NCAA Tourney Team Selection Options

[DrunkTrainPolka]

in this order...

1) two teams from each conference for a total of 12;

- regular season champion
- conference tourney champion
- if they are the same team, i would take the conference tourney runner up (you could argue for the regular season runner up but i think that's less exciting)

2) four 'extra' teams (this is where it gets real fun) for a total of 16;

- teams that have the longest (going backwards) continuous streak of NCAA tourney appearances staring with 2019 -OR-
- teams that have the longest (going backwards) continuous streak of NCAA tourney appearances staring with 2019 without a NCAA championship in their history -OR-
- the last four NCAA championship winners (obviously none of these three options including any of the 12 teams above)

my pick would be the second option to pick the four teams... just because i like cinderellas.

GO TECH GOLD!

[Sol Diablo]

in this order...

1) two teams from each conference for a total of 12;

- regular season champion
- conference tourney champion
- if they are the same team, i would take the conference tourney runner up (you could argue for the regular season runner up but i think that's less exciting)

2) four 'extra' teams (this is where it gets real fun) for a total of 16;

- teams that have the longest (going backwards) continuous streak of NCAA tourney appearances staring with 2019 -OR-
- teams that have the longest (going backwards) continuous streak of NCAA tourney appearances staring with 2019 without a NCAA championship in their history -OR-
- the last four NCAA championship winners (obviously none of these three options including any of the 12 teams above)

my pick would be the second option to pick the four teams... just because i like cinderellas.

GO TECH GOLD!

This could be as controversial as what the govt & sports should be doing about Covid !

[Sol Diablo]

BTW, my cousin used to run a train from Nogales down to Mazatlan, filled full of college students on Spring Break, called the "Tequila Train", was drunk but no Polka......

[DrunkTrainPolka]

This could be as controversial as what the govt & sports should be doing about Covid !

i am going to take that as the perfect complement...

[SiouxFanatic]

I think option 1 is a non-starter. How can you justify giving 2 bids to the AHA when under normal circumstances, they only get one team into the tournament. Also doesn’t make sense when you have a 4-team ECAC this year.

I don’t know what the solution should be and I don’t envy the decision makers.

[Fighting Sioux 23]

I think option 1 is a non-starter. How can you justify giving 2 bids to the AHA when under normal circumstances, they only get one team into the tournament. Also doesn’t make sense when you have a 4-team ECAC this year.

I don’t know what the solution should be and I don’t envy the decision makers.

Modified Colorado College Rule, applicable to Hockey East, B1G, NCHC, and WCHA. 1 Auto-bid for AHA and ECAC.

Put in place criteria for the remaining 6 selections, including: (1) the team must be over .500; (2a) for teams in conferences, the team must be in the top-half of the conference (regular season) or have advanced to the conference's tournament championship game; (2b) for Independents, the team must have at least 1 win over a top-half CC Rule conference team; and (3) no more than 2 additional teams from any one conference. This should bring the total teams in consideration for the remaining 6 selections down to approximately 13-15 teams. The smoke-filled room takes it from there, but at least there are specific criteria in place heading into the selection.

[SJHovey]

Modified Colorado College Rule, applicable to Hockey East, B1G, NCHC, and WCHA. 1 Auto-bid for AHA and ECAC.

Put in place criteria for the remaining 6 selections, including: (1) the team must be over .500; (2a) for teams in conferences, the team must be in the top-half of the conference (regular season) or have advanced to the conference's tournament championship game; (2b) for Independents, the team must have at least 1 win over a top-half CC Rule conference team; and (3) no more than 2 additional teams from any one conference. This should bring the total teams in consideration for the remaining 6 selections down to approximately 13-15 teams. The smoke-filled room takes it from there, but at least there are specific criteria in place heading into the selection.

In the old smoke filled room, one of the most important criteria, and maybe most controversial, was the "how have you done in the last 16 games" question. Many a year went by where the committee justified their selection by picking a team (usually a name school) by claiming they played great over the last two months.

[Fighting Sioux 23]

In the old smoke filled room, one of the most important criteria, and maybe most controversial, was the "how have you done in the last 16 games" question. Many a year went by where the committee justified their selection by picking a team (usually a name school) by claiming they played great over the last two months.

This carried over into the Pairwise era as well. I don't remember exactly when, but for awhile record over the last 16 games was a comparison point.

[jjmc85]

Pairwise tried to be objective and measure the strength of conferences based on OOC games. Can’t be done this year for obvious reasons.

Here’s my solution:
ECAC: they get one bid for whoever is their tournament winner. Only four teams. No need for multiple bids.

other five conferences: 3 conditional bids. 1 bid goes to your regular season winner. 1 bid goes to your post season tournament winner. One at large bid is picked by the committee for that conference.

