Picks & Polls

This week, the official Ivy League preseason football poll, (the poll is of writers who cover the league, not the coaches), was released with Columbia coming in at 6th.

We also got the list of pre-season All Ivy picks from the Phil Steele website, with 10 Lions making either 1st, 2nd, or 3rd team.

Here's my take on these two developments:

-Count me among the many who believe Columbia will finish better than 6th this season, and I'll discuss the reasons why in about three weeks or so when my full 2019 season preview is out.

-But the fact that Columbia was picked so far down isn't the big story here. What really stands out from this poll is that there's a real split among the voters about who will win the league this year, and it's not just the usual split over two teams. It's clear a decent number of voters think any one of four or even five teams could win it all this year, and I can't remember any time when the poll has been this split. Columbia got a 1st place vote as well, (NOT from me, I no longer participate in the poll), so it's not like this team isn't on the general radar.

To me, this is really a very healthy sign for what should be a very good season of Ivy ball. The fact that two dominant teams emerged last season, (Princeton and Dartmouth), while the other would-be contenders, (Columbia and Yale), were ravaged with injuries was a lucky break for the league that could have suffered with just Princeton dominating everyone every week. Dartmouth challenged the Tigers about as well as possible without beating them in New Jersey and that made the season exciting enough. What a healthier Yale team could have done to Princeton and what a healthier Columbia squad could have done to Princeton and Dartmouth we'll never know.

-All that said, I don't see how anyone can make a really informed pick in this league before the coaches' pre-season news conference. We often learn of key additions, injuries, and other changes during those news conferences that change everything.

-And all THAT said, I'm still sticking with my Dartmouth pick to win the league until I see some compelling evidence to convince me otherwise. If you don't agree, look at the returning roster and the Big Green's 2018 stats and then get back to me. I do not remember looking at a team coming into any season looking as formidable as Dartmouth does now.

-All the pre-season All Ivy picks are nice, but the Phil Steele folks mistakenly left off Dartmouth's DL Jackson Perry because it's clear they didn't know he was coming back for a 5th year. (Hmm... did the voters who chose other teams for first not know that too?) He's a contender for the defensive Bushnell Cup, so that's a big omission. I just look as the list as a nice acknowledgement for everyone mentioned and leave it at that.