Minnesota State Wins Conference Title – Final 6 Set

Winona State split with Concordia today while Minnesota State swept St. Cloud State which means the Mavericks win the Northern Sun Conference regular season title.  Congratulations are in order but judging by comments made by many on this board in the comments over the past few days, many other programs may not be quick to offer their well wishes.

Minnesota Duluth, Southwest Minnesota State and Wayne State all swept their doubleheaders today which leaves Augustana on the outside looking in for the NSIC Postseason tourney which will begin on Wednesday in St. Cloud.

More info on the NSIC Tourney will come next week.  It may be especially interesting to see what transpires between the Mavs & Huskies going forward.

Last Chance For Vikings

No – not the Minnesota Vikings.

The Augustana Vikings are still in 7th place and hoping for a miracle.  They almost got it yesterday in an unexpected place.  The common perception (by me) was that their best chance to make the 6 team Northern Sun Tournament would be for Minnesota Duluth to lose a game (and win the tiebreaker) or to lose 2 games and take 6th place outright.  With just 2 games to go in the season today there are actually multiple options for them -

1. Duluth could still lose today but that looks less likely after a dominating day against Upper Iowa yesterday.  The Bulldog bats put up 38 runs and 37 hits in their doubleheader.  That said, it just takes 1 hot Peacock pitcher.
2. Southwest Minnesota State could lose another game to Mary who has been competitive all year.  SMSU and Augustana split their 4 game series and I haven’t looked at the tiebreaker options for those 2.
3. Finally, the unthinkable almost happened yesterday as Wayne State almost lost a game against winless Crookston.  Just 1 loss by Wayne will put them out of the playoffs in all likelihood by virtue of the game they didn’t play against Concordia.

Speaking of Concordia, they got swept by Winona State which now gives the Warriors a share of first place.  As I predicted, St. Cloud State and Minnesota State split their games.  A sweep by either today guarantees a share of the conference title.