Last year at this time I was having a beer, shouting in a loud room at a former D-III quarterback and future D3football.com color analyst, breathing in the smoke and looking at the shambles of my previous bracket projection while trying to assemble the next one.

This year at this time … well, it’s done.

Wednesday night’s projected hold up pretty well. All of the at-large teams remain the same, though selected in a different order. And the wrinkle of Maine Maritime, which is so far away from the rest of the field that there’s only one team in our projection it can drive to, actually got a fairly simple solution, if surprising to some.

But enough with the chit-chat and on with the brackets. Pool B and Pool C teams are noted. The rest got automatic bids.

Bracket 1
1. Mount Union
2. Delaware Valley
3. Alfred
4. Mary Hardin-Baylor (Pool C)
5. Montclair State
6. Maine Maritime
7. Johns Hopkins
8. Susquehanna

The games: Susquehanna at Mount Union; winner faces the winner of Maine Maritime and Mary Hardin-Baylor. Johns Hopkins at Delaware Valley; winner faces the winner of Montclair State at Alfred.

Why? Maine Maritime could only drive to one place: Montclair State. Mary Hardin-Baylor doesn’t have an opponent it can drive to. (Or, more accurately, it could drive to Mississippi College, but that would leave Huntingdon without an opponent. Basically, two flights are required in the first round no matter how we arrange the 32 teams, so why not match UMHB this way?)

Bracket 2
1. UW-Whitewater
2. Wittenberg
3. Case Western Reserve (Pool B)
4. Illinois Wesleyan
5. Coe (Pool C)
6. Wabash (Pool C)
7. Trine
8. Mount St. Joseph

The games: Mount St. Joseph at UW-Whitewater; winner faces winner of Coe at Illinois Wesleyan. Wabash at Case Western Reserve (again, yes); winner faces winner of Trine at Wittenberg.

Why? Coe wasn’t going to be in this bracket, but there’s a bind in the West that would either force Coe and Central to play each other or put Coe at St. John’s in the first round. Coe can get to Illinois Wesleyan easily within 500 miles, as well at UW-Whitewater.

Bracket 3
1. Wesley (Pool B)
2. Thomas More
3. Hampden-Sydney
4. Huntingdon (Pool B)
5. Albright (Pool C)
6. Mississippi College
7. Ohio Northern (Pool C)
8. North Carolina Wesleyan

The games: North Carolina Wesleyan at Wesley; winner faces winner of Mississippi College at Huntingdon. Ohio Northern at Thomas More; winner faces winner of Albright at Hampden-Sydney.

Why? Well, Ohio Northern is here because it’s closer to the rest of the teams than DePauw is, even though DePauw is in the NCAA’s South Region. I put Albright here instead of swapping them with Johns Hopkins because Albright would likely have had been seeded to play Delaware Valley if both were in the same bracket.

Bracket 4
1. St. John’s
2. Central
3. Linfield
4. Monmouth
5. St. Thomas
6. Cal Lutheran
7. DePauw
8. Lakeland

The games: Lakeland at St. John’s; winner faces winner of St. Thomas and Monmouth. Cal Lutheran at Linfield; winner faces winner of DePauw and Central.

Why? Cal Lutheran was going to play Linfield no matter what. Central nudged ahead of Linfield in my mind with a .537 SOS compared to Linfield’s .508. Each was 1-0 against teams in our mock regional ranking: UW-Stevens Point did not make the ranking.

When Ohio Northern was selected as our last Pool C team, Springfield, Washington and Jefferson and St. Norbert were left on the board. Ohio Northern has a win against a regionally ranked team, which those teams lacked.

The final board, with regional record, strength of schedule and results against regionally ranked opponents:

Springfield 7-2 .568 lost to ALF
Ohio Northern 8-2 .537 beat NCC, lost to MTU
Wash. & Jeff. 9-1 .433 lost to TMRE
St. Norbert 9-1 .491 lost to MONM

This is a fairly unusual-looking bracket for those who may still be stuck in the pre-Pools era and expect to see only East, South, North and West teams in their respective brackets. But when you have a South team from Indiana and another from suburban Cincinnati … when you have three East teams from Pennsylvania and a South team even further East, in Delaware, you simply cannot build a bracket that makes sense to the old guard.

This bracket makes the best use of the limited first-round flight resources, and does so in a responsible manner. It makes sense.

We’ll see if it makes the big screen tomorrow.