Session 5.  Conference standings set the tourney tables.  WGM Sweet 16, where pretenders and contenders (and the grossly unjustly upset) are separated.  Non-conference would-be-champs get their first shot at table-topping perfection.  And for some, it's 4-match madness as teams basically choose which matches to lose and which to try to win, possibly sacrificing winnable matches for chance of present and future glory, and risking the season-sinking 0-for-4 weekend.  Did any suffer such fate this season?  No!  Olmec saw fit to gift at least one win to every team except the Bloodsuckers, who only finished 0-for-3, not playing the WGM this round.  Thanks for taking one for the rest of the league, John!  On the opposite end of the spectrum, we also had no 4-0 teams!  Of those playing in 4 matches, all lost at least one, though we did have three 3-0 teams in Burlington, Starkville, and Alton with a perfect 9-0 set record that saw them hold off Aires' BullyFrogs for the top conference spot.

Speaking of Conference Kings, here are your #1 seeds for the conference tourneys: PAC 8, Carlsbad; BIG 8, Pekin (the only defending tourney champ to be a #1 seed this season); Big East, Alton; and SEC, N'Orleans.  Home court could be huge as Pekin looks to fend off overall #1 T7 Columbia this season, and Alton and N'Orleans try to overcome their boogeymen, Cincinnati and Starkville respectively.  Carlsbad in particular will have an uphill climb and need every home bonus point available, as Mat-Su, Denali, San Jose, and Tucson all have higher T7 ratings! Who will the Silent Stone Sentinel select as this season's special squads? We shall soon narrow the field as the opening round is bound to give us at least one good upset, given past seasons' proclivities!

And now a word from our sponsor: Brian's Nuthouse, favored after-match dive for the Squirrel Supporters and Home of the Acorn Pizza(TM)! Brian, we saw your front page comments wall posts about not expecting a win this past weekend (taking the under on the .5 win total), and being wrong about your own team! And also to being better in season 15, when you "knew less about the game."  We're curious here at the BUM Report.  What exactly do you think you know more of this season?  Please comment below!  Not wanting to be sued for libel, we will hold off on citing any attributed direct quotes, and will instead toss out some data points for your own interpretations on how Squirrelville is doing in scaling the heights of TMVL!  How fare they on record? They are currently 4-11; last season they were 7-8 at this point.  How did they fall off pace by three games?  Schedule didn't help.  Over the past four conference matches they won vs Mendon, then fell @ Cinci, @ Spokane, and home to top Big East T7 and top-4 overall T7 Alton. There's only a handful teams in all TMVL that could hope for better than 1-3 against that slate. They also suffered a -3 upset when playing a home 80-rated team. But Mr. BUM, how do you know that Schenectady is actually better than last season, or not? Their 76.4 T7 rating to start season 16 is the highest for the team since at least season 12 (when we started tracking such things). They also have recruited more 5* A-potential players in the past three seasons than the prior five combined! They currently have two A-potential (one actual!) Ls, and up-and-comers at RS and S, with a new incoming 5* MB already recruited this season. Next season they'll have a 5* player at every position but OH, where they'll have two B-rated players leading the team.  That's a solid mid-80's-rated lineup that can compete with most teams at home and 2/3 of the league on neutral court. And perhaps they can still grab a skill+ 4* OH this season to really round out the T7. So... you're saying that the Arboreal Rodents might be decent? Soon? Their 80.4 T7 is already better than two Big East teams, and at home the bonus is enough that only Alton and Cinci could flat-out overpower them with their top lines. Anyone else in the conference could be an even match or even an underdog for the Static Fuzztails of Electric City on their home court. That leaves multiple home matches available for some wins, like non-conf v Santa Clara & San Diego, and conference matches v Manitowoc and Spokane.  There's also the Cup/Shield and Holyoke to steal a win or three in. So you think they can top their 13-18 mark from last season? Uh, no. But they could top their 10-21 from season 14, and definitely the 5-26 from season 13 when this rebuild began! I like them to reach double-digit wins, if anyone is taking odds on the matter. I'd wager a can of honey roasted peanuts and maybe one of cashews or mixed nuts as well, depending on the odds offered. What's holding them back right now? Getting Fit figured out. It's going into session 6, and all the top teams have at least their T7s topped, if not the whole roster. Finding a pattern or acceptable CP cost to max earlier in the season next year will help. If there's one thing to figure out next, it's a good Fit plan for the roster before session 1, so anticipated losses early will be tactical to build strength, and not just random or "why not?" matches.  Any other words for The Beerman this week? Only to thank Mr. Beerman for offering to host a new manager each week to pick apart their rosters and look ahead to things to come! Will those be teams he plays, or teams similar to his, or just league-random? Yes, yes they will be, and thanks for the question.

