USA Ultimate

Colorado Springs, Colo. (March 30, 2016) – USA Ultimate, the national governing body for the sport of ultimate in the United States and member of the U.S. Olympic Committee, released today the fourth set of official rankings for the 2016 college season. 

This week’s Division I rankings remained largely unchanged with Massachusetts and British Columbia staying in the top men's and women's spots, respectively. 

In the men’s division, the top seven teams held their spots after last week. The lone addition to the top 10 was Harvard who sits at number 10 in week four. Oregon and Washington were the only two teams from last week’s top 10 to compete last weekend. After their performances at Northwest Challenge, Oregon maintained their fourth overall spot, thanks to a 7-0 record on the weekend, while Washington fell to number 11 to make way for Harvard in the top 10. 

In women's D-I, Oregon made the biggest move, taking over the number two spot after a 7-0 performance at Northwest Challenge. The event was a big one for the women’s top 10. In addition to Oregon, British Columbia (1), Stanford (3), Whitman (4) and Washington (7) all competed in Burlington, Wash., this weekend, but Oregon was the lone mover. Colorado also joined the top 10 for the first time this season in the 10th spot.

Division III’s top teams also remained unchanged this week, with John Brown and Bowdoin still holding number one spots for the men’s and women’s divisions, respectively. 

Thanks to an off weekend for all of the division’s top 10 teams, Division III men’s only had one real move this week. John Brown maintained their stranglehold onto the top spot for the fourth week in a row. The lone change in the top 10 was Colorado College’s jump from the seventh overall spot to third. Last week's second through sixth teams all dropped one spot to accommodate the move.

Despite maintaining their top team, women's D-III saw the most change in week four. Mount Holyoke (2) joined the top 10 after competing in their first tournament of the season and earning some convincing wins. Their 5-1 record at I-85 Rodeo helped Williams (6) rejoin the top 10 after being out for the previous two weeks. Haverford dropped six spots to number 10 after a mixed bag of results at Jersey Devil 5, and Puget Sound and Messiah both dropped out of the top 10 to make way for the new additions.

The college rankings are run each week, beginning in March, in the lead up to the division’s postseason. The rankings use data from games between rostered college teams at USA Ultimate sanctioned events that occur during the regular season, which runs January 2 to April 3, 2016. 

The final set of 2016 college rankings will be run next week and will include bid allocations for conference championships to regional championships and regional championships to the College Championships. At that time, teams must have competed in 10 regular-season games to be included in the rankings.

The 2016 postseason begins the weekend of April 16-17, when the first conference championship events will be held around the country. Regional championships are scheduled for April 30-May1 and May 7-8, when teams will earn bids to the Division I and Division III College Championships, set to be held May 21-22 and May 27-30 in Winston-Salem, N.C., and Raleigh, N.C., respectively.

Each of the nation’s 10 regions is guaranteed one automatic bid to the College Championships, with the remaining 10 bids being allocated to the regions whose teams finish highest in the final regular season rankings. Rankings also determine strength bid allocations from conference championships to regional championships. 

Additional information on the bid allocation process is available in the college season guidelines. The algorithm used to determine the rankings is version 2.0 of the USA Ultimate rankings algorithm. An explanation of the algorithm can be found on the main rankings page. 

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