Many Storylines to Follow at Akron’s ‘WAR III’

No photo description available.This weekend, the University of Akron will host their 3rd annual WAR tournament.  The WAR, slated for Feb. 9-10, will be the biggest tournament to date this year, and the only two-day tournament of the National Collegiate Dodgeball Association’s regular season!

WAR III, much like the two previous years, will have plenty of intriguing storylines to follow.  With 15 NCDA teams heading to Northeast Ohio to take part in this event, it is basically a mini-Nationals.

Jake Bruce has emerged as a star for SVSU this year. He will need to perform well if the Cardinals expect to finish WAR with an undefeated record.

This weekend, the tournament will include teams from each of the league’s 3 toughest regions: Michigan, Ohio, and the East Coast.  As has historically been the case, WAR will provide a fantastic opportunity for teams from multiple regions to face off, providing the league with a better idea of where each team stands before Nationals.  With so many compelling games on the docket for this Saturday and Sunday, we have put together an in-depth tournament preview below. We will give a brief preview of each individual team, highlight the most intriguing games on this weekend’s schedule, and we may even give some bold predictions.  Make sure to scroll all the way to the bottom of this preview to find out the many ways you will be able to follow all the action online. For starters, here is the (MASSIVE) tournament schedule (also found here): Continue reading “Many Storylines to Follow at Akron’s ‘WAR III’”

Midway’s Best

The second semester is off to a great start and we are ready for the 2nd half to the season.  With that in mind, it is a good time to look at the top players in the Midway Conference. These individuals where active last semester and earned their spot on this list. We have representatives from Ball State, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, University of Nebraska, and the University of Wisconsin Platteville.  Let’s take a look at the players that made the list. Continue reading “Midway’s Best”

Power Rankings: February 2019

Happy New Year College Dodgeballers!  After taking a month off the power rankings during the mid-season winter break, we are finally back for the second half of the season, with the February Power Rankings.  Not many matches have been played yet in 2019, but this is just the calm before the storm.  The month of February promises to be the most exciting month yet this season with huge tournament taking place each of the next three weekends:

Feb. 9-10: The WAR

Feb. 16: Michigan Dodgeball Cup

Feb. 23: BEAST / Ohio Dodgeball Cup

Below is the official February 2019 Power Rankings list produced by NCDA Executive Board members Jacob Leski (Director of Recruitment and Retention) and Kevin Bailey (Chief of Content).  Please keep in mind: these power rankings have no impact on the actual NCDA Standings.

Continue reading “Power Rankings: February 2019”

Magnus’ Rock Fest Tournament Review

This past weekend had West Virginia, Saginaw Valley State, Kent State and Akron traveling to Cleveland State to take part in the Magnus’ Rock Fest. Cleveland State hosted their first tournament and it was a great success, bringing in five teams from three different states. Thank you to Casey Brown for giving us his thoughts on this tournament.

Results:

Kent def CSU 2-1

SVSU def WVU 4-0 

Akron def WVU 4-0

SVSU def CSU 4-1

Kent def WVU 4-0

SVSU def Kent 5-0

Akron def CSU 2-1

 

The Following was written by CSU’s Casey Brown and Akron’s Colby Briceland

Continue reading “Magnus’ Rock Fest Tournament Review”

Tournament Review: Rally in the Valley

This past weekend saw James Madison University, The University of Akron, and West Virginia University travel to Penn State to take part in the Rally in the Valley Tournament. There were many great moments this weekend, as most of you have seen the play that Steve Herrick of PSU pulled off to save Penn from an overtime. It was a great turnout and we thank Penn State for hosting, below I will review each teams performances throughout the day.

JMU def PSU 3-1

Akron def WVU 4-0 (Called Early)

PSU def Akron 4-2

JMU def WVU 4-0 (Called Early)

JMU def Akron 4-1

PSU def WVU 4-0 (Called Early)

Continue reading “Tournament Review: Rally in the Valley”

Standings as of 2019-01-29

Standings are aimed to be released by the end of every Tuesday. 

In the 2019 Season, we have 27 technical upsets in 136 ranked matches (80.15% success rate) across 21 events. Additionally, there have been four JV matches entered into the Records.

The Gonzalez System is a computer ranking model similar to Elo and is a rating exchange system based on research performed by World Rugby. It has been adapted by the NCDA to the demands of College Dodgeball, but can be tuned and customized endlessly to incorporate accurate data. It has been used to help determine seeds for the Nationals bracket since Nationals 2014, and was used exclusively for the Nationals 2017 and 2018 bracket. 

