News Summary

GRANVILLE — Around the North Coast Athletic Conference, they're known as the "W schools" — Wabash, Wittenberg and Wooster.

They can claim 11 solo or shared NCAC titles over the past 10 seasons, so it was no surprise they were chosen as the top three teams in the conference at the 24th annual NCAC Football Media Day.

Wabash was chosen by the media and the coaches to win the NCAC, garnering seven of 10 first-place votes from the coaches and 29 of 32 from the media. Wittenberg was picked to finish second, earning three first-place votes in both the coaches' and media polls. Wooster was third in the media poll and fourth in the coaches poll.

Last year, Wittenberg was chosen to finish fourth in the league, but they finished 7-3 overall, 6-1 in the NCAC during the regular season, sharing the title with Wabash.

Wittenberg coach Joe Fincham understands not being the favorite after the graduation of 2006 NCAC Offensive Player of the Year Tristan Murray, a Tecumseh grad.

"I think we have a solid nucleus," Fincham said, "but we have a lot to prove of both sides of the ball. We're going to be leaning on a lot of young kids."

Wabash coach Chris Creighton has never been a big proponent of preseason polls, but he feels his team is near the top.

"We feel good about our team because we have a lot of experience back and they're motivated," he said. "It would be interesting to find out how many times the media has been right in the last few years. It's probably been wrong a lot more than it's been right."

Contact this reporter at (937) 328-0365 or mcooper@coxohio.com

Media poll

Team Points

1. Wabash (29) 317

2. Wittenberg (3) 281

3. Wooster 228

4. Allegheny 222

5. Ohio Wesleyan 185

6. Oberlin 154

7. Kenyon 141

8. Denison 125

9. Earlham 69

10. Hiram 38

Coaches poll

Team Points

1. Wabash (7) 97

2. Wittenberg (3) 91

3. Allegheny 76

4. Wooster 66

5. Ohio Wesleyan 60

6. Oberlin 49

7. Kenyon 41

8. Denison 40

9. Earlham 18

10. Hiram 12