First FCS Preseason Polls Are Out and JMU Is Not In Them

NCAA basketball has March Madness. FBS football has the bowl games and a kinda sorta four team playoff thing. The FCS however, has a real honest to God playoff system in which 24 of the top teams in the country face off to determine a true National Champion. Which means that the polls are thankfully not all that important. And the preseason polls are even less so. But the publication of said preseason polls are a welcome sign that football season is fast approaching. JMU has often been the beneficiary of some sort of historical former champion bias with preseason polls. This year, not so much. Lindsy and the Sporting News football preview magazines hit the shelves and neither publication has JMU in its FCS top 25 preseason poll.

The polls aren’t available online, but Eastern Washington took the top spot in each. Despite losing over 20 starters and its head coach, North Dakota State found itself in the top 3 for both polls along with Southeastern Louisiana. Villanova checked in at a CAA best fifth for the Sporting News. The Sporting News has New Hampshire as its top CAA team, also at fifth. Richmond, William and Mary, and Towson were also ranked in both polls. .

Should we be worried? Well, no. Preseason polls are notoriously suspect and we’ve never put much stock in them. While we don’t know for certain, it sure doesn’t seem like these things are rooted in any rigorous analysis. It’s more like taking last year’s final poll, seeing which teams lost marquee players, and then shuffling the order slightly, add a few perennial playoff teams, and filling in the remaining slots with teams finishing near the top of power conferences. And if you do that, presto, no Dukes!

Despite its significant advantages in terms of resources and fans support, JMU has not lived up to expectations in recent years. You could say it’s been one of the most underperforming programs in the FCS relatively speaking. We all know this. It’s why Mickey Matthews was fired and Everett Withers was brought in. Withers is putting his own stamp on the program. He’s bringing in new blood in the form of transfers and forcing every returning player to earn his spot on the field. We happen to think the future is very bright. But to the outsider JMU is just a program that has underachieved since 2009 and entering the 2014 season attempting to replace Michael Birdsong, a record setting QB, and its all time winningest coach. To the outsider paying casual attention, things might look dicey. To some of us though, the ship finally has a chance to be righted. And we’re optimistic Withers and his staff have assembled the talent to do just that.