams would get to Nationals.

[BobK]

Great point MT.  I don't know either. 

[BobK]

Great point MT.  I don't know either. 

[2006alum]

+1 to MT. I don't think these sports all matter equally, because we regularly score points in more sports than we can count, so what we're looking for is teams who are likely to score 55 or 60+ points. The comparison is our PAR (points above replacement) team, which is the team whose score we'd have to replace. BigEasy will know for sure, but my sense has been in past years our last score that's counted has been around 50 or so points, so we'd be looking for the highest PAR above 50. It might be even higher this year, since there's one fewer total sport to count, and our women's scores usually are higher and so we could count the 11th women's sports if it's better.

In softball, significantly beating PAR is really unlikely at the moment; scores are generally negligible unless you make progress into the NCAA tournament. Getting past the first round of the NCAA tournament only gets you to 50 points, and that's neglible PAR. So we'd need to have not just a solid team, but a dominant one.

By contrast, with Water Polo, second place is like 90 points, so the key is to get past the MPSF and into the NCAA's, and then get to the championship game. Given how much parity there is between us, USC, UCLA, and Cal, that's almost always plausible. Even third place is 55, which is a PAR of 5, so that semifinal game turns out to be worth far more than the final, national championship notwithstanding.

Men's volleyball is similarly boom or bust - third place is also only worth 55. Given this, I'd rather have us be mediocre 8 years out of 10 and in the championship game the other two, which is more or less what's happened. Anything in between just doesn't give us much.

Beach Volleyball is slightly more nuanced; the same 90 points for second place as in MWP and MVB, but third place is worth 72.5, and fourth is 55. That might change since the sport seems to keep expanding, but for now, similar PAR considerations: either be nearly the top in the country or irrelevant for Directors Cup points.

Given all this, what's much more important is that we score in all 4 required sports and a lot of the sports where "participation counts," like tennis, gymnastics, T&F, CC, and soccer. In those sports you can get around 60-70 points just for a tenth place finish, and it's usually been our consistent top ten performance across many of these sports that's kept the cup in our cupboard.

[2006alum]

+1 to MT. I don't think these sports all matter equally, because we regularly score points in more sports than we can count, so what we're looking for is teams who are likely to score 55 or 60+ points. The comparison is our PAR (points above replacement) team, which is the team whose score we'd have to replace. BigEasy will know for sure, but my sense has been in past years our last score that's counted has been around 50 or so points, so we'd be looking for the highest PAR above 50. It might be even higher this year, since there's one fewer total sport to count, and our women's scores usually are higher and so we could count the 11th women's sports if it's better.

In softball, significantly beating PAR is really unlikely at the moment; scores are generally negligible unless you make progress into the NCAA tournament. Getting past the first round of the NCAA tournament only gets you to 50 points, and that's neglible PAR. So we'd need to have not just a solid team, but a dominant one.

By contrast, with Water Polo, second place is like 90 points, so the key is to get past the MPSF and into the NCAA's, and then get to the championship game. Given how much parity there is between us, USC, UCLA, and Cal, that's almost always plausible. Even third place is 55, which is a PAR of 5, so that semifinal game turns out to be worth far more than the final, national championship notwithstanding.

Men's volleyball is similarly boom or bust - third place is also only worth 55. Given this, I'd rather have us be mediocre 8 years out of 10 and in the championship game the other two, which is more or less what's happened. Anything in between just doesn't give us much.

Beach Volleyball is slightly more nuanced; the same 90 points for second place as in MWP and MVB, but third place is worth 72.5, and fourth is 55. That might change since the sport seems to keep expanding, but for now, similar PAR considerations: either be nearly the top in the country or irrelevant for Directors Cup points.

Given all this, what's much more important is that we score in all 4 required sports and a lot of the sports where "participation counts," like tennis, gymnastics, T&F, CC, and soccer. In those sports you can get around 60-70 points just for a tenth place finish, and it's usually been our consistent top ten performance across many of these sports that's kept the cup in our cupboard.

