BALTIMORE, MD -- The Johns Hopkins football team has separate winning streaks that stretch into the teens and a pair of national rankings in the teens as well as the Blue Jays are ranked 13th in this week's American Football Coaches Association (AFCA) Division III Poll and 18th in the latest D3football.com Poll. The Blue Jays earned 500 points to move from 15th to 13th in the AFCA Poll, while they totaled 202 points to make the move from 19th to 18th in the D3football.com Poll.
The AFCA Poll, which the Johns Hopkins Athletic Communications Office uses to reflect JHU's official national ranking, is headed again this week by Mount Union, which grabbed 40 of 42 first-place votes and totaled 1,048 points. Mary Hardin-Baylor earned the remaining two first-place votes and checks in at number two in the poll with 1,009 points, while St. Thomas (949 points), Linfield (901) and Wisconsin-Whitewater (827) round out the top five.
Johns Hopkins (5-0, 4-0 Centennial) ran its regular season winning streak to 19 games and its Centennial Conference winning streak to 17 games with a 40-20 win against Juniata last Saturday. The Blue Jays have now been ranked in the top 25 by the AFCA for 13 consecutive weeks dating back to the start of the 2011 season and this is the 12th straight poll in which the Blue Jays have been ranked in the top 20. This is also the 31st time Johns Hopkins has been ranked in the top 25 by the AFCA since 1999, when it first released its rankings.
Mount Union also tops the d3football.com Poll as the Purple Raiders grabbed 23 of 25 first-place votes and 623 points. Mary Hardin-Baylor grabbed the other two first-place votes and 599 points to check in at number two, while Linfield (463), St. Thomas (546) and Wisconsin-Whitewater (520) are also in the top five. This week's #18 ranking marks the 24th time Johns Hopkins has been ranked in the top 25 by D3football.com since its poll debuted in 2003.
Johns Hopkins is off this week and will return to action on Saturday, October 13 when the Blue Jays travel to Dickinson.
AFCA Division III Coaches Poll (10-1-2012)
1. Mount Union (OH) (40) (4-0/1,048 points)
2. Mary Hardin-Baylor (TX) (2) (4-0/1,009)
3. St. Thomas (MN) (4-0/949)
4. Linfield (OR)(4-0/901)
5. Wisconsin-Whitewater (3-1/827)
6. Wesley (DE) (3-1/793)
7. Bethel (MN) (4-0/783)
8. St. John Fisher (NY) (4-0/739)
9. Hobart (NY) (5-0/672)
10. Salisbury (MD) (3-1/621)
11. Birmingham Southern (AL) (5-0/534)
12. North Central (IL) (3-1/507)
13. Johns Hopkins (5-0/500)
14. Cal Lutheran (5-0/495)
15. Illinois Wesleyan (4-0/438)
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