I say conditional 3 bids because it is possible a team wins both the regular season and conference tournament. If this happens, that team get a bye to the second round and the conference only gets two bids. The number of teams in the tournament is decreased by one. Winning both would equal winning a first round game.

ASU would be eligible for B1G at large bid. LIU isn’t eligible anyway so we don’t have to worry about them.

It’s objective. It rewards regular season and conference tournament success. It has the potential to have a smaller field if teams win both RS and tournament, and with the virus having less teams isn’t the worst idea.

[JohnsonsJerseys]

I'm a little shocked nothing has been put forth yet by the NCAA regarding post season play. Part of me thinks they are hoping Covid ramps up again the they can just scrap the tourney since they care very little about it anyway. The other part of me figures they are too busy figuring out how to make their cash cow, the basketball tourney, happen in a way that generates millions of dollars in revenue.

As for who makes the tourney, honestly we're down to just discussing conferences at this point. ASU has eliminated themselves with their record. Even if they win out they'll only be at 0.500.

While it is a reasonable point to give one spot to a regular season champ and a conference tourney champ, conferences like the NCHC would never agree to losing a tourney spot if the same team wins both. Also given the one and done nature of any tourney, rewarding regular season play makes sense. So if you have a double champion, then your second place regular season team is in the NCAA tourney.

I absolutely think that Atlantic Hockey deserves a minimum of two spots this year. It's a one and done tourney, anything can happen. Just ask all the teams that have lost to AH teams in the tourney before. As for the ECAC, it is very hard to argue against them only getting one team this year. Every conference should be treated equal this year, but with only four active teams I just can't make the case that they should get the same number of teams in the tourney as conferences w/ 10+ teams.

Since you have very little play between conferences, you really need to treat all conferences as equals this year. Yeah I know that thought really grinds some conferences that think they are heads and tails above the rest, but you'll get your two or more teams in so don't worry about it. Your 4th place team doesn't deserve to be in the tourney, especially this year with no comparison to other conferences. And no, I'm not buying any of that "past year's performance" being factored into the tourney field. Teams from the last decade are not playing in the 2021 NCAA tourney. Their results are useless to consider in this scenario. The only true equality is trying to get an equal percentage of teams from each conference in the tourney and then let the teams play the games. This scenario give each conference 25%-28% of their teams in the tourney. That's about as fair as you can make it. AH and HE can have their two champs plus 2nd place regular season, or if you have a double champ, the 3rd place regular season team.

AH - 11 teams - 3 bids (27%)
BIG - 7 teams - 2 bids (28%)
ECAC - 4 teams - 1 bid (25%)
HE - 11 teams - 3 bids (27%)
NCHC - 8 teams - 2 bids (25%)
WCHA - 8 teams - 2 bids (25%)

This gives you 13 teams in and lets the smoke filled room have their say with three additional teams, no more than one extra for any conference. Knowing hockey "experts" that pretty much that means the Big and NCHC will each get one more, because that's how humans work. They'll take a 0.500 Denver team over AIC with a 0.750 record every day of the week and twice on Sunday because of "history" and "the name" (especially with a regional slated to be truly "out West" this year an hour from Denver.

If HE has 5 teams with records over 0.600 when "the room" meets, I think that's a strong case for HE get a 4th team over the WCHA getting a 3rd team. If the WCHA has three teams with records over 0.700 when the smoke clears then they get the final bid, but that scenario is less likely.

AH - 11 teams - 3 bids (27%)
BIG - 7 teams - 3 bids (43%)
ECAC - 4 teams - 1 bid (25%)
HE - 11 teams - 4 bids (36%)
NCHC - 8 teams - 3 bids (37%)
WCHA - 8 teams - 2 bids (25%)
Sixteen teams... done.

[SJHovey]

I'm a little shocked nothing has been put forth yet by the NCAA regarding post season play. Part of me thinks they are hoping Covid ramps up again the they can just scrap the tourney since they care very little about it anyway. The other part of me figures they are too busy figuring out how to make their cash cow, the basketball tourney, happen in a way that generates millions of dollars in revenue.

As for who makes the tourney, honestly we're down to just discussing conferences at this point. ASU has eliminated themselves with their record. Even if they win out they'll only be at 0.500.

While it is a reasonable point to give one spot to a regular season champ and a conference tourney champ, conferences like the NCHC would never agree to losing a tourney spot if the same team wins both. Also given the one and done nature of any tourney, rewarding regular season play makes sense. So if you have a double champion, then your second place regular season team is in the NCAA tourney.

I absolutely think that Atlantic Hockey deserves a minimum of two spots this year. It's a one and done tourney, anything can happen. Just ask all the teams that have lost to AH teams in the tourney before. As for the ECAC, it is very hard to argue against them only getting one team this year. Every conference should be treated equal this year, but with only four active teams I just can't make the case that they should get the same number of teams in the tourney as conferences w/ 10+ teams.