[ColoradoTree]

Hmmm....  If MPSF split into two leagues (north & south), then maybe the top 4 teams would get to Nationals.

Alas, it's already at the NCAA-minimum 6 teams as it is.  They competed last year with just 5 teams (adding Penn State-Behrend to Stanford, Cal, USC, and UCLA), but needed to get up to 6 for this coming season to retain an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament.  That 6th team is Austin College, a D-III school from Texas.  Neither Austin College nor Penn State-Behrend plays regular season games against other "conference" foes, but comes out for the MPSF tournament. An odd arrangement, to be sure, but it appears to be what we're stuck with after the other 6 teams from the old MPSF (UOP, Long Beach State, UC Irvine, UCSB, Pepperdine, and SJSU) split off to start the men's division of the Golden Coast Conference, so at least one of that group of teams would be guaranteed a spot in the NCAAs.

[ColoradoTree]

Hmmm....  If MPSF split into two leagues (north & south), then maybe the top 4 teams would get to Nationals.

Alas, it's already at the NCAA-minimum 6 teams as it is.  They competed last year with just 5 teams (adding Penn State-Behrend to Stanford, Cal, USC, and UCLA), but needed to get up to 6 for this coming season to retain an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament.  That 6th team is Austin College, a D-III school from Texas.  Neither Austin College nor Penn State-Behrend plays regular season games against other "conference" foes, but comes out for the MPSF tournament. An odd arrangement, to be sure, but it appears to be what we're stuck with after the other 6 teams from the old MPSF (UOP, Long Beach State, UC Irvine, UCSB, Pepperdine, and SJSU) split off to start the men's division of the Golden Coast Conference, so at least one of that group of teams would be guaranteed a spot in the NCAAs.

[BigEasyCard]

+1 to MT. I don't think these sports all matter equally, because we regularly score points in more sports than we can count, so what we're looking for is teams who are likely to score 55 or 60+ points. The comparison is our PAR (points above replacement) team, which is the team whose score we'd have to replace. BigEasy will know for sure, but my sense has been in past years our last score that's counted has been around 50 or so points, so we'd be looking for the highest PAR above 50. It might be even higher this year, since there's one fewer total sport to count, and our women's scores usually are higher and so we could count the 11th women's sports if it's better.

In softball, significantly beating PAR is really unlikely at the moment; scores are generally negligible unless you make progress into the NCAA tournament. Getting past the first round of the NCAA tournament only gets you to 50 points, and that's neglible PAR. So we'd need to have not just a solid team, but a dominant one.

By contrast, with Water Polo, second place is like 90 points, so the key is to get past the MPSF and into the NCAA's, and then get to the championship game. Given how much parity there is between us, U$C, UCLA, and ןɐɔ, that's almost always plausible. Even third place is 55, which is a PAR of 5, so that semifinal game turns out to be worth far more than the final, national championship notwithstanding.

Men's volleyball is similarly boom or bust - third place is also only worth 55. Given this, I'd rather have us be mediocre 8 years out of 10 and in the championship game the other two, which is more or less what's happened. Anything in between just doesn't give us much.

Beach Volleyball is slightly more nuanced; the same 90 points for second place as in MWP and MVB, but third place is worth 72.5, and fourth is 55. That might change since the sport seems to keep expanding, but for now, similar PAR considerations: either be nearly the top in the country or irrelevant for Directors Cup points.

Given all this, what's much more important is that we score in all 4 required sports and a lot of the sports where "participation counts," like tennis, gymnastics, T&F, CC, and soccer. In those sports you can get around 60-70 points just for a tenth place finish, and it's usually been our consistent top ten performance across many of these sports that's kept the cup in our cupboard.

2006, I just reviewed Directors' Cup points for 2016-17.  On the Men's side, the lowest score included was 50 points each for Wrestling and Baseball.  On the Women's side, the lowest score included was 60.75 for Outdoor Track & Field.  Including Fencing, the Men averaged 68.75 for ten scoring sports and the Women averaged 83.0.  A total of five lower scores were excluded due to the ten-sport limit for each gender.

