Tweet
Re: Hockey East - Bye, Home, and Road: by the numbers - 2016-17 edition
After Sat Feb 25:
ND 1 @ BU 4
NU 4 @ ME 5
UMA 1 @ PC 2 (OT)
UNH 2 @ CT 4
MC 3 @ UVM 2
--- Bye Lock – 27 (PC tb) ---
--- Home Lock – 20 (CT tb) ---
--- R1 Road - 20 (MC/UNH/CT) ---
Upcoming schedules:
UML - Bye
BU - Bye
BC - Bye
ND - Bye
PC - UMA x2/3
UVM - ME x2/3
MC - UNH x2/3
NU - CT x2/3
CT - @NU x2/3
UNH - @MC x2/3
ME - @UVM x2/3
UMA - @PC x2/3
Fun facts:
As seems to happen more often than you'd think, teams facing off on the final weekend play again in the first round of the playoffs. This time it's PC hosting UMA again after the H/H this weekend, the latter at PC.
Prior to tonight, I recall only one other 3WT in the final HE standings. That was when 09-10 BU/ME/UML tied for 3rd in perhaps the closest results ever in HE, certainly from 3-9 - which were separated by four points and included a different 2WT for 6/7 as well.
In a statistical oddity, BC rode a 8-0-1 league start to run wire-to-wire without ever trailing in the league standings... but is the 3 seed. They were swept by the other two teams tied for 1st and split with the other Bye team. Plus, BU beat them in the non-conf Beanpot opener. That gives the Eagles a 1-6-0 record against the rest of the top four.
One thing that is true about ND that is not true of the other three Bye teams - or, in fact, most of the rest of the league? They lost to UMA. UMA only took 5 points in league play (also beat MC and tied CT in back-to-back games), but their 5-4 win over the Irish could arguably be what kept ND from at least a share of first place.
---
Quarterfinal peek:
If the first round goes according to seed, the next round would have:
ND hosting PC. They played last weekend with a tie coming after a ND win - but that first game was tied into the early 3rd. Also, PC's schedule begins to look like a palindrome.
BC hosting UVM. They also played last weekend and had two ties.
BU hosting MC. MC swept BU in a Tue-Fri series immediately after BU was named #1 in the country.
UML hosting NU. These two played two close, late-decided games on the two Fridays before the Beanpot and split.
That makes the BU/MC pair on Jan 24 & Jan 27 the least-recent matchup, by only a few days compared to UML/NU's Jan 27 & Feb 3 pair. Still, all of these matchups happened within the last month-ish, so the teams should be fresh in each other's minds.
The higher seeds have a collective 2-3-3 record in these pairings.
---
PWR report:
Union and Cornell tied each other tonight, which allowed victorious BU to move up to 7th and idle UML to move up to 6th. Union fell to 8 and Cornell is at 10.
Even though they lost, ND rose up to a tie for 10 with Cornell (11th after TB), while PC dropped from winning a tie at 11 to 12th outright - despite their victory. All of this was, I'm sure, helped by Wisco (now 13), SCSU (14), OSU (15) and NoDak (16) all losing tonight.
ND wins all the pairs below and loses all the pairs above, while PC takes the Cornell pair above them, but loses to both ND and BC, who is below, due to league results H2H.
UML and BU split H2H, and match COP - which makes sense since they tied in the league, plus each won an extra non-league game against a HE opponent (BU over BC, and UML over UMA). UML currently leads in RPI, but by virtue of their higher seed, they will play the mathematically lesser opponent in the quarterfinals. These two could match results after their Bye, but BU could move ahead because of facing a tougher opponent on paper. Also, BC's results will weigh more heavily on BU because of the extra game, as UMA's will for UML. If they meet, as the 1 and 2 seeds, that would have to be in the HE final. That game would likely decide the pair as the H2H win and RPI boost should surpass the RPI drop of the loser, even if one plays a three-game QF series (absorbing a loss) and the other wins a 2-0 QFs.
UVM's loss drops them into the tie for 19th with idle BC.
