JERSEY CITY, N.J. – Bolstered by historic campaigns from the men's basketball and men's soccer teams, which highlighted an overall year of excellence throughout all 16 athletic programs in Jersey City, the Saint Peter's University athletic department learned its official final standings in the 2019-20 Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference (MAAC) Pepsi Zero Commissioner's Cup, which was announced Wednesday by the league office.
Saint Peter's recorded a second-place finish in the men's Commissioner's Cup standings, marking its best finish in nearly 30 years and just the department's seventh top-five placement in the men's circuit since the league began tracking individual men's and women's standings in 1984. The only other academic year that saw a better placement was when the Peacocks placed first on the men's side in 1993-94.
Previous Top-Five Men's Commissioner's Cup Finishes
2019-20: 2nd
2010-11: 4
th
1996-97: 5
th
1995-96: 5
th
1994-95: 3
rd
1993-94: 1
st
1992-93: T4th
Finishing with 31.00 points on the men's side – just 2.5 points back of the leader – the men were buoyed by historic seasons by the men's basketball and men's soccer programs, which combined to earn 27 of those 31 points.
The men's soccer program started the fall off on an incredible high after they went 9-1 in league play to earn their first MAAC regular season title since 2010. At one point, the team won 10 straight games and posted a 13-6 overall record by the conclusion of the season. They would reach the league tournament's championship game, which they nearly won before finishing as the league runner-up.
The men's basketball team was in the midst of the program's greatest season in quite some time before the COVID-19 pandemic led to the early cancelation of the league championship. Saint Peter's had finished the year with 18 overall wins, including a 14-6 mark in MAAC play, finishing in second in the league standings while tying the program record for most league wins in a season. They won 11 games at the Yanitelli Center (the most in nearly 30 years), with a program-record nine of them done so in league play.
The athletic department also saw point contributions on the men's side from the men's indoor track & field team, which placed fifth at the league's indoor championship meet in February highlighted by a bevy of stellar individual performances.
Those contributions altogether combined to help the Peacocks finish in ninth place in the overall standings, its best finish since 2010-11 and highest since an eighth-place department performance in 2001-02.
The women's standings saw contributions from the women's soccer, women's volleyball, women's swimming and women's indoor track & field teams in addition to the women's basketball team, which earned a ninth-place MAAC regular season finish after securing the most wins by the program in nearly a decade.
The MAAC Pepsi Zero Commissioner's Cup is awarded annually as a symbol of overall excellence in athletics in the 24 MAAC Championships. Each institution is scored in all regular seasons and championships that it fields a varsity team. Only the scores from men's and women's basketball, plus the top two men's and top four women's scores were used to determine an institution's total points in 2019-20 due to the abbreviated athletics and academic calendar year.
Overall Standings
Place School Points
1. Rider 72
2. Iona 71.5
3. Fairfield 70.00
4. Marist 69.50
5. Quinnipiac 68.50
6. Monmouth 66.50
7. Siena 48.00
8. Manhattan 45.50
9. Saint Peter's 42.00
10. Niagara 40.00
11. Canisius 34.50
Men's Standings
Place School Points
1. Iona 33.50
2. Saint Peter's 31.00
T3. Rider 25.50
T3. Monmouth 25.50
5. Quinnipiac 24.50
6. Siena 24.00
7. Manhattan 21.00
8. Marist 20.50
9. Fairfield 14.00
T10. Canisius 11.00
T10. Niagara 11.00
Women's Standings
Place School Points
1. Fairfield 56.00
2. Marist 49.00
3. Rider 46.50
4. Quinnipiac 44.00
5. Monmouth 41.00
6. Iona 38.00
7. Niagara 29.00
8. Manhattan 24.50
9. Siena 24.00
10. Canisius 23.50
11. Saint Peter's 11.00
About the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference:
With 11 institutions strongly bound by the sound principles of quality and integrity in academics and excellence in athletics, the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference (MAAC) is in its 39th year of competition during the 2019-20 academic year. Current conference members include: Canisius College, Fairfield University, Iona College, Manhattan College, Marist College, Monmouth University, Niagara University, Quinnipiac University, Rider University, Saint Peter's University, and Siena College.