Geaux Cardinal! 

[BigEasyCard]

+1 to MT. I don't think these sports all matter equally, because we regularly score points in more sports than we can count, so what we're looking for is teams who are likely to score 55 or 60+ points. The comparison is our PAR (points above replacement) team, which is the team whose score we'd have to replace. BigEasy will know for sure, but my sense has been in past years our last score that's counted has been around 50 or so points, so we'd be looking for the highest PAR above 50. It might be even higher this year, since there's one fewer total sport to count, and our women's scores usually are higher and so we could count the 11th women's sports if it's better.

In softball, significantly beating PAR is really unlikely at the moment; scores are generally negligible unless you make progress into the NCAA tournament. Getting past the first round of the NCAA tournament only gets you to 50 points, and that's neglible PAR. So we'd need to have not just a solid team, but a dominant one.

By contrast, with Water Polo, second place is like 90 points, so the key is to get past the MPSF and into the NCAA's, and then get to the championship game. Given how much parity there is between us, U$C, UCLA, and ןɐɔ, that's almost always plausible. Even third place is 55, which is a PAR of 5, so that semifinal game turns out to be worth far more than the final, national championship notwithstanding.

Men's volleyball is similarly boom or bust - third place is also only worth 55. Given this, I'd rather have us be mediocre 8 years out of 10 and in the championship game the other two, which is more or less what's happened. Anything in between just doesn't give us much.

Beach Volleyball is slightly more nuanced; the same 90 points for second place as in MWP and MVB, but third place is worth 72.5, and fourth is 55. That might change since the sport seems to keep expanding, but for now, similar PAR considerations: either be nearly the top in the country or irrelevant for Directors Cup points.

Given all this, what's much more important is that we score in all 4 required sports and a lot of the sports where "participation counts," like tennis, gymnastics, T&F, CC, and soccer. In those sports you can get around 60-70 points just for a tenth place finish, and it's usually been our consistent top ten performance across many of these sports that's kept the cup in our cupboard.

2006, I just reviewed Directors' Cup points for 2016-17.  On the Men's side, the lowest score included was 50 points each for Wrestling and Baseball.  On the Women's side, the lowest score included was 60.75 for Outdoor Track & Field.  Including Fencing, the Men averaged 68.75 for ten scoring sports and the Women averaged 83.0.  A total of five lower scores were excluded due to the ten-sport limit for each gender.

Geaux Cardinal! 

[BigEasyCard]

Beach may have scholarship players for Beach only for the first time now.    And some more coming in.  Plus  indoor Player of the year Plummer is an awesome beach player.  Beach has played quite well thus far.    Will they be top 10?  Maybe

Here are the current selection criteria for the 8-team NCAA Championship tournament:

Selection Process
The 2018 Beach Volleyball Championship provides for a field of eight teams to compete in a double elimination tournament. The NCAA Women's Beach Volleyball Committee will conduct team selections, selecting the top three teams from the East Region and the top three teams from the West Region. The remaining two teams will be selected at-large from across the country by the NCAA Women's Beach Volleyball Committee.

https://www.ncaa.com/championships/beach...ampionship

Glad to hear that this sport is also trending favorably for the Cardinal.

Geaux Cardinal!

[BigEasyCard]

Beach may have scholarship players for Beach only for the first time now.    And some more coming in.  Plus  indoor Player of the year Plummer is an awesome beach player.  Beach has played quite well thus far.    Will they be top 10?  Maybe

Here are the current selection criteria for the 8-team NCAA Championship tournament:

Selection Process
The 2018 Beach Volleyball Championship provides for a field of eight teams to compete in a double elimination tournament. The NCAA Women's Beach Volleyball Committee will conduct team selections, selecting the top three teams from the East Region and the top three teams from the West Region. The remaining two teams will be selected at-large from across the country by the NCAA Women's Beach Volleyball Committee.

https://www.ncaa.com/championships/beach...ampionship

Glad to hear that this sport is also trending favorably for the Cardinal.

