D1/D2 scheduling alliance for 2017-18

[Arafel]

Re: D1/D2 scheduling alliance for 2017-18

Alright, so I have a bit of an update on this:

(1) The committee wrote itself an out into the criteria that says each team will be evaluated "based on its full body of work." That wasn't in there before, so they at least have an out.

(2) Man, that is going to cause some serious heartburn for bubble teams at tournament time, especially if St. A's is way up there like top 4 or so.

https://www.bcinterruption.com/bost...r-clarifies-d1-d2-tournament-selection-issues

Oh for ****'s sake Grant, I'm literally embarrassed for you that you actually posted that tripe. Take it down before you destroy any semblance of being an actual journalist.

First you say:

"This would appear to give the selection committee a way out of selecting a team for the tournament if their schedule was not comparable to the rest of Division I, even if an eligible team (say, St. Anselm) made it into an at-large position based on RPI"

Then you end by saying:

"Not only will a top 8 alliance team have no clue whether or not they are even being considered for selection, but think about what the bubble teams will be going through. If you’re sitting in 7th or 8th in the Pairwise among “regular” D-I teams, but St. Anselm is looming in 4th in the RPI to potentially knock you out despite not having a D-I caliber roster, you’re going to have a very, very long and stressful day to look forward to."

And you literally ignore what Sarah Fraser told you.

All I can conclude is that you are hoping you'll get hits by being controversial. I supposed in our age of Cheetos Jesus and "alternative facts" you can just make up whatever you want, but if you want to be taken seriously, you should still try to actually be a journalist.

 

[TonyTheTiger20]

Re: D1/D2 scheduling alliance for 2017-18

Oh for ****'s sake Grant, I'm literally embarrassed for you that you actually posted that tripe. Take it down before you destroy any semblance of being an actual journalist.

I have to admit when I saw you were reading the thread I got REALLY EXCITED!

First you say:

"This would appear to give the selection committee a way out of selecting a team for the tournament if their schedule was not comparable to the rest of Division I, even if an eligible team (say, St. Anselm) made it into an at-large position based on RPI"

Then you end by saying:

"Not only will a top 8 alliance team have no clue whether or not they are even being considered for selection, but think about what the bubble teams will be going through. If you’re sitting in 7th or 8th in the Pairwise among “regular” D-I teams, but St. Anselm is looming in 4th in the RPI to potentially knock you out despite not having a D-I caliber roster, you’re going to have a very, very long and stressful day to look forward to."

I mean the fact that they gave themselves an out means that they're going to be ambiguity about it, no? I would not like to be in 9th in the PWR with St. A's sitting in 4th, would you?

And you literally ignore what Sarah Fraser told you.

I do not know what this means

All I can conclude is that you are hoping you'll get hits by being controversial. I supposed in our age of Cheetos Jesus and "alternative facts" you can just make up whatever you want, but if you want to be taken seriously, you should still try to actually be a journalist.

Did you, like, personally write the NCAA handbook and are mad that I'm criticizing? I can't figure out why you're so personally offended by all this.

*Clearly* it's an interesting quirk of how the criteria is set up and how the Pairwise works. You can not think so, that doesn't bother me, but the visceral response is nothing short of bizarre.

 

[joecct]

Re: D1/D2 scheduling alliance for 2017-18

What if an Alliance team runs the table and is left home? Candace can remember the hue and cry when undefeated Adrian was left out of the D3 men's tournament.

The difference was Adrian's strength of schedule (a criteria) was in the toilet and the committee had a justification.

 

[Rightnut]

Re: D1/D2 scheduling alliance for 2017-18

Oh for ****'s sake Grant, I'm literally embarrassed for you that you actually posted that tripe. Take it down before you destroy any semblance of being an actual journalist.

First you say:

"This would appear to give the selection committee a way out of selecting a team for the tournament if their schedule was not comparable to the rest of Division I, even if an eligible team (say, St. Anselm) made it into an at-large position based on RPI"

Then you end by saying:

"Not only will a top 8 alliance team have no clue whether or not they are even being considered for selection, but think about what the bubble teams will be going through. If you’re sitting in 7th or 8th in the Pairwise among “regular” D-I teams, but St. Anselm is looming in 4th in the RPI to potentially knock you out despite not having a D-I caliber roster, you’re going to have a very, very long and stressful day to look forward to."

And you literally ignore what Sarah Fraser told you.

All I can conclude is that you are hoping you'll get hits by being controversial. I supposed in our age of Cheetos Jesus and "alternative facts" you can just make up whatever you want, but if you want to be taken seriously, you should still try to actually be a journalist.

