Women's Notebook - Holiday Break Spotlight

2023-’24 – D2 East Women’s Basketball – Info at break

By Stephen Zerdelian

Every season (except for the COVID season of 2020-’21), I try to check out the teams who are doing well at this point in the schedule (.667 or better overall), the holiday break, and see how they got there. This is the sixth seasonal edition of this column, and it has eleven teams on it. The fact that 11 of 33 teams, exactly 1/3 of the region, are here means that there is a clear division of haves and have-nots, with little in the middle. Let’s see how it shakes out…

Information thru December 29, 2023 – teams in region with .667 winning percentages or better:

Only three of the eleven teams on the list have played a schedule over .500, with Bentley (.561) leading the pack. The College of Saint Rose (.533) and Franklin Pierce (.510) are the others and, frankly, nobody else is close. In fact, four of the teams listed are under .400; Pace (.398), Jefferson (.362), Holy Family (.344) and Assumption (.337). In terms of winning percentages of the teams these eleven have beaten, not even one has a mark over .500 (Bentley and Saint Rose are the closest at .478 each). Let’s check out each team…

Holy Family has the region’s best record right now but aside from the win over Bentley and the defeat by Franklin Pierce, their slate has been thin. They don’t have much chance to build their resume in the CACC (other than playing Jefferson twice) but the Tigers could help their case with non-league wins over Lincoln (PA) and UDC next month… Across town is Jefferson, who have a slightly better resume right now than HFU when it comes to opponents winning percentage but the Rams lost an OT game to 3-7 Bloomsburg, which hurts. They also have a chance to aid their case with a non-league game against St. Thomas Aquinas next month but, like Holy Family, the CACC games work against them… Pace has one quality victory (Saint Rose) and a mediocre loss (Southern Connecticut, but that may look a little better if the Owls improve), so it’s kind of a blah slate overall. The only non-conference game the Setters have left is against the College of Staten Island, so they’ll need to bolster their resume within the NE10… AIC has a reasonable resume with key wins over Bentley and Franklin Pierce. The Yellow Jackets also have wins over STAC and SCSU, so that may help down the line. A loss to Adelphi is a bummer, and recent wins over Goldey-Beacom and Queens won’t help much but AIC does have a handful of big NE10 games left to build their schedule out… Saint Rose has played a good schedule, has solid wins over Assumption and Franklin Pierce and has only lost to Pace, so they are in as good a shape as any when it comes to strength of schedule. A key three-game road trip out of the hiatus (D’Youville, AIC and Bentley) could tell a lot about the Golden Knights path… UDC started 11-0 with good wins over Virginia Union (10-2), Mercy and Bowie State (8-5) but setbacks to Frostburg State (7-4) and Adelphi slowed their roll. They Firebirds do have a vital non-league game coming up against Holy Family, as well as key ECC dates with Daemen and STAC (they already own a win over the Spartans), so they can recover their mojo… Bentley’s opponents winning percentage is the best on the list, including their two defeats to quality foes (AIC and Holy Family). The Falcons own wins over Daemen and SNHU and jump right back into the fire after the break with home clashes against NE10 powers Assumption and Saint Rose… Assumption’s opponents have the worst winning percentage on the list and their only win over a team not under .500 was against SCSU (5-5). The defending regional champions dropped games to Saint Anselm and their only contest against a team currently over .500 (Saint Rose), so there is work to be done. The Greyhounds can make up ground quickly after the restart as they host AIC and then travel to Bentley and Franklin Pierce… Southern New Hampshire has been a little under the radar – their only two games against teams with winning records resulted in a split (a loss to Bentley and a victory over Franklin Pierce) while a defeat at Post is a dent on the chassis. The Penmen could get a good win out of the break as they host STAC, and then NE10 games against Pace, AIC, Saint Rose and Assumption dot their testing January slate… Franklin Pierce has faced a solid set of foes (.510) but have dropped three of four games against the elite (a win over Holy Family but defeats to SNHU, Saint Rose and AIC), which leaves them with some convincing to do. Their NE10 ledger will help them, assuming the Ravens can gather a few more key wins… Along with AIC, Daemen has played the fewest games on this list (nine) and the Wildcats best win was against Roberts Wesleyan (4-6), an indication that they don’t have an impressive resume. Losses to Bentley, Nova Southeastern (7-3) and Palm Beach Atlantic (6-5) highlight their only games against teams currently at or over .550. The Wildcats do have non-league games against #6 Ferris State (6-1, and with a win over previously top-ranked Ashland to their credit) and Indiana, PA (6-2) ahead, so they could really help themselves before delving fully into ECC play.

No other regional teams are within a game of being on the list, but somebody could emerge to make a late run or, more likely, somebody could be a surprise league tournament champion (to grab an automatic qualifier bid, like Dominican last season) but it remains to be seen who could do so.

How predictive is this mid-season list? Here is how it broke down over the first five seasons of data collection:

2022-’23 – 8 on the list, 6 made NCAA’s (two teams not on the list made the NCAA field).

2021-’22 – 9 on the list, 6 made NCAA’s (three teams were one game shy of the list and two made it to the NCAA field).

2019-‘20 – 11 on list, 5 made NCAA’s (three teams were one game shy of the list, one of which made the NCAA’s).

2018-‘19 – 12 on list, 8 made NCAA’s.

2017-‘18 – 10 on list, 7 made NCAA’s (the other NCAA team was 7-5 at the break).

Is it a perfect predictor? Certainly not, particularly this season with so many variables. How many of these eleven combines will reach the eight-team regional field? Some will obviously miss out, but my guess is at least six of the eleven will get there. Nobody knows for sure, but I’ve found it instructive to check back at the end of the season each time before and see just how predictive it may be. Once we get to March, I’ll revisit and see how it turned out.