Geaux Cardinal!

[2006alum]

2006, I just reviewed Directors' Cup points for 2016-17.  On the Men's side, the lowest score included was 50 points each for Wrestling and Baseball.  On the Women's side, the lowest score included was 60.75 for Outdoor Track & Field.  Including Fencing, the Men averaged 68.75 for ten scoring sports and the Women averaged 83.0.  A total of five lower scores were excluded due to the ten-sport limit for each gender.

Geaux Cardinal!

Wow. We really dominated last year. It's incredible that our women's teams averaged the equivalent of roughly 2.5th place across 10 sports!

[2006alum]

2006, I just reviewed Directors' Cup points for 2016-17.  On the Men's side, the lowest score included was 50 points each for Wrestling and Baseball.  On the Women's side, the lowest score included was 60.75 for Outdoor Track & Field.  Including Fencing, the Men averaged 68.75 for ten scoring sports and the Women averaged 83.0.  A total of five lower scores were excluded due to the ten-sport limit for each gender.

Geaux Cardinal!

Wow. We really dominated last year. It's incredible that our women's teams averaged the equivalent of roughly 2.5th place across 10 sports!

[BigEasyCard]

In the first D1 Winter standings released today, Stanford leads with a total of 784.50 points and Penn State is second with 629.75 points.  Press release here: http://www.nacda.com/sports/directorscup...18aaa.html

The press release has a link to the full standings.

Unofficially, in the four required sports, Stanford leads each of the next five schools in the standings.  More details on this after basketball concludes.

Geaux Cardinal!

[BigEasyCard]

In the first D1 Winter standings released today, Stanford leads with a total of 784.50 points and Penn State is second with 629.75 points.  Press release here: http://www.nacda.com/sports/directorscup...18aaa.html

The press release has a link to the full standings.

Unofficially, in the four required sports, Stanford leads each of the next five schools in the standings.  More details on this after basketball concludes.

Geaux Cardinal!

[BigEasyCard]

With a Sweet 16 loss to Louisville, Stanford Women's Basketball earns 64 Cup points for ninth place.  Thirteen teams have scored an unofficial total of 848.50 points which is 21.25 points more than scored by these same thirteen sports last year.

Geaux Cardinal!

[BigEasyCard]

With a Sweet 16 loss to Louisville, Stanford Women's Basketball earns 64 Cup points for ninth place.  Thirteen teams have scored an unofficial total of 848.50 points which is 21.25 points more than scored by these same thirteen sports last year.

Geaux Cardinal!

[BigEasyCard]

Stanford Men's Swimming earns 72 Cup points for seventh place.  Fourteen teams have scored an unofficial total of 920.50 points which is 18.25 points more than scored by these same fourteen sports last year.

Geaux Cardinal!

[BigEasyCard]

Stanford Men's Swimming earns 72 Cup points for seventh place.  Fourteen teams have scored an unofficial total of 920.50 points which is 18.25 points more than scored by these same fourteen sports last year.

Geaux Cardinal!

[unclechuck]

Michigan men are in Final 4 for Hoops and Frozen Four as well. A 160 point (minimum) bounce for them? Plus, just one spot behind us for 8th in men's Swim & Dive.

[unclechuck]

Michigan men are in Final 4 for Hoops and Frozen Four as well. A 160 point (minimum) bounce for them? Plus, just one spot behind us for 8th in men's Swim & Dive.

[BigEasyCard]

Stanford Fencing earns 57 Cup points for 11th place at the NCAA Fencing Championship.  Fifteen teams have scored an unofficial total of 977.50 points which is 15.25 points more than scored by these same fifteen sports last year.

Geaux Cardinal!

[BigEasyCard]

Stanford Fencing earns 57 Cup points for 11th place at the NCAA Fencing Championship.  Fifteen teams have scored an unofficial total of 977.50 points which is 15.25 points more than scored by these same fifteen sports last year.

Geaux Cardinal!