That's more than enough of the Nuts - on to the Blowouts!  We had a pair of "they didn't even try to make it close" conference matches taking our #3 spot this past weekend. Both match 14, conference play. First in the PAC 8, where the Pursecarried Pooches were sent north to face the Antlered Army. Mat-Su played a home 90. Given that the average Chihuahua, standing fully on hind legs, can't reach the knees of an adult Moose, this one went as expected when Martyn sent out the 64-rated reserves. It was surprisingly close for a bit, and ended 18-25 for the opening set. Set 2 was the kicker, 9-25 to Mat-Su. Set 3 saw some uncharacteristic charity from the Bearded Buglers, and ended 16-25 for a combined +32 blowout.  Similarly in ratings, we saw Father Al travel to once-but-perhaps-no-more favored son Max's garden, when the 'Crows played an 87-rated team against the 63-rated Rabbids. With Al first having a home match against the Vermilingua and later on a WGM Sweet 16 clash against top-10 T7 Mat-Su, there did not appear to be a lot of the starters left to take the two-hour bus ride down Hwy 61 for this clash of Mississippi River powers. That, or Al was feeling a bit sorry for edging out Max for the 4* L in the prior recruiting session. Or maybe Al is playing long-game-mind-games and setting up the final conference match this season (St. C @ Quincy, match 44) in a strategic "if we're probably losing anyway" kind of thing. Whichever. Who can guess the mind of a Rabbid? The GourdHeads didn't bother to try, they just beat down on the Blue-Shirts the way that Red Shirts used to take it in the original Star Trek series. Similar 18-25 opening set to the Mat-Su game, followed by the 'Crows turning up the heat and taking set two 13-25. Set 3, and did they let off? Nope, best one saved for the last one, 12-25, and Max left no doubt as to who would be taking the spoils. +32 total blowout, tied with Bryce for our #3 Blowout of the Week! Congrats, Bryce & Max!

Doing his best C-Ball impression, Bryce helped out the BUM Report this week by both serving and receiving a top three Blowout! Thanks, Bryce!  And thanks to Andy for dishing it out! Match 13, PAC 8 conference play, with Mat-Su making the cross-country trek to Denali, where the 66-rated Meese were immediately noted as sick or weak and thus became prey in the eyes of the Livid Lupines (89 @ home). +23 rated was less than St. Charles (+24) or Mat-Su (+26) in their blowouts, yet the Wolves seem to like the challenge. Though they didn't hit single digits in points allowed, they did keep it consistent, not letting the Meese get inside of 10 points from a win. Three very solid sets later (15-25, 12-25, 15-25), Denali had hit over .600 for the match (no set worse than .500) while holding Mat-Su to a Chronic Wasting Disease-like power set of .111 hitting. They out-dug the Moose 28 to 10, and out-blocked 'em 21-7. That was a set's worth of points right there, even before you start counting Mat-Su's 18 hitting errors. The final +33 tally wasn't fast enough to be called a mercy killing, yet was certainly a great pack stalking effort for Andy, our #2 Blowout of the Week!

