There will be a six-team seeded championship the week prior to the NCAA championship. The conference champion shall be determined by the winner of the championship match.
Seeding for the Championship tournament will be determined by conference standings using best conference records and/or tie-breakers below. The top six teams will advance to the conference tournament to be played the week before the NCAA Tournament. On Tuesday of championship week, No. 6 will play at No. 3 and No. 5 will play at No. 4 in opening round action, as the top two seeds receive opening round byes. Semifinal action will be played on the Thursday of Championship week, as the winner of 4/5 will play at No. 1 in one semfinal and winner of 3/6 will play at No. 2 in the second semifinal. The semifinal winners will advance to the Championship to be played at the highest remaining seed on Saturday.
* Please note that the Empire 8 does not re-seed after the opening round.
Two-way tie: Result of the in-season head-to-head conference competition shall be used to break the tie.
Three or more team tie-breaker
i.) If there is a tie among three or more teams for a place in the standings, head-to-head conference record amongst the tied teams will be considered. The team(s) with the best record versus each other shall be given the highest seed.
Example: Three teams are tied with a 4-3 conference record - Team A is 2-0, Team B is 1-1 and Team C is 0-2 amongst the tied teams. Then clearly team A has the best record and would advance to highest available seeding, leaving team B and C to revert to a two-team tiebreak.
*Anytime a team is advanced (based on record/results) from the three or more team tie-break the remaining teams will revert to a two-way tiebreak scenario.
ii.) If there is still a tie involving more than two teams. For example: Team A is 1-1, Team B is 1-1, Team C is 1-1 against each other. Each team’s head to head record will be compared in descending order starting with the highest seeded team.
- Example 1: Naz, Fisher, Utica are all tied for third place.
- Their records against each other are all 1-1. So they move into step two. The rankings are as follows:
- 1- Ithaca
- 2- Stevens
- 3- Naz, Fisher, Utica
- 6- Hartwick
- 7- Alfred
- 8- Elmira
- 9-Houghton
- Naz, Fisher, and Utica all have the same head to head record except Fisher beat Stevens which means that Fisher advances to third place leaving Naz and Utica tied for fourth place so they would go to the two-way tie breaker.
- Example 2: Naz, Fisher, Utica are all tied for third place.
- Their records against each other are all 2-1. So they move into step two. The rankings are as follows:
- 1- Ithaca
- 2- Stevens
- 3- Naz, Fisher, Utica
- 6- Hartwick
- 7- Alfred
- 8- Elmira
- 9-Houghton
- Naz, Fisher, and Utica all have the same head to head record except Fisher and Naz beat Stevens which means that Fisher and Naz would be advanced and compared head to head in the running for third place and fourth place and Utica would be placed fifth.
iii.) If there is still a tie among three or more teams, use goal differential of the tied teams only. Goal Differential- the goal differential of the tied teams only at the end of the contest shall be used up to maximum of six goals.
Example:
Team A – Goal Differential +2
Team B – Goal Differential –0
Team C – Goal Differential –2
Team A would earn the highest possible seed, leaving Team B and Team C to be compared in a two-way tiebreaker.
iv.) If there still remains a tie between three or more teams, use goal differential for games against teams in descending order starting with the highest seeded team.