Since you have very little play between conferences, you really need to treat all conferences as equals this year. Yeah I know that thought really grinds some conferences that think they are heads and tails above the rest, but you'll get your two or more teams in so don't worry about it. Your 4th place team doesn't deserve to be in the tourney, especially this year with no comparison to other conferences. And no, I'm not buying any of that "past year's performance" being factored into the tourney field. Teams from the last decade are not playing in the 2021 NCAA tourney. Their results are useless to consider in this scenario. The only true equality is trying to get an equal percentage of teams from each conference in the tourney and then let the teams play the games. This scenario give each conference 25%-28% of their teams in the tourney. That's about as fair as you can make it. AH and HE can have their two champs plus 2nd place regular season, or if you have a double champ, the 3rd place regular season team.

AH - 11 teams - 3 bids (27%)
BIG - 7 teams - 2 bids (28%)
ECAC - 4 teams - 1 bid (25%)
HE - 11 teams - 3 bids (27%)
NCHC - 8 teams - 2 bids (25%)
WCHA - 8 teams - 2 bids (25%)

This gives you 13 teams in and lets the smoke filled room have their say with three additional teams, no more than one extra for any conference. Knowing hockey "experts" that pretty much that means the Big and NCHC will each get one more, because that's how humans work. They'll take a 0.500 Denver team over AIC with a 0.750 record every day of the week and twice on Sunday because of "history" and "the name" (especially with a regional slated to be truly "out West" this year an hour from Denver.

If HE has 5 teams with records over 0.600 when "the room" meets, I think that's a strong case for HE get a 4th team over the WCHA getting a 3rd team. If the WCHA has three teams with records over 0.700 when the smoke clears then they get the final bid, but that scenario is less likely.

AH - 11 teams - 3 bids (27%)
BIG - 7 teams - 3 bids (43%)
ECAC - 4 teams - 1 bid (25%)
HE - 11 teams - 4 bids (36%)
NCHC - 8 teams - 3 bids (37%)
WCHA - 8 teams - 2 bids (25%)
Sixteen teams... done.

I have no idea how they'll come up with the field, but I think they'll surprise a lot of people if they put 3 AHA teams into the field, given the fact that only once in their history have they had an at-large bid.

My assessment as to what they should do (and might, if they use the so-called "eye test"):

AHA - 1 team
B1G - 3 teams
ECAC - 2 teams
HE - 4 teams
NCHC - 4 teams
WCHA - 2 teams

I think the most likely scenario for what they will do will be two auto bids to each conference, one for the tournament winner and one for the regular season winner. If one team wins both, they'll probably leave it to each conference to decide whether the second bid goes to the regular season runner up or the tourney runner up.

Then, the four remaining at-large teams will be selected using the "eye test," which will likely result in one additional B1G team and the other three spots coming out of the NCHC and HE, with one conference getting a total of four teams and one getting a total of three.

[J.D.]

With the number of teams that aren't playing why are they even committed to a 16 team field? I wonder if it gets to a point where they try to do the old 6 team super regionals with a 12 team field. It would certainly be nice to get a plan announced even if changes have to be made along the way.

Basketball is having their tournament all within the state of Indiana. If basketball is doing that i have a hard time envisioning the 4 regional format taking place. And we don't even know about that since Manchester backed out. I do think we will see a tournament of some sort but you gotta announce something soon.

[jjmc85]

My proposed format could get you to as little as 11 teams, so I’m not opposed to a smaller tournament but I’d want it to be as objectively picked and seeded as possible, which is hard with such a shortened regular season and almost no OOC games.

For 12 teams you could do two bids per conference. Eventually you’re gonna need byes. I suppose you could have teams play the two rounds and then of the three remaining, whoever has the best goal differential gets a bye to the championship?

[Timothy A]

1. Dartboard
2. Roll dice
3. Lottery
4. Winning percentage*GPA/number of player missed games+((GF-GA)*pp%)*PK%)/3.12

[SJHovey]

My proposed format could get you to as little as 11 teams, so I’m not opposed to a smaller tournament but I’d want it to be as objectively picked and seeded as possible, which is hard with such a shortened regular season and almost no OOC games.

For 12 teams you could do two bids per conference. Eventually you’re gonna need byes. I suppose you could have teams play the two rounds and then of the three remaining, whoever has the best goal differential gets a bye to the championship?

It wouldn't shock me if they shrunk the field in light of both the reduced number of teams playing and the fact that Manchester bowed out as a regional host. It'll probably be easier to dump one of the three remaining cities as a host rather than find a replacement for Manchester.

However, keeping it at 16 teams does give the committee some cover. They can give two bids to each conference, which should stop the squealing from the AHA, ECAC and WCHA, and still have four bids to give to at-large teams from the more traditional power conferences. I still think that's the way they'll go, although making it two eight team regionals wouldn't surprise me.