It’s time once again to do what we like to call Bracketology, college hockey style. It’s our weekly look at how I believe the NCAA tournament will wind up come selection time.
It’s a look into what are the possible thought processes behind selecting and seeding the NCAA tournament teams.
This is the first installment of our Bracketology for the 2010-11 season, and we’ll be bringing you a new one every week until we make our final picks before the field is announced on March 20. Make sure to check out our other entries on the Bracketology Blog, where we’ll keep you entertained, guessing and educated throughout the rest of the season.
Here are the facts:
• Sixteen teams are selected to participate in the national tournament.
• There are four regional sites (East — Bridgeport, Conn.; Northeast — Manchester, N.H.; Midwest — Green Bay, Wis.; West — St. Louis)
• A host institution which is invited to the tournament plays in the regional for which it is the host, and cannot be moved. There are three host institutions this year, Yale in Bridgeport, New Hampshire in Manchester and Michigan Tech in Green Bay. St. Louis’ host is the CCHA, not a specific team.
• Seedings will not be switched, as opposed to years past. To avoid undesirable first-round matchups, including intra-conference games (see below), teams will be moved among regionals, not reseeded.
Here are the NCAA’s guidelines on the matter, per a meeting of the championship committee:
In setting up the tournament, the committee begins with a list of priorities to ensure a successful tournament on all fronts including competitive equity, financial success and likelihood of playoff-type atmosphere at each regional site. For the model, the following is a basic set of priorities:
• The top four teams as ranked by the committee are the four No. 1 seeds and will be placed in the bracket so that if all four teams advance to the Men’s Frozen Four, the No. 1 seed will play the No. 4 seed and the No. 2 seed will play the No. 3 seed in the semifinals.
• Host institutions that qualify will be placed at home.
• No. 1 seeds are placed as close to home as possible in order of their ranking 1-4.
• Conference matchups in first round are avoided, unless five or more teams from one conference are selected, then the integrity of the bracket will be preserved.
• Once the five automatic qualifiers and 11 at-large teams are selected, the next step is to develop four groups from the committee’s ranking of 1-16. The top four teams are the No. 1 seeds. The next four are targeted as No. 2 seeds. The next four are No. 3 seeds and the last four are No. 4 seeds. These groupings will be referred to as “bands.”
Given these facts, here is the top 16 of the current PairWise Rankings (PWR), and the conference leaders (through all games of Jan. 25, 2011):
1 Yale
2t Minnesota-Duluth
2t North Dakota
2t Denver
5t Boston College
5t Michigan
7t Wisconsin
7t Rensselaer
9 Notre Dame
10 New Hampshire
11t Merrimack
11t Western Michigan
13t Union
13t Nebraska-Omaha
13t Dartmouth
16 Miami
— Rochester Institute of Technology
Current conference leaders based on winning percentage:
Atlantic Hockey: RIT
CCHA: Michigan
ECAC: Yale
Hockey East: New Hampshire
WCHA: Denver
Notes
• The Bracketology assumes that the season has ended and there are no more games to be played. i.e., the NCAA tournament starts tomorrow.
• Because there are an uneven amount of games played inside each conference, I will be using winning percentage, not points accumulated, to determine who the current leader in each conference is. This team is my assumed conference tournament champion.
Step one
From the committee’s report, choose the 16 teams in the tournament.
We break ties in the PWR by looking at the individual comparisons among the tied teams, and add in any current league leaders that are not currently in the top 16. The only team that is not is RIT.
From there, we can start looking at the ties and bubbles in a more detailed fashion.
The ties and bubbles consist of Minnesota-Duluth, North Dakota and Denver at No. 2, Boston College and Michigan at No. 5, Wisconsin and Rensselaer at No. 7, Merrimack and Western Michigan at No. 11, and Union, Nebraska-Omaha and Dartmouth at No. 13.
We break all of our ties based upon the RPI.
