For proof that the NESCAC really is a league of its own, look no further than the field hockey team's 6-0 trouncing of non-conference Endicott last night.
Entering the contest, Endicott was 12-3 on the season and a second-place 6-1 in the Commonwealth Coast Conference. Their 12 wins had included several blowouts; the Gulls had scored four or more goals seven times this season, and had thrice exploded for six-plus.
The Jumbos, while poised for perhaps their best season in years, fielded slightly less dazzling statistics. The team is 8-4, 5-3 in the NESCAC, and averaged 2.23 goals per game to the Gulls' 4.61.
But the 6-0 Tufts win left little doubt as to which was the better team, and made an even louder statement about the strength of the NESCAC. With three teams ranked in the top nine nationally and a strong track record in NCAA Tournament play, the NESCAC is simply the strongest conference in Div. III field hockey.
"Endicott is 6-1 in their conference and is obviously a good team," coach Tina McDavitt said. "A game like this just shows the strength of the NESCAC and the strength of our team."
Coming out of the weaker CCC, the Gulls had not played a nationally ranked team all season. The Jumbos have faced four, three from within league ranks, and have gone 2-2 against this top-tier competition, besting No. 4 Williams and No. 3 Div. II Bentley and falling in tight games to No. 10 Middlebury and No. 11 Bowdoin.
"I think that inter-league games like these really do demonstrate the wide range of skill among Division III teams," Casellas-Katz said. "This makes us a more skilled team, because we are constantly playing great opponents - anybody in NESCAC - but on the same token, the teams that make it to the NCAA [Tournament] may not always represent the best teams in the country."
The stacked nature of the NESCAC does indeed have implications on the national stage. The NESCAC and leagues like the CCC are each granted one automatic qualifying bid for the tournament champion, without taking into account the top-to-bottom strength of the conference. At-large bids are awarded, but playing against tougher competition, teams like Tufts might slip under the radar of the NCAA selection committee.
"It's so great and so frustrating at the same time to play in such a great league," coach Tina McDavitt said. "Teams like [Endicott] will get to go to NCAAs because of the conference they're in, and I know that if we could get there, we'd be able to play with a lot of those teams."
Last season, Bowdoin won the automatic bid to NCAAs and advanced to the semifinals, but Middlebury and Williams both earned at-large bids and easily won their first-round games against automatic qualifiers from smaller, weaker leagues. The Panthers skated past Freedom Conference champion Manhattanville, 5-1, and Williams, interestingly enough, iced the CCC champion, Western New England, 6-0.
"[Endicott] was a good game for us to play, just to show the girls that we really do play in the best conference in the country, and that we're a better team for it," McDavitt said.