And at #1 for the week, we stay in conference play, match 13, with the Dust Devils winding their way to Starkville. The Hemoglobin-Loving Hounds played the weakest of our home lineups for the blowouts this session, a "mere" 85.  T-Town though? They really set the bar low. The away 55 was the lowest of the session, tied non-ironically by Teutopolis in their non-conf match 15 v San Jose. More on that match later. In fact, as we look back at our lowest away ratings of the season, there have been 14 matches where a team was rated 51-55 away. C-Ball has 6 of those. The other 8 are 8 other teams, no one having done it more than once except our man Mike. 6 huzzahs for the gift-win-giving Twisters! In this case, the Bloodhounds were not thrown off scent by the slight breeze emanating from the other side of the net. The opening set was truly a sight to behold. Starkville scored first, and then just kept scoring. The Dust Devils didn't get their first point until it was 0-18! Not a typo. 18-straight points for Starkville to open the match, which has to be a TMVL record though we can't say that for absolute certain because we've not tracked that stat before. What's even funnier for me is that T-Town's first point didn't even come on a kill or block. Starkville's setter was in the net on an attempted block. How did 18 points roll out? 5 dig/kills, 5 hitting errors, 3 blocks, 5 aces (4-straight at one point). The Windy Warriors ended the set 4-25, with just 2 kills and 2 points from Starkville being in the net. 4-25! That's not just our new season low, that ties the #1 lowest all-TMVL-time points allowed in a set! Perhaps it was mercy. Perhaps the Twisters mustered a little more fight as the match progressed. Perhaps Olmec simply rolled the virtual dice and they were more average than the opener. In any case, 9-25 set 2 and 15-25 set 3, and we have our #1 Blowout of the Week, and tied for #1 on the season as well, a +47 victory by the Bloodhounds! Congrats, Eduard! As a side note, with another stat we haven't tracked yet jumped out to me from the match report, T-Town's hitting finished at -.203 for the match. I don't think I've seen a match-final under -.200 before. Not a single hitter finished with a positive hitting rating, the best on the team being MB Hamwaffle at .000, 2 kills, 2 errors, on 5 attempts. Everyone else had more errors than kills (apart from the setter, who had 0 kills, 0 errors, 2 attempts, both dug).  That's our new bar for "bottom seven peak performance."  Thanks to C-Ball and Eduard for their combined effort and non-effort on this one, truly a BUM-worthy match!

On Upsets, we're not going to mention the -1 upset in the WGM matches that went out to five sets before ending in the 5th set at 21-23, our new highest-scoring 5th set of the season! We're not going to mention it because it was just a -1 upset by San Jose, a win by the home side and #3 seed despite the visiting team playing the highest road rating of the WGM matches (89). We're also not going to note that in said 5th set, the road team, perhaps or perhaps not comprised of semi-aquatic mammals, served for match point at 14-13. And then at 15-14. And then at 16-15. And then again and again and again and again and again! Every. Single. Point. From 14-13 to 21-20, the losing team served 8 times for match point and lost all 8 of those points! And then from 21-21, the Shrimps won a point and in their first serve for match point, won it all. 21-23, 5 set upset after surviving 8(!) match points. Too bad it was just a -1 and not worth mentioning in the upsets. You can all offer Vick congrats anyway on the WGM win, despite it being an abso-tzao-gao-lutely pathetic excuse of a five-gorram-set upset where they were outscored by 5 points overall. And the resulting extra points in set 2 & 5 ended up with 229 total, our second-highest scoring match of the season, which garners exactly nothing outside of the BUM Report recognition that there were a lot of balls hit around in this one, and one manager got kicked squarely in his. (*sigh* 8 match point serves! we are not good. *sigh again*)

