Take a look at the MIAA standings, and it appears Emporia State is in good shape. The Hornets are 2-1 and in a three-way tie for fourth place. But that’s not the way ESU coach David Moe sees things.
Moe has the Hornets in a three-way tie for sixth place in his standings. The coach has a different way of figuring the conference standings, and it goes like this:
F A home win or a road loss counts for zero points.
F A road win counts for one point.
F Deduct one point for a home loss.
So with two home wins and a road loss at Central Missouri, Emporia State is sitting at zero points after three games — essentially a .500 record.
“The only thing that we’ve done at this point is put ourselves in position to compete at the top of the league,” Moe said. “Next week we could be just competing for a berth to get in the conference tournament.”
The Hornets have a chance to put a point on the board tonight at Truman, the last place team in the league at 0-3 — also in last place under Moe’s criteria at minus-2.
Tonight’s game is the first of three in six days for the Hornets, who host Nebraska-Omaha on Wednesday and Southwest Baptist on Saturday.
Moe’s formula is a better projection of where a team will finish in the standings once everyone has a few road and home games under their belt. By the end of this week, things should start to clear up, because after three games, some things don’t make a lot of sense in Moe’s system.
For instance, Northwest Missouri is tied with Emporia State at zero, even though Northwest Missouri is 0-3. The Bearcats’ losses were all on the road, including a loss in Emporia.
“They’re really no worse off than we are if they take care of business at home,” Moe said.
Moe preaches his system to his team, so much so that his players have started to sound like him.
“You’ve definitely got to win one on the road before you can lose one at home,” Lamar Wilbern said.
“Win at home and then get steals on the road,” Robert Moores said. “If we can do that, we’ll be in good shape to win the conference.”
If the Hornets won only one of three games this week, they would be 3-3 in the conference, but they would be minus-1 in Moe’s standings and most likely rank in the bottom half of the conference.
In Moe’s estimation, if the Hornets want to compete for a conference title, they cannot afford to lose tonight at Truman — the weakest team thus far in conference — or lose more than one upcoming home game.
“You’ve got to win some road games to finish at the top of the league,” Moe said. “You’ve got to be plus-3 or four to get up there. For us, we play three games in a row at home, and we will have played five home games and two road games, and we can be 5-2 and be sitting at zero. 5-2 might get you in second or third place in the actual standings, but we’ll have played no road games.”
Moe’s measure
The MIAA men’s standings according to a formula devised by Emporia State coach David Moe:
Washburn +1
Southwest Baptist +1
Missouri Southern +1
Nebraska-Omaha +1
Missouri Western +1
Emporia State 0
Central Missouri 0
Northwest Missouri 0
Pittsburg State -1
Fort Hays State -2
Truman State -2
Actual standings
W L
Washburn 3 0
Missouri Southern 2 0
Southwest Baptist 2 0
Emporia State 2 1
Nebraska-Omaha 2 1
Missouri Western 2 1
Central Missouri 1 2
Pittsburg State 1 2
Fort Hays State 0 2
Northwest Missouri 0 3
Truman State 0 3
Comments
We allow registered users to post comments on this Web site. To learn more about our posting policies please read our User Poster Agreement Policy.
Use the comment form below to begin a discussion about this content.