Welcome to Volume 1 of the D5 Power Rankings, a new feature we will premier this season so that league members can get mad at other people’s rankings of their teams and not just my own. Methodology is simple; each week I will send a poll to a select group of league insiders (aka people who have nothing better to do but fill out a street hockey survey every week), then I will collate their responses along with my own into these unified ranks. Future editions of this will be a weighted mix of recent results with projected finish but seeing as these are the preseason ones, made before any games are played, they are based on zero on-ice play and literally only on looking at the lists of players and trying to figure out who the hell they are. Do not use this list for gambling purposes or the gods will surely punish you like they punished Hicks for taking Gonzaga -4 (sorry, this will never stop being funny to me).
1) Hungry Hippos 2.0
Rank Points: 40
Average Rank: 2
Highest Rank: 1
Lowest Rank: 3
Comments: Hicks may have gotten smoked betting on college basketball, as is tradition, but he rolls into this season with his finest draft in years and earns the #1 spot in the preseason ranks. He and Hogg made it to the finals together in Fall 2019 and they’ll look to run it back this season. If the 3rd liners end up being sleepers, this team has championship potential.
2) I Just Blue Myself
Rank Points: 38
Average Rank: 2.4
Highest Rank: 1
Lowest Rank: 5
Comments: Blue finishes 2nd in the inaugural voting and settles in as the #2 preseason, even with three of five 1st place votes. While this is clearly the most progressive team in the league with literally double the ladies of most other teams and was almost called “I Just Blue They/Them” before it lost a razor-thin team vote, there are some questions as to how this group will mesh and how the 4 lady rotation will work. But with a good mix of sexiness at all positions, chances are blue finishes top 3 for the 6th time in 7 seasons.
3) Chili Peppers
Rank Points: 36
Average Rank: 2.8
Highest Rank: 1
Lowest Rank: 6
Comments: Most captains completely butcher their first draft so you can imagine everyone’s surprise utter shock when Nate came out of the draft with a solid all-around team. Sure, having the #2 overall pick helps but the bigger assist may have been in getting Campbell, who drafted a team of his own once upon a time, to take the reins as alternate captain. With a solid core of Sam, Tarnow, Ryann and Jeff Green in net, the only thing that may prevent them from a top 4 finish is attendance, which is indeed very suspect with Sam basically living in Montreal and Nate generally showing up to games in the middle of the first period.
4) MelRose Place
Rank Points: 28
Average Rank: 4.4
Highest Rank: 3
Lowest Rank: 7
Comments: A solid group for MelRose which, for both of their seasons, has been better than their final standings position and now boast a roster including Wes, Danilo, Izzy and Ridzik in net. Rankers worry what this team will look like on days that Wes doesn’t show up, but one reason Wes is such a great 1st round pick is his attendance is usually stellar. They should be just fine.
5) The Narwhals
Rank Points: 20
Average Rank: 6
Highest Rank: 4
Lowest Rank: 7
Comments: A season after winning the championship Jack clearly wanted to draft some of his friends, trading up to get Kev and picking up his ice hockey teammate Tom early in the 2nd round even though he probably could have gotten him in the 4th as he’s a rookie and half the captains had no idea who the hell he was. Homecomings abound as Jacob Green and Shirtless Rob are back to go for the repeat and Corey returns to his first D5 team. Jack and Annie will need to recapture last season’s elite form if they’re going to have a shot at making some noise in the playoffs.
6) Green Street Hooligans
Rank Points: 19
Average Rank: 6.2
Highest Rank: 3
Lowest Rank: 9
Comments: Mixed bag for green here as they have two top-end male forwards in Neil and Tom, but both are heavy attendance risks due to music (one playing it, one following Phish around the country with a war chest of drugs). The ladies will have to score by committee and the team will have to play with far more cohesion than last year’s version. With some strong play from Max I see them as being middle of the pack and a possible playoff dark horse, but not a true championship contender (yet).
7) Shooting Blancs
Rank Points: 18
Average Rank: 6.4
Highest Rank: 5
Lowest Rank: 9
Comments: Simon feels his team has been underrated, that they have excellent depth which will carry them and that “winners win baby.” Being called baby by Simon was really beautiful but I’m not sure I fully agree with him. Then again, we did have last season’s team ranked fairly low as well and they made it all the way to the finals. We’ll see where they stand after their first couple games.
8) Medium Rare
Rank Points: 14
Average Rank: 7.2
Highest Rank: 3
Lowest Rank: 9
Comments: Since this team has been drafted there have been tons of comments about how savage the guys on this team are, and with very good reason. They have top-end offensive talent in Jason, Jeff Oberg and Source but their performance may be inhibited by what I am sure will be many mid-game bench shotguns. Meanwhile action is extremely hot on the Source v Kev points bet so there’s a chance Sean will actually show up to games this season in between making out with girls at Brooklyn cowboy bars. Brita and Vanessa are missing week one, probably on the advice of counsel, but once they return this should be one of the best offensive teams in the league. It just remains to be seen if they ever play defense and if they are ever sober.
9) Julie’s Football Club
Rank Points: 12
Average Rank: 7.6
Highest Rank: 5
Lowest Rank: 9
Comments: I legitimately can’t believe this ranking. I was the one person who ranked them above 8, all the way up at #5, and I expect them to be middle of the pack, but apparently some people think they will be quite bad. I suppose only time will tell and somehow orange does have attendance issues every season but if their players show up, this team will surprise people. It’s a veteran group and it’s not super sexy, but the football club should be just fine. If anyone wants to place straight up bets on how orange does this season, please contact me directly.