For the actual Upsets of the Week, we start with a small one, noteworthy mainly because it kept our streak going of Upset Sweeps! Match 15, non-conference, Columbia (69) at Spokane (71). Columbia poured the T7 into the conference matches and tossed out the Cherry Tomatoes for this one. The 'Squatch played a top line in the WGM (87), and look like they split the roster out over the other three matches (road 78, home 76, home 71). Not exactly playing for the win here themselves, with their weakest line of the weekend. Despite that, they were still slight home favorites. The match results said otherwise: 25-19, 25-18, 25-21, and the -2 Upset Sweep was completed! This match is one that perhaps highlights how the skills in TMVL play with each other, and end up leading to strikingly different match results. In this one, two stats stand out in stark contrast: A. Columbia hit .514 as a team, on .606 setting with a 13-SET setter while Spokane hit .270 on .493 setting with a 15-SET setter. B. Columbia had 16 blocks while Spokane had 5.  What jumps out from that is Spokane had better blockers from their setter (17) top OH (15) and both MBs (14). Columbia was weaker at each point from setter (9) to top OH (12) and both MBs (13,8) with only the RS (14) equal to any of the 'Squatch top 4.  So why weren't there more blocks for Spokane on the match?  Because Columbia received the ball better. What? The serve receive determined the blocks? Columbia's receiving stats (16,15,13) were better than Spokane's (14,12,12). The serving was fairly equal with Columbia having more aces (6 to 2) yet also more errors (12 to 8). Columbia received at .962 though with an average 2.33 (scale of 1-3), to Spokane's .902 and a 2.03 average rating. Weaker service receive scores lead to worse passes to the setter. The setter then has a lower chance of getting a high set roll (a 3 on a 1-3 scale). With a 1 or 2 set score, more blockers can get up and have a chance to block the attack.  On a great set (3), the blocking odds are way lower due to just one player having a chance to get in on the action. So despite weaker blockers overall, Columbia had more blocking chances and better blocking odds because Spokane's serve receivers were not getting clean and accurate passes to the setter as often. Similarly, yet reverse, Spokane's servers were a tad weaker, so the serves didn't always go to the weakest receiver, so the receives were for the better RCV-skilled Tomatoes, leading to cleaner passes to the setter. A clean pass opens the way to an easier set though, which despite having the poorer setter still led to much higher kill ratings by the higher-skilled attackers for Columbia.  So how did our -2 Upset Sweep come about? Sure, luck mattered, as it does in any Random Number Generated game. Yet the RNG was slanted toward Columbia in this one because the first contact when receiving serve was better, leading to a much broader pathway toward winning the point. If your team is in similar matches, and you're staring at the screen wondering how to even out blocking and hitting mismatches where your team is similarly-rated on BLK and ATK, look first at the setter, of course. And if that is close as well, look to the RCV stats and see if that is where your team could stand to improve next. If also similar, then go a step more toward first contact and look at the match results for the Serve ratings on each point. Are your players hitting 3 serves, which go to the other teams' weaker receivers? Lots of stats. Lots of depth. Lots of places to improve. This match was a good example of how one outcome (blocks) was really more a result of three steps earlier in the process (receiving).

Data BLAH stats BLAH one to three scales TRIPLE BLAH!!!  Give us the humanity and misery of others again, BUM Report, so we can laugh at those less fortunate than ourselves!

You have been heard - the back breaking Upsets!  Where we start with the perpetual on-and-off again love affair Olmec has with Mr. Dear John himself, Olmec's Hold-Me-Close Holden.  The Stone One loves you, or at least loves to mess with you.  Match 13, Big East conference play, and Sheboygan was playing for the win, 87 at home, because their kryptonite was coming to town: Porkopolis (road 83).  Because we have access to such things and because we can, we would like to point out that in the last ten matches of Hogs @ Bats, John's team has been higher rated 8 times.  They are 6-2 in those, suffering a -2 and -3 upset. When Cinci is higher rated, Cinci is 2-0. On the flip side, when JT has hosted Haiku Holden, in 8 matches going back to season 9, Cinci was higher rated 5 of the 8 times, and was 5-0 in those matches. John was higher rated in 3 matches, and went 1-2 (-4 & -5 upsets).  So, to recap, Sheboygan, in the past 6+ seasons, have never upset Cinci at home or on the road.  Porkopolis has four upsets (-2 to -5 range) in that same time span.  Now five.  If Olmec were a chatting AI, this seems like one of those cases where a guy starts chatting to get help on a lineup or math problem, and the AI steers the conversation over to whether or not the guy might want to kill himself. Hard to overcome a top team in your conference when Olmec never gives you a break in conference play. So what happened in this one? The Hovering Hams finished with 67 kills, just 2 more than the Bloodsuckers' 65. Sheboygan had more hitting errors in the opening set though, which Cinci took 25-22. In the 2nd set, it was more of the same, with Cinci's setter (20!) consistently putting hitters in good spots. That led to fewer blocks by the home team (only 10 v 21 for visitors).  Finally in set 3, John's Bats kept up with the Hogs, and they traded points up to 32-34, our highest-scoring set of the session and #2 on the season! And that was it for the home team. A brief point of hope just to make John's crushing defeat in set 4 (25-20) all the worse, and the -4 upset was complete, our #3 on the week. Congrats (again) for James and the Hogs overtaking the Bats on the road, and with this upset also overtook Sheboygan on the conference table, with both having a 6-4 conference record and Cinci holding the .502 pts tie break (+8 pts) over John's .500 (+1 pt). Seriously, just 7 points scored or allowed difference set #3 over #4 for the tourney seedings. Now JT avoids Alton until the final (if both make it).  Every match matters.

