Not much happened this week and yet a lot did.

The thing about D2 college rugby is that when teams play across conference borders, the result can force you to take a look at everyone in the conference. So Marist beating Vermont makes us consider, hey, maybe not only is Marist better than the rankings were saying, but maybe the Merchant Marine Academy and RPI are a little better too. 

We had a couple of lower-ranked teams beat higher-ranked teams, but none that were massive surprises except Marist over Vermont. UNC-Charlotte (4) and UNC-Wilmington (8) weren't ranked that far apart and playing a tight game. Auburn and Georgia Tech were always close; it was just Georgia Tech's win over Memphis (which, we suspect, changed their lineup because they had the #1 spot sewn up) that had moved Georgia Tech up. They were, of course, still close, at 24-22. 

Support us! A small donation os $5 from everyone who reads this goes a long way to paying out hosting, travel, and IT costs! It's easy, just click here>>

One thing of note is that the Top 10 doesn't change. The teams shuffle slightly, but the same teams are in the Top 10. This is a relative rarity. We had a look at it and 22 teams have been ranked in our Top 10 this year. Of those, three are now not ranked at all (!), and five are ranked 24 or lower. That's to be expected, but was probably exacerbated by the questions following the COVID shutdowns. Interestingly also, we had only one team in the Top 10 from our preseason rankings all the way through to now, our current #1 Norwich. Another team, Adrian, has been in the rankings in 10 of the 11 weeks. This is because at the time of our preseason rankings we weren't even sure what division they'd be in. 

Also, if you look at our preseason Top 10:

Whitewater obviously wasn't as strong as we expected (numbers were a bit low), but this isn't a bad list. MTSU is not ranked anymore and that was a guess. UMS&T isnow #39 and Minnesota-Duluth didn't play for the longest time but is now coming back into the rankings at #26. Villanova is #24, Vermont #15, and Furman #12. Norwich, ISU, and Lowell are still there. It's imperfect, but not a ridiculous list given how weird the season was.

This coming weekend, of course, two games for everyone. The graphic at right shows you the rankings from NCR. They are pretty good. They had Marist higher than we did; same with Virginia, and they thought well of Duluth before we did. We have Principia higher and we pretty much agree on Lowell, ISU, Wilmington, Adrian, and Norwich. (PS, just to be clear, we make it a point of not looking at anyone else's rankings when we do our own; it muddles the process.)

We guarantee that someone (Duluth? Virginia?) will shake both rankings up this weekend.

Rank	Prev	Team	Conference	Notes
1	1	Norwich (VT)	New England-Wide
2	2	Adrian (MI)	Great Lakes
3	3	Principia (IL)	Gateway
4	5	Illinois State (IL)	Great MW
5	8	UNC-Wilmington (NC)	Southern	Beat UNC-Charlotte (4)
6	6	UMass-Lowell (MA)	New England-Wide
7	7	IUP (PA)	Allegheny
8	4	UNC-Charlotte (NC)	Southern	Lost to UNC-Wilmington (7)
9	9	Northern Iowa (IA)	Great MW
10	10	Thomas More (KY)	MCRC
11	11	Marquette (WI)	Great MW	Beat SLU (28)
12	12	Furman (SC)	Southern
13	13	Marian (IN)	MCRC	Beat Central Michigan (21)
14	26	Marist (NY)	Tri-State	Beat Vermont (15)
15	15	Vermont (VT)	New England-Wide	Lost to Marist (26)
16	16	Georgetown (DC)	MARC
17	19	Memphis (TN)	SCRC	Beat Ole Miss
18	20	Auburn (AL)	SCRC	Beat Georgia Tech (14)
19	14	Georgia Tech (GA)	SCRC	Lost to Auburn (20)
20	23	Virginia (VA)	Cardinals	Forfeit win
21	17	Montana State (MT)	Rocky Mountain
22	18	Bucknell (PA)	MARC
23	22	Drexel (PA)	MARC
24	24	Villanova (PA)	MARC
25	25	UW-Whitewater (WI)	Great MW
26	Unr	UM-Duluth	Northern Lights
27	21	Central Michigan (MI)	Great Lakes	Lost to Marian (13)
28	27	Providence (RI)	New England-Wide
29	29	UNC (NC)	Southern
30	31	Citadel (SC)	Southern
31	28	SLU (MO)	Gateway	Lost to Marquette (11)
32	30	Pitt State (KS)	Gateway
33	32	East Carolina	Southern
34	33	Boston University (MA)	New England-Wide
35	35	Coast Guard (CT)	New England-Wide
36	39	USMMA (NY)	Tri-State
37	40	RPI (NY)	Tri-State
38	34	Belmont Abbey (NC)	Southern
39	36	UMS&T (MO)	Gateway
40	37	UW-Platteville (WI)	Great MW