11/29/2011 6:27 PM 

The ACHA released its second Division II rankings of the year today, and the Retrievers were in 2nd position once again.

The first ranking period saw UMBC garner 7 second place votes and 4 third place votes. After a November that saw the Retrievers navigate a tough schedule with a 5-1-0 record, the voters rewarded UMBC with all eleven second place votes. With Florida Gulf Coast University having an automatic berth in Nationals as the host team, there is only one automatic bid available in the Southeast Region; that auto-bid currently belongs to UMBC.

Every voter had the exact same ballot for the top four teams in the region. FGCU sit in first place with 9 points, UMBC in second with 18 points, Penn State is third with 27 points and Miami is in fourth with 36 points. From there the voters begin to disagree. Liberty edged out Kennesaw St for the #5 spot with 57 points to Kennesaw's 58. Maryland-College Park was voted as a solid #7 with 68 points. Virginia Tech fell from #4 in the first ranking to #8 following a 1-3-1 November with 75 points, Rider dropped one spot to #9 with 79 points. Pittsburgh made their top 10 debut coming in with 93 points.

Traditional Southeast powers Ohio State and Temple rebounded from slow starts to move into the bubble positions of #11 and #12 after being 15 and 14 respectively in the first ranking . They have 112 and 117 points respectively. Rowan fell to #13 with 119 points, Kentucky dropped from #10 to #14 and recieved 125 points. Bowling Green moved into the #15 spot with 128 points to finish out the rankings after not even recieving a vote the first time around.

Dayton dropped out of the top 15 but still recieved votes, Toledo also recieved votes.

Rankings are comprised of votes from 11 coaches, managers, and independent voters from across the region. The highest and lowest rankings are dropped and the remaining nine votes are added together based on a 1 point for first place, 2 for second place, etc. system to give each team their point totals. The third ranking period is comprised of games from November 28 to December 18, and the rankings will subsequently be released once they are tabulated.

During the third ranking period the #2 ranked Retrievers will play #3 Penn St, #13 Rowan, #12 Temple, #7 UMCP, and #14 Kentucky.