At #2 we go to the WGM round of 16, match 16, Ames @ Pekin.  The Edible Thistles were making an effort, playing a road 86, third-highest (tied) of the WGM matches. What they ran into though was a Pekin team playing the 2nd-highest home rating of the season-to-date, 94. The Legume Legion's home rating was the highest of the WGM so far, and 3 higher than the next-best, #1 seed Quincy's 91. So, then, it was clear to Olmec that this latest greatest threat to Al's next trophy in the cabinets had to go.  Set 1 set the tone. It was tight early and late, with the largest lead of the entire set only at 3 points, 11-8 Ames. Pekin had a chance to go up 3 themselves, at 16-18, serving to make it 16-19 only for Kirk to serve it out. Instead, it was 17-18, and Pekin's lead was gone by 20-20. At 23-24, Pekin served first for set point, and Ames got the kill to stay alive. They'd go on to swap points, though Pekin never led after that serve. Ames served 5 times for set point, finally winning the set only after Pekin committed back-to-back errors, with a net violation at 28-28 and then down 29-28 they attacked the ball out and it was 30-28 for Ames in the opener! The Pod People rallied back in set 2, taking a lead at 5-6 and never trailing the rest of the match, with leads up to 5 pts (though Ames did tie it up at 15-15). Pekin didn't buckle or break though, and cruised back out to a 21-25 ending. And then the service issues came up again. Ames' frosted green tips must throw off depth perception when they start swaying back and forth pre-serve. Ames had two aces in the first 5 points. Pekin had two service errors in the first ten. By 17-rated servers! Pekin rallied back from the early deficit and took the lead at 14-15, and again at 15-16 before another bad serve gave it back to Ames without making 'em earn it. 16-16 turned to 20-16, and then after getting one back at 20-17, what did the Pod People do? They served it out again, again by a 17-rated server! Now 21-17, and despite a great rally at 23-19 (4 digs!) to get to 20 pts, Pekin stalled out and the Artichokes took set 3 25-20.  Now with the match on the line, and Pekin needing to exert dominance early, Ames came out and served... an ace. Despite that lousy omen, it was tight most of the way, with it going from 4-3 to 18-17 without either team ever leading by more than one point! That ended with a Steve Tommatta ace making it 19-17 (though he then served it out to give it back to Pekin). Tommatta made up for that erorr on the next point with a great back row kill off the block, and Ames served at 20-18. A weaker pass (2) and serve (2) led to a key block, and now up 3 at 21-18, Ames never let Pekin back into it. They traded points up to 24-21 before it was finally over on the Watkins kill, 25-21 final for set 4 and the -8 WGM Upset was completed! The key on this one appeared to be in the serve game. For the match, the hitting was really close (.442 Ames v .476 Pekin, both with 17 errors), as was the setting (.633 v .649) and receiving (.962 v .955), with identical digs at 19 each. Again, we saw a blocking difference, with Ames landing 20 team blocks (no solo) and Pekin only having 10, with 6 blocking errors. I think that was fueled by weaker serving random numbers. Ames served at a rate of .880 for the match, with 4 aces and 12 errors. Pekin served at .832, with 3 aces and 16 errors.  If you're looking at the little points that killed rallies or let the other side back into it (as noted in the commentary above), it was lousy-timed service errors on this one. And weaker serves lead to easier passes, which lead to better sets, which lead to less blocking chances, which is exactly where we landed. 10 more blocks, and 4 less blocking errors, equaled 14 points more for Ames. Add in one more Ace and 4 fewer serve errors, and there's 5 more points for 19 total. Ames ended up winning by a combined 7 points over the four sets. If even half those blocking differences go away, or the serve game ended up even, that's the difference in a set won/loss and we're looking at least at a 5th set, if not Pekin winning in 4. MB Corbin had the worst serving day, despite a 17 rating, as he was the key culprit. Sure, he had 3 blocks and 13 kills. He also netted 0, as in zip, zilch, nada, nothing, for service points. 13 serves, 4 errors, no aces, no points scored when he served, .692 serve rating worst on the team. Libero Blackburn only serves at 14 rating, so it made sense to let 17-rated Corbin serve. Still, with that performance, perhaps less would have been more. In any case, it's easy to judge a match once it's over, and this one is over as Colin pulls off a massive -8 WGM Upset against the #4 seed and overall #2 T7 Legume Legion, our #2 Upset of the Week!