Therefore the 16 teams in the tournament, in rank order, are:
1 Yale
2 Minnesota-Duluth
3 North Dakota
4 Denver
5 Boston College
6 Michigan
7 Wisconsin
8 Rensselaer
9 Notre Dame
10 New Hampshire
11 Merrimack
12 Western Michigan
13 Union
14 Nebraska-Omaha
15 Dartmouth
16 RIT
Step two
Now it’s time to assign the seeds.
No. 1 seeds — Yale, Minnesota-Duluth, North Dakota, Denver
No. 2 seeds — Boston College, Michigan, Wisconsin, Rensselaer
No. 3 seeds — Notre Dame, New Hampshire, Merrimack, Western Michigan
No. 4 seeds — Union, Nebraska-Omaha, Dartmouth, RIT
Step three
Place the No. 1 seeds in regionals. Following the guidelines, there is one host team in this grouping, Yale, so Yale must be placed in its home regional, the East Regional, Bridgeport.
We now place the other No. 1 seeds based on proximity to the regional sites.
No. 1 Yale is placed in the East Regional in Bridgeport.
No. 2 Minnesota-Duluth is placed in the Midwest Regional in Green Bay.
No. 3 North Dakota is placed in the West Regional in St. Louis.
No. 4 Denver is placed in the Northeast Regional in Manchester.
Step four
Now we place the other 12 teams so as to avoid intra-conference matchups if possible.
Begin by filling in each bracket by banding groups. Remember that teams are not assigned to the regional closest to their campus sites by ranking order within the banding (unless you are a host school, in which case you must be assigned to your home regional).
If this is the case, as it was last year, then the committee should seed so that the quarterfinals are seeded such that the four regional championships are played by No. 1 vs. No. 8, No. 2 vs. No. 7, No. 3 vs. No. 6 and No. 4 vs. No. 5.
So therefore:
No. 2 seeds
No. 8 Rensselaer is placed in No. 1 Yale’s regional, the East Regional.
No. 7 Wisconsin is placed in No. 2 Minnesota-Duluth’s regional, the Midwest Regional.
No. 6 Michigan is placed in No. 3 North Dakota’s regional, the West
Regional.
No. 5 Boston College is placed in No. 4 Denver’s regional, the Northeast Regional.
No. 3 seeds
Our bracketing system has one regional containing seeds 1, 8, 9, and 16, another with 2, 7, 10, 15, another with 3, 6, 11, 14 and another with 4, 5, 12 and 13.
But we have one host institution, New Hampshire, which needs to be placed first.
Therefore:
No. 10 New Hampshire is placed in No. 5 Boston College’s regional, the Northeast Regional.
No. 9 Notre Dame is placed in No. 8 Rensselaer’s regional, the East Regional.
No. 11 Merrimack is placed in No. 7 Wisconsin’s regional, the Midwest Regional.
No. 12 Western Michigan is placed in No. 6 Michigan’s regional, the West Regional.
No. 4 seeds
One more time, taking No. 16 vs. No. 1, No. 15 vs. No. 2, etc.
No. 16 RIT is sent to No. 1 Yale’s regional, the East Regional.
No. 15 Dartmouth is sent to No. 2 Minnesota-Duluth’s regional, the Midwest Regional.
No. 14 Nebraska-Omaha is sent to No. 3 North Dakota’s regional, the West Regional.
No. 13 Union is sent to No. 4 Denver’s regional, the Northeast Regional.
The brackets as we have set them up:
West Regional:
Nebraska-Omaha vs. North Dakota
Western Michigan vs. Michigan
Midwest Regional:
Dartmouth vs. Minnesota-Duluth
Merrimack vs. Wisconsin
East Regional:
RIT vs. Yale
Notre Dame vs. Rensselaer
Northeast Regional:
Union vs. Denver
New Hampshire vs. Boston College
Our first concern is avoiding intra-conference matchups. We have a West Regional with two of them, and a UNH-BC matchup in the Northeast.
Let’s take care of the UNH-BC matchup first. We can’t move UNH because the Wildcats are the host institution, so BC must be moved. The next ranking after BC at No. 5 is Michigan, No. 6. So we switch those two teams.
We’ve now solved two of our intraconference matchup problems.
The last one to solve is UNO-North Dakota.
