Most wins by any team in top-flight college softball this year.
Took the double -- the Big Ten regular season title and the Big Ten Tournament title.
An RPI of #12.
Ranked, depending on which poll you're looking at, third or second in the country.
A 25-game winning streak, the longest active in the College Softball Nation.
Clearly the best University of Minnesota softball team in program history.
And yet, despite all that, my presumption that I would get to see these ballers host (and presumably crush) their opponents in the Regional this weekend, and then (hopefully) crush their foe at Cowles Field in the Super Regional the U. would ever host next weekend, will not happen. Not only did the NCAA Committee not deem the Golden Gophers worthy enough of a top-eight seed and thus the possibility of playing the first two weekends of the NCAA Tournament at home, they didn't even regard them worthy enough for any of the 16 national seeds and are thus deprived of even hosting a Regional. They are the 2-seed -- yes, the fucking goddamn 2-seed -- in the Tuscaloosa Regional in Alabama. The Crimson Tide are the overall 16 seed, so, as you may have surmised, if the Gophers overcome this obstacle and get out of that Region, they will face the overall #1 seed in the tournament, Florida, in Gainesville the following weekend.
I'm not saying that Minnesota has no chance against the Gators. I'm not saying that they wouldn't lose to Alabama this weekend. And I'm not saying that they deserve the #1 overall seed. What I am saying that it's an absolutely goddamn screwjob that this softball team is forced into this indignity even though they have proven that they are worthy of better treatment. I don't give a good goddamn about their triple-digit Strength Of Schedule or that they're only 2-2 against the RPI Top 25. No team -- and I mean in any sport -- has never finished the regular season ranked so high and be brought this low in the tourney. From ranked second to unranked??? Fucking really?!?!?!
Monday the NCAA barfed up some propaganda bullshit justifying this disgrace. But SB Nation U.-centric site The Daily Gopher deftly noted in this takedown piece that this ass-covering by the NCAA won't work due to one small but huge problem. The NCAA is now doing this thing where they're teasing which team is where in the weeks leading up to a sport's selection date. College football started doing it several years ago (even though the NCAA has nothing to do with it; college football is such a racket that the NCAA does not deal with most of the affairs regarding top-flight college football), and college basketball has recently started to announce which teams are on track to be the best teams come the tournament. It's a really stupid idea to string teams and fans along like this, especially when the committee decides to change its mind. Any drastic changes, be it rises or drops, will have to be explained given the ranking that team was given before.
And this is where the NCAA is caught with its hand in the cookie jar. Just last week, on its Twitter feed, it teased its order of seeded teams. Guess what? Minnesota was ranked seventh:
Take a look at the second Top 10 ranking by the NCAA DI Softball Committee! #NCAASoftball pic.twitter.com/tuDAf1F8t4— NCAA Softball (@NCAAsoftball) May 7, 2017
Still too low in my estimation, especially given what the team accomplished. Nevertheless, they were in line as of just last fucking week to receive a national seed. And so the NCAA thinks Minnesota went from seventh to unranked in a space of a week? When all they did was win their conference tournament title?? And oh, with a No-Hitter to boot??? Bullshit. Absolute fucking bullshit.
I'm not being overdramatic. This may be The Worst Ranking For Any Team In Any Tournament In Any Sport In NCAA History. Injustice is the first of what you can call this disaster. Seriously, I'm really fucking pissed off about this.
I thought people were being a little too cruel, ridiculing the NCAA on such matters as paying the players. Not any more. Not after fucking the Gopher softball team like this. (I know those two matters are unrelated. I'm angry, let me have this.)
Oh, and even though they're women and technically this is not correct to say: Poor Bastards.
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