For our top upset, we go back to Match 13, PAC 8 conference play. Carlsbad (79) at San Jose (88). Yes, Phil is leading the PAC 8. No, this was not their best lineup. Yes, they played three A-rated players. Yes, they also played two D-rated players. Vick had out three A-rated guys and 4 B's. What was at stake here? First place in the conference. If the Ten-Legged Terrors won, it would be 7-3 for both teams in the conference, though the Chameleons would still hold the sets won/lost edge. That's a two-game swing though, with just four matches remaining after the session was done. San Jose won the opening set, 23-25, despite trailing at 20-16, and not tying it back up until 23-23. A timely dig/kill followed by a Chameleon attacking error (his outside-facing eye was rotated onto the wrong ball, we think, we never can tell where those guys are actually looking) gave the final two points to the Shrimps. Set 2 also went San Jose's way, pulling ahead at 9-10 and then leading the rest of the set to a final 21-25 score. Set 3 opened with a dud, service error for San Jose. Then another at 2-2. And another at 5-6. That kept Team HyperColor in this one, leading up to 20-21, San Jose serving. Carlsbad got the kill, and then a block followed by an ace to steal the momentum and lead 23-21! Venkman got a kill to swim back to 23-22, only for another service error! 24-22, and a lousy pass (1) led to a lousy set (1) and an easy dig for Carlsbad, with the return set on target and the kill by Barnes to win the set, 25-22! Now on to set 4, and the teams traded points and small leads up to 20-20, where San Jose again gave up the lead with a service error. Carlsbad targeted Valentini, San Jose's worst passer, whose lousy pass (1) led to a weak set (2), and a dig/kill for the Chameleons and the 2-pt lead! Then another dig/kill and a block and now it's 24-20! The Shrimp clawed one back, only for Dunne to redeem a bad Barnes pass, and the Morgan kill ended it, 25-21. Set 5, and San Jose needed a strong start. Ace! Dig/kill! Dig/kill! and it's 0-3! Then out to 1-5 and Valentini again errs at the serve, handing it to Carlsbad who hits the ace! Instead of possibly 1-6, it's now 3-5, and though San Jose swapped points to 5-7, they again had a service error and free point for the Spiking Saurians, and the gap closed. Up to 9-9, and Carlsbad serves it out! Only for San Jose to give it right back with their own lousy serve! 10-10 and San Jose's Valentini now hits it out, which gives the ball to Carlsbad's OH Drake Morgan, he of the 19 SRV rating.  Ace. ACE. ACE!!! Three straight (followed by a service error) and Carlsbad leads 14-11! The San Jose ace was too little, too late, and the final 15-13 5th set score gave Phil the -9 upset, our #1 Upset of the Week and sole first place by 2 matches in the PAC 8! Congrats, Phil! What went wrong for San Jose? In a word, or rather, in a name, OH Valentini. The worst player on San Jose's roster for the match got sorely exposed at RCV. OH Venkman RCV 17 & L Walker RCV 17. So every good Carlsbad serve went to the Popcorn Shrimp-sized OH, RCV 13. That's not shabby. It's also not great. When you have the likes of OH Morgan (19 SRV, leading all players in service points at 12 and aces at 4) hitting them at you, you need a solid receive game. Instead, Valentini returned at .707, worst of the match, with 12 receiving errors, and an average return rating of 1.54. Anything under 2 is not good.  Anything around 1.5 or lower (meaning more 1's than anything else) is downright lousy. It's hard to say exactly how many points that led to San Jose missing, as some were redeemed by S Abreu's good day (SET 16, overall .629 set rating, higher than S Dunne's .571 for Carlsbad).  If it was even 2 points though, in any given set that Carlsbad won, that made the difference. Ultimately, Valentini's 2.11 match rating was the worst of the day, even lower than Carlsbad's D-rated players and less than half of anyone else on the Shrimp roster. Valentini is just a sophomore, and has a solid B+ potential. He's going to need some RCV love soon though, if he's not going to cost San Jose future matches, as he may have already cost them the conference title (or at least a share) this season, along with the blemish on San Jose's otherwise perfect 7-1 home record and league-leading 12-4 overall record.

