The Little Brass Bell went home with Wheaton on Saturday night. Wheaton (Ill.) athletics photo

Well, this was an interesting weekend.

As we get closer to the playoffs, with conference title implications on the line and bubble teams still hunting for at-large consideration, I suppose that every weekend is going to be a big one. But it’s particularly exciting from the outsider’s perspective to see how conferences can still get shaken up this late in the season. People have built so many expectations by this point that much is assumed going into game day, and yet, things still go haywire.

Take the Mary Hardin-Baylor/Texas Lutheran game. I doubt many of us really thought TLU could emerge from the game victorious, but there was every reason to be interested in whether TLU could keep it close and show that it would be a competitive, especially with a Pool B bid looming.

That did not happen.

UMHB scored 35 second-quarter points and came away plus-4 on turnovers for the day. The 72-16 final just wasn’t pretty, but many of the games against Top 10 teams on Saturday were like that. TLU was averaging 50 points a game coming in; on Saturday, the Bulldogs mustered just 16.

Perhaps most notably is that UMHB reaffirmed its justification for being No. 2 in the poll and the source of much Stagg Bowl speculation dating to the preseason.

Texas Lutheran has only one team with a winning record still on its schedule, and with their strength of schedule doomed to slide, it’s too soon to tell how they would fit in to postseason discussions as a 9-1 team. TLU is in a conference eligible for a Pool B, and that’s where the focus should be for the Bulldogs right now. If they happen to miss the Pool B cut, they’ll then be eligible for a Pool C slot (there are six available nationally). TLU fans should be hoping for some help in that the second-place teams in the OAC, MAC, ODAC and others gain an extra loss before Nov. 16 gets here.

• To learn what the “Pools” mean and how the criteria for at-large teams work, see D3football.com’s playoff FAQ. (Note, some of these details are TBA, as the NCAA is looking over its list of automatic bids at our request. Their first championships handbook release appeared incorrect.)

In the realm of Pool B competition, Wesley is almost assured one of the two bids. But TLU’s biggest threat for the other spot is Centre. The Colonels just survived a close game against Rhodes, and to the Colonels’ credit, the SAA is having a fairly good year that will reflect positively on the strength of schedule rating. But to be even more blunt than that, Centre is the only Pool B candidate besides Wesley that is undefeated right now. There is no way – no possible way – that I could see the committee taking a one-loss TLU team over a 10-0 Centre team.

The Colonels still have Hendrix, Millsaps and Birmingham-Southern coming up, and, as noted earlier, there are no assumptions that should be made about how those remaining games will play out.

Pool A delivered some treats on Saturday, too. Widener’s win over Lycoming made sure that the MAC will be decided Nov. 15 against Delaware Valley. The potential for an undefeated team out of the East from a power conference is an exciting notion. Not since 2011 (and not often in the years just prior to that) have we had the opportunity for a non-Mount Union No. 1 playoff seed in the bracket that generally covers the eastern and northeastern part of the nation.

The Empire 8 got another jolt on Saturday, with Ithaca again finding its groove and dealing Salisbury a hefty loss and with Buffalo State felled by Utica, a team that had just lost three straight against the top pack in the conference. St. John Fisher doesn’t have an easy road for its final three regular season games, but there’s no question that it’s on top of the E8 at the moment. I had to include “regular season” in that previous sentence because I would be shocked if the Cardinals weren’t going to play at least four more games this season.

The USA South continues to be a conference of question marks, with this weekend’s loss by Huntingdon being its second in conference play. Christopher Newport, which lost to Huntingdon earlier this month, now has a little bit of breathing room. CNU is one of three 4-1 teams in conference play, and it already owns the head-to-head victory over one of those other teams, Methodist, thanks to the thrilling double overtime game they played on Sept. 27.

Defending USAC champ Maryville, which lost to Huntingdon already this year, might be the wait-and-see team here because it doesn’t play CNU or Methodist until the final two weeks of the season. It’s hard to gauge how things will wrap up – but we can be sure it won’t be nice and tidy, not with everyone beating up on each other. N.C. Wesleyan has been playing well this season and could be an additional spoiler to Maryville’s run.

In the CCIW, Wheaton got its much-needed win over North Central in the Little Brass Bell rivalry game.  While the Thunder technically share the top spot in the conference with Elmhurst, Wheaton is clearly the team with the target on its back now and is in the best position to snag the automatic qualifier. The mystery is: Where does this leave North Central come playoff time? The committee has shown that it is willing to take two-loss teams over a weaker one-loss team, and North Central’s losses come against some pretty tough competition. But, moreso, it’s the win against UW-Platteville, which I expect will be a regionally ranked team when those lists come out, will be an impressive mark on North Central’s resume.

Husson on Saturday toppled Castleton State, a top rival for the ECFC title. The Eagles’ next two games are against the conference’s cellar-dwellers, but the team will close out with Mount Ida, which has just one conference loss so far. If Mount Ida plays well until then, that game would decide who gets the Pool A spot. Just to add to the suspense, in five years of ECFC play, Husson has never beaten Mount Ida.

Tweets, et al.: There will be a handful of opportunities each week for me to showcase what’s going on nationally in Division III. On:

• Sundays, look for my reaction and recap of Saturday’s games in Snap Judgments;
• Thursdays, see my centerpiece feature story of the week;
• Fridays, read our Triple Take prediction column, where Pat, Keith and I give you some things to look out for in the following day’s games, including the top matchups and upset possibilities.

Between all that will be D3football.com’s regional columns, the ATN podcast, and the team of the week, among other things. Don’t go too far!

(Also, if you are tweeting about Division III football, don't forget to use the #d3fb hashtag.)