With three WCHA teams at the No. 1 seed band, we can switch UNO only to a matchup against Yale. So that’s what we do.
So our tournament now becomes:
West Regional:
RIT vs. North Dakota
Western Michigan vs. Boston College
Midwest Regional:
Dartmouth vs. Minnesota-Duluth
Merrimack vs. Wisconsin
East Regional:
Nebraska-Omaha vs. Yale
Notre Dame vs. Rensselaer
Northeast Regional:
Union vs. Denver
New Hampshire vs. Michigan
Do we like the way this looks? We have no intraconference matchups, so we are OK. Bracket integrity seems to be OK.
Do we have an attendance issue? I would say that there are some shaky issues there.
Can we make it better? Of course we can.
Let’s go back to our original bracketing.
West Regional:
Nebraska-Omaha vs. North Dakota
Western Michigan vs. Michigan
Midwest Regional:
Dartmouth vs. Minnesota-Duluth
Merrimack vs. Wisconsin
East Regional:
RIT vs. Yale
Notre Dame vs. Rensselaer
Northeast Regional:
Union vs. Denver
New Hampshire vs. Boston College
Now, remember, we have to switch out Boston College first. This is a must. But if you switch BC with the next ranking, you send BC out west and bring Michigan east, which creates a little bit of an attendance issue.
So how can we change that?
We can avoid the UNH-BC matchup by swapping BC with Rensselaer. That way, two big fan bases stay in the East.
Let’s look at it now.
West Regional:
Nebraska-Omaha vs. North Dakota
Western Michigan vs. Michigan
Midwest Regional:
Dartmouth vs. Minnesota-Duluth
Merrimack vs. Wisconsin
East Regional:
RIT vs. Yale
Notre Dame vs. Boston College
Northeast Regional:
Union vs. Denver
New Hampshire vs. Rensselaer
The East and Northeast look good now. We’ve maintained our attendance and straightened out our intraconference matchup.
Now on to the other matchups.
As we mentioned, UNO has to play Yale in the first round to avoid the WCHA-WCHA matchup. So we have to make that switch.
West Regional:
RIT vs. North Dakota
Western Michigan vs. Michigan
Midwest Regional:
Dartmouth vs. Minnesota-Duluth
Merrimack vs. Wisconsin
East Regional:
Nebraska-Omaha vs. Yale
Notre Dame vs. Boston College
Northeast Regional:
Union vs. Denver
New Hampshire vs. Rensselaer
But, at the moment, RIT is not in the top 16, therefore, should be paired with the highest seed. In this case, that’s Minnesota-Duluth.
And then to take care of the WMU-Michigan matchup, we swap WMU with Merrimack.
West Regional:
Dartmouth vs. North Dakota
Merrimack vs. Michigan
Midwest Regional:
RIT vs. Minnesota-Duluth
Western Michigan vs. Wisconsin
East Regional:
Nebraska-Omaha vs. Yale
Notre Dame vs. Boston College
Northeast Regional:
Union vs. Denver
New Hampshire vs. Rensselaer
So let’s look at our brackets now. It looks pretty good.
In Green Bay we have UMD and Wisconsin, great bracket for attendance.
In Bridgeport we have Yale, BC and Notre Dame. I like that as well.
In Manchester we have New Hampshire and Rensselaer, a nice draw.
In St. Louis we have Michigan and North Dakota, not bad either.
Anything else we can switch up?
I think that I can make a case for one more switch — swapping Dartmouth and Union.
A Manchester regional with two New Hampshire teams? No offense to Union, which may draw fans, but Dartmouth playing in New Hampshire? That sounds like a no-brainer to me.
West Regional:
Union vs. North Dakota
Merrimack vs. Michigan
Midwest Regional:
RIT vs. Minnesota-Duluth
Western Michigan vs. Wisconsin
East Regional:
Nebraska-Omaha vs. Yale
Notre Dame vs. Boston College
Northeast Regional:
Dartmouth vs. Denver
New Hampshire vs. Rensselaer
That is it. My bracket for the week.
More thoughts and education and plain wit on the blog. We’ll see you here next week for the next Bracketology.
