Photo: Melissa Barker
We’re restarting the Women’s DI Club Rankings from scratch, as too much time has elapsed since the fall edition. Although the update comes later than desirable, it’s still useful as a nationwide check-in now that all leagues are operational. Remember that only league games are reflected in the records but all games are considered in the rankings.
RELATED: DI Club Update: National League • DI Club Update: American League
Seattle has a tenuous hold on the top spot. The reigning USA Rugby champion will not be competing toward the 2017 title and thus there will be no American contests to gauge the team’s relative strength this year. So Seattle will work toward the BC Premier championship, and despite the 7-5 record, the team currently sits in second place behind undefeated Westshore. But four of those losses have occurred in the New Year. This weekend is the team’s final league game before the April 29 semifinals, which will hopefully be live-streamed.
Life West and Raleigh are the top candidates to move into the #1 spot. The Gladiatrix have conceded 34 points throughout the entire NorCal season and have been playing with a sense of urgency; we just need to see them against some veritable opposition. One hopes that Glendale provides that pushback on May 13. Mid-Atlantic leader Raleigh has lost and won games this spring, and then surprised with back-to-back shutouts against Chicago North Shore and Detroit during the final round of the Gold Cup.
NOVA also banked two wins against the Midwest visitors, resulting in Beantown being named the Gold Cup champion. The New England leader challenged itself last weekend, contesting a doubleheader against Quebec in Canada, and the A side lost 39-19. Beantown will host the D.C. Furies this weekend before contesting its Atlantic North semifinal against unranked Village Lions (Empire #2).
Empire’s champion, Monmouth, went undefeated through its DI/DII hybrid league and will host New England runner-up Boston. The New Jersey team defeated Albany 29-24 in a recent friendly, while Boston dropped a 29-26 friendly contest to Philadelphia on April 8. While it was difficult to add a team that hasn’t won a league game, Philadelphia’s comparative scores (44-7 loss to Raleigh, win over Boston) hold the #15 spot for now (Philly plays Pittsburgh this weekend, so that could change). Also, remember that Boston participated in a hybrid fall league, so it was competing against DI and DII teams.
We’re intrigued by what’s happening in the new three-team Frontier league. The competition includes Black Ice, Glendale and Utah Vipers, which has come on strong in the spring: Read more. Black Ice and Glendale play this weekend, and then the Raptors travel to Salt Lake City for a Vipers rematch. On May 6, the top-two teams will decide the league’s rep to nationals.
Santa Monica is currently leading the Pacific South, but true to history, any team can win on any day, and has. The Dolphins play Belmont Shore this weekend, and the top-two teams will contest a final for the berth to nationals.
Austin is the favorite to repeat as Red River champion and will play second-place HARC this weekend in the final round of league. Since the four-team competition is a hybrid – the champion advances to the DI post-season and the runner-up moves to the DII post-season – only one team is included in the rankings. The same goes for NorCal, which has a similar make-up (except NorCal’s runner-up will advance to the DII Pacific North championship first).
When one considers the hybrid leagues, the pool of women’s DI clubs is very small. At most, the rankings could expand to 20 teams.
