Spartans jump to second in Director’s Cup standings

Published 9:45 am Thursday, January 9, 2014

CLEVELAND — The reigning champion Stanford Cardinal added to their lead in the final fall Division I Learfield Sports Directors’ Cup standings after the football team ranked 10th in the final USA Today/Coaches poll.

They end the fall with a total of 461.25 points.

Michigan State jumped into second thanks to its Rose Bowl victory and has 382.5 points. The Florida State Seminoles moved into third after capturing the BCS National Championship and have 351.5 total points. North Carolina moved up to fourth thanks to a bowl victory and now has a total of 333 points. After dropping three spots, Virginia completes the top five and still has 323 points.

The ACC leads all conferences with five institutions in the top 10 — Florida State (third), North Carolina (fourth), Virginia (fifth), Notre Dame (eighth), and Duke (ninth).

To date, all nine fall NCAA championships have been completed with the following institutions capturing titles: women’s cross country —Providence; men’s cross country — Colorado; field hockey ­­— Connecticut; women’s soccer — UCLA; men’s soccer — Notre Dame; men’s water polo — USC; women’s volleyball — Penn State; FCS football — North Dakota State; FBS football — Florida State.