This seems like an awfully strong personal attack arising out of something that wouldn't normally seem to create a lot of emotion. I don't profess to know much about this but Grant does raise issues and puts a lot of content into this board. I agree that it is a bit bizarre.

 

[Arafel]

Re: D1/D2 scheduling alliance for 2017-18

I have to admit when I saw you were reading the thread I got REALLY EXCITED!


I mean the fact that they gave themselves an out means that they're going to be ambiguity about it, no? I would not like to be in 9th in the PWR with St. A's sitting in 4th, would you?

I do not know what this means

Did you, like, personally write the NCAA handbook and are mad that I'm criticizing? I can't figure out why you're so personally offended by all this.

*Clearly* it's an interesting quirk of how the criteria is set up and how the Pairwise works. You can not think so, that doesn't bother me, but the visceral response is nothing short of bizarre.

Grant, you keep trying to pound this nonexistent point, like you've done since you first published your piece last spring, when there is LITERALLY nothing there. You postulate a scenario where St. A's is in fourth in the PairWise and the team sitting ninth would be worried. They are NOT, in any way, shape or form, going to take St. A's over a team that plays a D-I schedule. And as I said, you LITERALLY ignored what Sarah Fraser told you, that each team's "full body of work" will be evaluated. You ignore every precedent, every semblance of fact, to try to pigeonhole things into your narrow interpretation, insisting in the face of all evidence that the sky is in fact yellow.

 

[Arafel]

Re: D1/D2 scheduling alliance for 2017-18

This seems like an awfully strong personal attack arising out of something that wouldn't normally seem to create a lot of emotion. I don't profess to know much about this but Grant does raise issues and puts a lot of content into this board. I agree that it is a bit bizarre.

No, Grant doesn't raise issues. He is tilting at windmills like Don Quixote. At best, he's taking an interesting alternate reality and trying to see how things might shake out in that alternate reality, but the alternate reality has absolutely zero correlation with how things will shake out.

 

[joecct]

Re: D1/D2 scheduling alliance for 2017-18

Picky point. You don't need a D1 schedule to qualify. You need 20 games vs. D1 or D2 schools to qualify.

If the committee wants to disparage D2, then make it a D1 only tournament and F the D2s over like they do to the men.

 

[Arafel]

Re: D1/D2 scheduling alliance for 2017-18

Picky point. You don't need a D1 schedule to qualify. You need 20 games vs. D1 or D2 schools to qualify.

If the committee wants to disparage D2, then make it a D1 only tournament and F the D2s over like they do to the men.

Do you think that ANY of the D-2 schools would be competitive with the D-I? If not, then what's the point. If you do, while I admire the spirit, I'd say that it is misplaced. No D-II school is going to be competitive with the men's D-I programs, nor will schools like St. A's or Franklin Pierce do well against a Clarkson or Boston College. The national tournament is meant to showcase the best teams.

Regardless, this is all academic, because none of the D-II schools will be competing in the NCAA D-I tournament in March.

 

[TonyTheTiger20]

Re: D1/D2 scheduling alliance for 2017-18

Do you think that ANY of the D-2 schools would be competitive with the D-I? If not, then what's the point. If you do, while I admire the spirit, I'd say that it is misplaced. No D-II school is going to be competitive with the men's D-I programs, nor will schools like St. A's or Franklin Pierce do well against a Clarkson or Boston College. The national tournament is meant to showcase the best teams.

With respect, I think everyone here agrees with you on all of these points, although maybe not on some semantics with the last one (it's not "the best teams" but rather "the four teams who won their conference championship plus the four teams ranked the highest in a complicated, imperfect, (straight-up bad), formula." This is semantics though and it's neither here nor there).

But is there precedent though? I ask that seriously, is there any sort of precedent for a D-II team actually meeting the criteria to qualify for the D-I/NC tournament? To joecct's point, what is the point of even explicitly saying what the D-II teams need to do to qualify for the tournament if they can't actually qualify by meeting that criteria? Frankly the whole setup is a mess and they shouldn't be combined in the first place, but here we are.

Anyway... I don't think it's as obvious as you're saying that they definitely, 100% would not select one of these teams. Yes, they have the ability to nix these teams at the end if the don't want them in. And yeah they'll probably do that. But if you're the coach of, say, Ohio State, and you're sitting in 9th with St. A's in the top 4, that you are 100% confident that your team will be in the tournament?