What have we now for the More portion of our weekly bulletin? We had a new high for home rating, with Columbia putting out a 95!  We also saw Columbia throw that T7 (rated 91 on the road) out in match 14, conference play at Portland. Only the Flanneled Fellsmen were ready, and played their own 91-rated team! Despite Steve keeping his only-team-that-has-done-it standard (and combining to set a new season ratings high at 182), Olmec saw fit to give Antione the straight-set win, at least making them go to 27-29 to win set 2. That kept Columbia from a share of the BIG 8 lead, so Roger can send a thank you card to Antoine's Axemen as he'll have home court in the tourney should both Pekin and Columbia make the final! On the opposite end of the power rankings, we have Nashville and Carlsbad, who really, really, really don't care about the non-conference matches. Nashville played a home 56 against Denali, and Carlsbad a home 58 against Starkville (and yet took it to 5 sets despite the -15 rating edge!). Those are the 2nd and 3rd lowest home ratings all season-to-date, with just one match all the way back in match 1 being lower (54). We had an interesting match result in match 15, non-conference, Squirrels at Scarecrows. Schenectady was higher rated (68-63) and ended up with the 5-set win, yet got so badly beat down in sets 2 (14-25) and 4 (15-25) that the resulting final tally had them win the match despite being outscored by 15 points overall, our new Reverse Blowout of the Season! Congrats for winning one the hard way, Brian, including needing a 26-24 set 1 and 18-16 set 5 to pull it off! Who is streaking right now? Alton, Portland, Starkville, and Burlington have 3-match win streaks going on. With both Kentucky and San Diego winning to break their extended losing streaks (congrats Matt & Matt!), that leaves Sheboygan with a 4-match losing streak and New Orleans at 3-losses needing a quick turnaround to salvage their respective seasons. Home conference tourney matches should help, as can home non-conference matches, which are utterly hit or miss as managers make their own priorities for wins vs. XP.

As an example of what Non-Conference matches can bring, we direct your attention to Match 15, Teutopolis at San Jose. We have seen both Mike and Vick earlier in this column, for differing reasons. Here, they met up to offer us a new season low for combined match ratings. T-Town (55) + San Jose (59) = Poo Poo Platter, our TOoT Match of the Week (The Opposite of Trying) at a combined 114, worse than anything we saw even in the first session! So the Opposite of Congrats to Vick & C-Ball, and congrats to anyone playing them for non-conf matches this coming session!

We'd also like to point out that we're expecting huge, HU-YUUUGE! RP to be spent on the services of +2 SET Setter Favaro this coming session with a whopping 10 teams competiting!  Who has the edge if they want to break the bank? Pekin, of course, sadly for everyone else in the league, with 3324 saved up and not bidding on any player prior to this one just to ensure that Roger can top everyone else! Alton's 2476 looks small by comparison, and the only ones higher (Starkville, Manitowoc) aren't bidding on this one. At least we may also see high prices for the +2 BLK MB Mandrake, as both Columbia and Starkville have well over 2000 RP to drop. We look forward to new recruiting records being set with 6 5* players available this coming weekend!  And where are Colin and Andy with their 2449 and 2452 war chests? Quietly bidding up the next 5* OH in session 8 and setting up our next massive recruit haul! It's good to see others jumping in there to keep them honest and make sure weren't not letting these top guys go for less than 1500 RP. Right, everyone else who has 1500 RP or more? ('cause we don't)

As we wrap up this edition of your favo(u)rite (because: only) running TMVL column, feel free to post what we missed about your team or your conference this session, and especially drop a note below if you have a team you'd like featured with a deep dive in Brian's Nuthouse next week! Something a little different this season to break up the typical Blowouts, Upsets, and More! fare that you've come to know and at least begrudingly not petition to have Al block from future postings! Happy Olmec'ing to all, and we look forward to featuring all you who won't have happy thoughts after the next round of Blowouts and Upsets in the WGM Elite 8 and the Conference Tourney openers to come!