After Sat Feb 25:
ND 1 @ BU 4
NU 4 @ ME 5
UMA 1 @ PC 2 (OT)
UNH 2 @ CT 4
MC 3 @ UVM 2
| UML | 29 | [1.1] |
| BU | 29 | [1.2] |
| BC | 29 | [1.3] |
| ND | 28 | [4] |
| PC | 27 | [5] |
| UVM | 24 | [6] |
| MC | 22 | [7] |
| NU | 21 | [8] |
--- R1 Road - 20 (MC/UNH/CT) ---
| CT | 20 | [ 9] |
| UNH | 18 | [10] |
| ME | 12 | [11] |
| UMA | 5 | [12] |
UML - Bye
BU - Bye
BC - Bye
ND - Bye
PC - UMA x2/3
UVM - ME x2/3
MC - UNH x2/3
NU - CT x2/3
CT - @NU x2/3
UNH - @MC x2/3
ME - @UVM x2/3
UMA - @PC x2/3
Fun facts:
As seems to happen more often than you'd think, teams facing off on the final weekend play again in the first round of the playoffs. This time it's PC hosting UMA again after the H/H this weekend, the latter at PC.
Prior to tonight, I recall only one other 3WT in the final HE standings. That was when 09-10 BU/ME/UML tied for 3rd in perhaps the closest results ever in HE, certainly from 3-9 - which were separated by four points and included a different 2WT for 6/7 as well.
In a statistical oddity, BC rode a 8-0-1 league start to run wire-to-wire without ever trailing in the league standings... but is the 3 seed. They were swept by the other two teams tied for 1st and split with the other Bye team. Plus, BU beat them in the non-conf Beanpot opener. That gives the Eagles a 1-6-0 record against the rest of the top four.
One thing that is true about ND that is not true of the other three Bye teams - or, in fact, most of the rest of the league? They lost to UMA. UMA only took 5 points in league play (also beat MC and tied CT in back-to-back games), but their 5-4 win over the Irish could arguably be what kept ND from at least a share of first place.
---
Quarterfinal peek:
If the first round goes according to seed, the next round would have:
ND hosting PC. They played last weekend with a tie coming after a ND win - but that first game was tied into the early 3rd. Also, PC's schedule begins to look like a palindrome.
BC hosting UVM. They also played last weekend and had two ties.
BU hosting MC. MC swept BU in a Tue-Fri series immediately after BU was named #1 in the country.
UML hosting NU. These two played two close, late-decided games on the two Fridays before the Beanpot and split.
That makes the BU/MC pair on Jan 24 & Jan 27 the least-recent matchup, by only a few days compared to UML/NU's Jan 27 & Feb 3 pair. Still, all of these matchups happened within the last month-ish, so the teams should be fresh in each other's minds.
The higher seeds have a collective 2-3-3 record in these pairings.
---
PWR report:
Union and Cornell tied each other tonight, which allowed victorious BU to move up to 7th and idle UML to move up to 6th. Union fell to 8 and Cornell is at 10.
Even though they lost, ND rose up to a tie for 10 with Cornell (11th after TB), while PC dropped from winning a tie at 11 to 12th outright - despite their victory. All of this was, I'm sure, helped by Wisco (now 13), SCSU (14), OSU (15) and NoDak (16) all losing tonight.
ND wins all the pairs below and loses all the pairs above, while PC takes the Cornell pair above them, but loses to both ND and BC, who is below, due to league results H2H.
UML and BU split H2H, and match COP - which makes sense since they tied in the league, plus each won an extra non-league game against a HE opponent (BU over BC, and UML over UMA). UML currently leads in RPI, but by virtue of their higher seed, they will play the mathematically lesser opponent in the quarterfinals. These two could match results after their Bye, but BU could move ahead because of facing a tougher opponent on paper. Also, BC's results will weigh more heavily on BU because of the extra game, as UMA's will for UML. If they meet, as the 1 and 2 seeds, that would have to be in the HE final. That game would likely decide the pair as the H2H win and RPI boost should surpass the RPI drop of the loser, even if one plays a three-game QF series (absorbing a loss) and the other wins a 2-0 QFs.
UVM's loss drops them into the tie for 19th with idle BC.
Comment