Thought it would be interesting to see where the MAC stands compared to our other 2 regional mid majors through today. With the ranking system I developed here is where the teams would rank in a combined MAC-Horizon-MVC Mega mega conference. Please ignore where my Huskies stand
My system is not in love with Valpo at only #6, that may be a bit out to lunch, we shall see.
1) Wichita St
2) Illinois St
3) Eastern Michigan
4) Central Michigan
5) Northern Iowa
6) Valparaiso
7) Kent St
8) Oakland
9) Ohio
10) Indiana St
11) IPFW
12) Missouri St
13) IUPUI
14) Loyola-IL
15) Buffalo
16) Nebraska-Omaha
17) Northern Kentucky
18) Evansville
19) Akron
20) South Dakota
21) Toledo
22) North Dakota St
23) Green Bay
24) Denver
25) Bowling Green
26) Southern Illinois
27) Ball St
28) Western Michigan
29) UW-Milwaukee
30) Youngstown St
31) Cleveland St
32) Northern Illinois
33) South Dakota St
34) Bradley
35) Illinois-Chicago
36) Miami-OH
37) Oral Roberts
38) Detroit-Mercy
39) Drake
40) Western Illinois
Graphically plotting the overall rankings, its very close between MAC and MVC, comparable scores. The first 2 teams in the MVC are clearly better, the vast range of middle of the pack teams in the MVC/MAC are about even, but the MAC seems to outdo the MVC in depth for the later teams. Horizon clearly lagging behind the MAC and MVC. Summit has some moderately good top half of the conference teams (nothing mind blowing) but really drops off at the bottom, even below Horizon.
From just offense, the MAC is clearly a better conference than the MVC or Horizon. Only the best offensive team in the MVC is putting up a similar score to the top offensive team in the MAC. MVC and Horizon are actually pretty comparable in the bottom two thirds of each conference in terms of offense. Summit's top 4 teams score offensively somewhere between that of MVC and Horizon but take sharp drop in bottom half of conference.
Now defense is what stood out to me, the MAC really is having a hard time measuring up. The defense being played in the top half of the MVC is blowing the doors off the MAC and Horizon. Can MAC defenses improve, or is it pretty much going to be an offensively dominated league? Summit defenses look to be on par with MAC and Horizon
So overall, I think the MAC and MVC are being regarded as the best mid majors out there, and clearly better than Horizon, but the ways those two conferences are getting to that evaluation is so different, MVC = Defense/bit top heavy, MAC = Offense/bit more depth