Continue reading “Standings as of 2019-01-29”

NCDA Scorigami

So the initial thought for someone reading this is probably, “what in the world is ‘Scorigami'”, or at least something along those lines.  The quick breakdown is that Scorigami looks at all the historical scores over time within any league and sees how frequently each result has happened.  It was an idea created by Jon Bois to implement with NFL scores.  In his case, he wanted to see which results have never happened before in the history of the NFL, in the hopes that teams eventually achieve every possible score to complete his chart.  For a full breakdown I recommend checking out his video on it here, and if you want to see what the NFL’s current Scorigami looks like check that out here.

Admittedly, a full Scorigami chart looks a lot cooler for American Football given how many different ways there are to score and with varying point values as compared to dodgeball.  Hopefully someone finds it entertaining though.  Aside from a pretty picture, we can use it to get a better understanding of the history of our league and see how scoring has changed over time.

Continue reading “NCDA Scorigami”

Magnus’ Rock Fest Tournament Preview

The following was written by Cleveland State’s Joseph Walsh:

Magnus’ Rock Fest will be held at Cleveland State University on Saturday, February 2, 2019.

University of Cincinnati

For me personally, I have never witnessed this team play and from what I know, the CSU tournament will be the second tournament for this team. I am hoping that Wesley Peters has brought together some great guys to make a strong team and hopeful future contenders in the NCDA. This team plays CSU, Akron, and Kent this weekend, which will be a good test for this team to see what they are working with. They have a tough weekend ahead of them and this will hopefully be a good showing for them going forward in the NCDA.

West Virginia University

This team last semester finished strong, especially with the comeback win over CSU which was extraordinary. Continue reading “Magnus’ Rock Fest Tournament Preview”

Rally in the Valley: Penn State Tournament Preview

Penn State looks to open up the second half of the season with their first home tournament of the year. Rally in the Valley will See Penn State, James Madison University, West Virginia University and the University of Akron in their first matches of the second semester. lets take a look.

9:00 AM: Penn vs JMU

10:15 AM: Akron vs WVU

11:30 AM: Akron vs Penn

12:45 PM: JMU vs WVU

2:00 PM: JMU vs Akron

3:15 PM: WVU vs Penn

Continue reading “Rally in the Valley: Penn State Tournament Preview”

Ohio Region Second Semester Preview

Here we are folks, the second semester of college dodgeball is under way. The largest dodgeball state in the NCDA is Ohio, who boasts 9 active teams with one more on the way who has yet to play their induction match. Today we share a glimpse into what the Ohio Region has in store for the second half of the 2018-2019 season.

Continue reading “Ohio Region Second Semester Preview”

Battle of the Valleys Recap: GVSU Sweeps SVSU Despite Strong Showing from the Cardinals

The second half of the National Collegiate Dodgeball Association’s regular season kicked off on Sunday with a doubleheader between two of the top teams in the nation.  #1 Grand Valley State completed the sweep of host school #4 Saginaw Valley State in their annual Battle of the Valleys event.  The final scores from the two varsity matches are below, along with a brief recap:

Game 1: GVSU def SVSU 3-2

Game 1 began with Grand Valley looking very much like the #1 team in the country, as they picked apart the solid SVSU roster to claim a 2-0 lead at the half.  SVSU was able to make the second point a bit closer, but overall, GVSU used a controlled pace to pick off one Cardinal at a time in each point.  The big takeaway from the first half was how disciplined GVSU looked.  Very few mistakes were made from the Lakers, as their leadership and experience were on full display. Continue reading “Battle of the Valleys Recap: GVSU Sweeps SVSU Despite Strong Showing from the Cardinals”

Standings as of 2019-01-22

Standings are aimed to be released by the end of every Tuesday. 

In the 2019 Season, we have 26 technical upsets in 130 ranked matches (80.00% success rate) across 20 events. Additionally, there have been four JV matches entered into the Records.

The Gonzalez System is a computer ranking model similar to Elo and is a rating exchange system based on research performed by World Rugby. It has been adapted by the NCDA to the demands of College Dodgeball, but can be tuned and customized endlessly to incorporate accurate data. It has been used to help determine seeds for the Nationals bracket since Nationals 2014, and was used exclusively for the Nationals 2017 and 2018 bracket. 

Continue reading “Standings as of 2019-01-22”

BOTM: January 2019 (Alumni Edition)

Kyle FitzPatrick playing for the Columbus Gamecocks

During the month of January, the NCDA Executive Board likes to honor an alumni that continues to stay relevant not just in the dodgeball community as a whole, but one that continuously makes an effort to do what they can to grow the sport of dodgeball on multiple levels. As the former Captain of Kent State, and current member of the Columbus Gamecocks, we have asked Kyle FitzPatrick to share some words with us about his journey through dodgeball over the past decade. Please follow along as President Felix Perrone and Director Jacob Leski (current teammates of Kyle’s) ask the ever-loving zookeeper about his passion for dodgeball, and why it still plays a major part in his life to this day… Continue reading “BOTM: January 2019 (Alumni Edition)”