I think it's interesting enough to be worthy of discussion rather than just to be immediately dismissed as something I should be "embarrassed" about. If you have some insider knowledge as to how the committee plans on dealing with this that the rest of us don't, that's information I would love to chat about. I respect the the hell out of the time you put into covering and promoting the sport. I don't know that the personal attack was worthy of the level of professionalism you normally present in your work, and I'm sorry you think I'm just trying to sensationalize the situation. I just find it interesting, and so I wrote about what I find interesting. But regardless of all this, I still respect and admire your love and knowledge of the game that you give us every week.

 

[Arafel]

Re: D1/D2 scheduling alliance for 2017-18

With respect, I think everyone here agrees with you on all of these points, although maybe not on some semantics with the last one (it's not "the best teams" but rather "the four teams who won their conference championship plus the four teams ranked the highest in a complicated, imperfect, (straight-up bad), formula." This is semantics though and it's neither here nor there).

But is there precedent though? I ask that seriously, is there any sort of precedent for a D-II team actually meeting the criteria to qualify for the D-I/NC tournament? To joecct's point, what is the point of even explicitly saying what the D-II teams need to do to qualify for the tournament if they can't actually qualify by meeting that criteria? Frankly the whole setup is a mess and they shouldn't be combined in the first place, but here we are.

Anyway... I don't think it's as obvious as you're saying that they definitely, 100% would not select one of these teams. Yes, they have the ability to nix these teams at the end if the don't want them in. And yeah they'll probably do that. But if you're the coach of, say, Ohio State, and you're sitting in 9th with St. A's in the top 4, that you are 100% confident that your team will be in the tournament?

I think it's interesting enough to be worthy of discussion rather than just to be immediately dismissed as something I should be "embarrassed" about. If you have some insider knowledge as to how the committee plans on dealing with this that the rest of us don't, that's information I would love to chat about. I respect the the hell out of the time you put into covering and promoting the sport. I don't know that the personal attack was worthy of the level of professionalism you normally present in your work, and I'm sorry you think I'm just trying to sensationalize the situation. I just find it interesting, and so I wrote about what I find interesting. But regardless of all this, I still respect and admire your love and knowledge of the game that you give us every week.

Grant, I can 100 percent accurately say that if St. A's is in the top four without having played a single D-I program, Ohio State at 9 in the PW would be in.

And yes, there is precedent. That precedent was discussed ad nauseam earlier in this thread with what happened with the MAAC schools back in the late 90s. When Niagara was awarded an at-large bid, the year it won the CHA and there was no auto-bid, that team had played MANY D-I schools, beating Boston University, Princeton, Cornell, Merrimack, Brown, Colorado College, Omaha, and Western Michigan. They had the body of work to get in where a team like Quinnipiac did not.

St. A's and St. Michael's and Franklin Pierce have not, to my knowledge, notified the NCAA of an intention to compete under D-I rules and offer D-I scholarships, as, for instance, a few men's teams like AIC and Bentley do.

A more interesting discussion would be, for instance, to take the members of the scheduling alliance and discuss the creation of women's NE-10 conference by trying to get AIC or Assumption in. There is a men's NE-10, yet, three NE-10 members actually compete up at the men's D-I level: AIC, Bentley, and Merrimack. Merrimack is also a WHEA member, and Bentley is rumored to be in the process of creating a women's team, likely in the next 2-3 years. Does Bentley follow its men's team example and go for
full scholarship limit and try to join the CHA to compete against schools like RIT and Mercyhurst that its men's program does, or does it drop to D-II and play St. A's et. al.

 

[TonyTheTiger20]

Re: D1/D2 scheduling alliance for 2017-18

St. A's and St. Michael's and Franklin Pierce have not, to my knowledge, notified the NCAA of an intention to compete under D-I rules and offer D-I scholarships, as, for instance, a few men's teams like AIC and Bentley do.

That's the thing though, they don't have to. They're D-II teams, not D-I. And our tournament is specifically a D-I/D-II combined tournament. It's just dumb that they have them combined in the first place.

In your mind, purely as a hypothetical, what do the D-II teams need to do to qualify for the D-I/D-II national tournament?

 

[joecct]

Do you think that ANY of the D-2 schools would be competitive with the D-I? If not, then what's the point. If you do, while I admire the spirit, I'd say that it is misplaced. No D-II school is going to be competitive with the men's D-I programs, nor will schools like St. A's or Franklin Pierce do well against a Clarkson or Boston College. The national tournament is meant to showcase the best teams.

Regardless, this is all academic, because none of the D-II schools will be competing in the NCAA D-I tournament in March.

I will point out an obscure NCAA rule that permits a D2 conference to declare for the NCAA D1 tournament if there is no D2 championship in that sport. Thus, the NE-10 could declare they want to play in the D1 tournament and after 2 years, the NE-10 champ gets an auto-bid. