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Busy NCAA weekend turns out Sweet for MIAC squads

BLOOMINGTON, Minn. – The most exciting time of the year is in full swing for fall sports teams in the Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (MIAC).
 
National tournament play began for men's and women's soccer teams over the weekend, while the NCAA Championship selections for cross country and football were announced on Sunday, and the field for the Women's Volleyball Championship was released on Monday.
 
All told, 14 MIAC teams - and six individual MIAC competitors - across six sports have received invitations to "The Big Dance" in the last week.
 
| Men's Soccer Bracket | Women's Soccer Bracket | Cross Country Qualifiers | Football Bracket | Volleyball Bracket |
FOUR MIAC SOCCER TEAMS PUNCH TICKETS TO SWEET 16
The MIAC qualified a conference-record six teams to the NCAA Men's and Women's Soccer Championships last week, and after two rounds of competition, four are now headed to the Sweet 16.
 
On the men's side, Augsburg (18-2-2), Macalester (17-4-0), and St. Olaf (18-2-3) were all chosen to host opening round games and each emerged from their four-team pods victorious. 
 
The Auggies defeated Occidental by a 3-1 margin on November 15 and maintained a 1-0 lead over Edgewood for more than 80 minutes on November 16 to return to the Sweet 16 for the second time in program history and the first time since 2008. Augsburg will now head to Washington University's campus in St. Louis, where the Auggies will square off with No. 9 Cortland (14-1-5) on Saturday, November 22. Game time is set for 11:00 a.m. on Francis Olympic Field.
 
St. Olaf avenged last year's PK exit from the NCAA Tournament at the hands (and feet) of UW-Superior by shutting out the Yellowjackets, 3-0, in the opening round of the 2025 Tournament on November 15. Like Augsburg, St. Olaf also earned a 1-0 victory in the second round the following day. The Oles' goal against Luther came in the 64th minute to send St. Olaf back to the Sweet 16 for the fourth time in the last five seasons. On Monday, St. Olaf was selected to host the sectional rounds of the Men's Tournament this weekend. The Oles will welcome No. 15 Williams (10-4-4) to Rolf Mellby Field at 11:00 a.m. on Saturday with a spot in the Elite Eight on the line.
 
As fate would have it, Macalester will also be headed to Northfield for the Sweet 16. The Scots collected a pair of 2-1 wins to punch their tickets to sectionals for the fourth time in program history and the first time since 2002. The MIAC playoff champs defeated Illinois Wesleyan in the opening round last Saturday before fending off UW-Eau Claire in round two on Sunday. The Scots are now set for a 1:30 p.m. match-up with No. 8 Wheaton College (Mass.) at St. Olaf on Saturday.
 
Gustavus, which earned an at-large berth to the Men's Soccer Championship, closed out the 2025 campaign on November 15 with a 3-0 loss to Edgewood in the second game of the opening round in Minneapolis. The Gusties finished the year with a 14-6-1 record.
 
In the NCAA Division III Women's Soccer Championship, the MIAC Playoff champion Carleton Knights (18-2-2) are headed to the Sweet 16 for the first time since 2008 after defeating John Carroll, 1-0, in the first round on November 15 and becoming the "1" in Lake Forest's 21-1-0 record on November 16 with a 2-0 victory over the Foresters. Both of Carleton's second-round goals came in the second half against what was the last remaining undefeated and untied team in Division III this season. The Knights will return to Illinois this weekend to take on Swarthmore (15-3-4) in the sectional round on the campus of the University of Chicago. Game time is set for 1:30 p.m. on Saturday, November 22, at UChicago's Stagg Grass Fields in the Windy City.
 
MIAC Regular season women's soccer champion St. Catherine (17-4-0) wrapped up its historic season with a 4-0 loss to UW-La Crosse, also at UChicago, on November 15. The Wildcats finished the year with a program record 17 wins.
  
| Men's Soccer Bracket | Women's Soccer Bracket |
OLES, KNIGHTS, AND SIX MIAC INDIVIDUAL MIAC RUNNERS HEADED TO NCAA CROSS COUNTRY CHAMPIONSHIPS
Three Northfield squads have been selected to represent the MIAC at the 2025 NCAA Cross Country Championships. The women's teams from both Carleton and St. Olaf earned at-large bids to nationals, while the Oles' men's team also received an at-large berth. A total of 32 teams were selected to participate in each championship. The top seven-person team automatically qualified from each of the 10 regions, and 22 additional teams were selected at-large.
 
In addition to the team participants, the first seven student-athletes from each region who were not part of a qualifying team were selected to participate in the NCAA Championships. The list this year included six runners from the MIAC. Augsburg's Mohammed Bati, Carleton's Gabe Nichols, and Saint John's Cole Stencel each qualified as individual participants for the men's championships, while Gustavus' Molly Liston will join Macalester's Kate Fox and Ingrid Norquist in the women's championship race.
 
Converse University and OneSpartanburg, Inc. will host the 2025 NCAA Division III Men's and Women's Cross Country Championships on Saturday, November 22, at the Roger Milliken Cross Country course in Spartanburg, South Carolina. The men's race will begin at 9:00 a.m. Central, followed by the women's race at 10:00 a.m. Central. A live webstream of the championships will occur on NCAA.com beginning at 9:00 a.m. Central time until the conclusion of the awards ceremony.
 
| Cross Country Qualifiers |
BETHEL, SAINT JOHN'S EARN NCAA FOOTBALL PLAYOFF BERTHS, BYES, AND HOSTING DUTIES
Bethel (10-0) and Saint John's (9-1) will be well-rested for their returns to the NCAA Division III Football Playoffs at the end of the month. The Johnnies and MIAC champion Royals both finished among the top 16 teams in the NCAA Power Index (NPI) and earned byes to the second round of the 40-team national tournament. Both teams have also been selected to host noon games on Saturday, November 29.
 
Playoff-bound for the fifth consecutive season, No. 3 Bethel will welcome either Concordia University Wisconsin (9-1) or Coe College (8-2) to Royal Stadium in the second round. The NACC champion Falcons will host the Kohawks - an at-large recipient from the American Rivers Conference - in Mequon this weekend. Coe will be making its third straight trip to the NCAA Playoffs, while CUW is back in the postseason for the first time since 2013. 
 
The Royals are 5-0 all-time against the Falcons, though Bethel and Concordia Wisconsin have not squared off since September 2011. Their only previous postseason meeting came in the opening round of the 2007 NCAA Football Playoffs, which resulted in a 28-0 Bethel rout on the Royals' run to the national semifinals. Bethel's first-ever meeting with Coe came in the first round of the 2024 NCAA Playoffs. The Royals held off the Kohawks for a 31-26 victory and finished the season in the national quarterfinals.
 
No. 6 Saint John's - returning to the NCAA Playoffs for the 30th time in program history - already knows its second-round opponent. The Johnnies will have two weeks and Thanksgiving dinner to prepare for No. 23 Monmouth (9-1) on November 29. The Midwest Conference champion Fighting Scots are back in the postseason for the first time since 2019. Monmouth and Saint John's have only met once before, in the opening round of the 2005 NCAA Football Playoffs. SJU won that game in lopsided fashion, with Johnnie defensive end Kevin McNamara setting an NCAA record with 7.5 sacks in the game.
 
All NCAA Division III playoff football games will be streamed on ESPN+ in 2025. Fans who do not have an ESPN+ account can subscribe here.
 
| Football Bracket |
THREE MIAC SQUADS SELECTED FOR NCAA VOLLEYBALL TOURNAMENT
While Saint Benedict (21-6) clinched an automatic bid to the NCAA Women's Volleyball Championships for the second year in a row after pulling off a dramatic reverse sweep in the MIAC Playoff Championship on Saturday night, St. Olaf (26-8) and Gustavus (23-7) held onto cautious optimism about their chances for an at-large berth in the national tournament.
 
That faith was rewarded on Monday when all three MIAC squads were included in the 64-team NCAA bracket reveal.
 
The Bennies and Gusties are now bound for Oshkosh, Wisconsin, where WIAC champion UW-Oshkosh will host an eight-team regional beginning on Thursday, November 20. CSB will open the action at 11:30 a.m. against No. 17 WashU (22-8). This will be the second straight season that the Bennies will take on the Bears to open the NCAA Tournament; WashU claimed a 3-0 sweep against Saint Ben's in the UW-Whitewater regional last November. The winner of this year's match will take on either No. 18 Dubuque (25-4) or Cornell (19-10) on Friday.
 
No. 23 Gustavus will challenge Edgewood (25-6) in the 4:30 p.m. match on Thursday in Oshkosh. The Gusties and Eagles have never met in the NCAA Tournament before, but did clash earlier this season at the Loras Invitational in September. Gustavus won that match, 3-0. The winner of Thursday's contest will face either the host Titans (28-3) – ranked No. 4 in the most recent AVCA Coaches Poll – or Greenville (24-10) on Friday.
 
Regular-season MIAC champion St. Olaf is headed to Bloomington, Illinois, on Thursday to compete in the Illinois Wesleyan regional. The Oles will take on a familiar foe in UMAC champion Northwestern-St. Paul (23-7) at 4:30 p.m. on Thursday. St. Olaf has won 24 of the 35 matches in the all-time series; however, the Eagles claimed the 2025 regular-season matchup in five sets back in September. The victor of Thursday's match will challenge either the No. 3-ranked Titans of host Illinois Wesleyan (26-2) or Asbury (22-7) on Friday.
 
| Volleyball Bracket |
FOLLOW THE ACTION
Fans can use the NCAA's interactive brackets as well as the MIAC scoreboard to track the progress of each championship throughout the postseason.
 
| Men's Soccer Bracket | Women's Soccer Bracket | Cross Country Qualifiers | Football Bracket | Volleyball Bracket |