C-P Preseason Top 20

A sneak preview of the rankings will be a regular feature of this blog. During the soccer season, I usually posted the list as soon as I finished it, on Saturday nights or Sunday mornings, and I expect that pattern to continue.

Anyway, here it is, followed by some explanation/analysis. Before anybody gets all pissed off, remember that the preseason rankings are just a jumping off point. I could list what I believe are the bottom 20 teams instead, and results would still fix the rankings inside a month.

1. Woodrow Wilson
2. Absegami
3. Camden Catholic
4. Holy Spirit
5. Bishop Eustace
6. Willingboro
7. Atlantic City
8. Timber Creek
9. Rancocas Valley
10. Haddon Heights
11. Cherry Hill East
12. Haddonfield
13. Washington Twp.
14. Sacred Heart
15. Williamstown
16. Sterling
17. Salem
18. Collingswood
19. Kingsway
20. Haddon Twp.

Almost: Cherokee, Lenape, Glassboro, Paul VI, Deptford, Trenton Catholic, Gloucester

The top three teams are obviously a level ahead of the rest. I thought hard about flipping WW and CC, making the Irish No. 1 and the Tigers No. 3, but I figured it was more trouble than it was worth and the defending TOC champions deserved the benefit of the doubt.

The rest of the list is kind of a crapshoot. I was lucky with a large amount of preseason information to work with, and I know many of the coaches well enough to be able to read between the lines. But this is still far from a perfect process. I'm sure I'll hear from a lot of folks about the results of preseason scrimmages, but that stuff doesn't matter to me. Coaches all approach them with different intentions, and most of them are trying out some stuff that would never make it to the court in a real game. Many folks take them very seriously, and continue to mention the games as real, concrete results well into the playoffs. For me the season starts at 3:45 on Friday and whatever happened prior to that moment immediately ceases to mater in the least.

Against my better judgment, I resisted putting in a fourth Olympic National team (Paul VI) and kept the two Oly American teams that finished last year ranked (CH East and Wash. Twp.). East obviously belonged, of course, but I wasn't sure about the Maids. That whole division full of big schools is on probation, pending the likes of Lenape and Cherokee proving themselves. Those teams are forever bleating about their unforgiving schedules, but I'd much rather be there than in the National with WW, CC and BE.

In the absence of any reliable info, I went to the final rankings of past years for wisdom, a fact which explains some of the last few spots. Did you know that Haddon Township hasn't finished outside the Top 20 since 1997? Or that Haddonfield has been ranked every year since 1992? Basically, any team that has finished in the T20 each of the last three seasons -- or the span of the seniors' high school careers -- automatically got a spot. That turned out to be 12 teams. Any team that was ranked last year and is bringing back its best player -- like Salem -- got back in. I also tried to represent all the leagues. The BCSL only got two teams, but they're both in the Top 10.

Anyway, as I said before, this is just a jumping-off point, and the list shouldn't be taken as seriously as many are inevitably going to take it. Every team starts with a clean slate, and I expect the first regular-season rankings, which will come out after the holidays, to look very different.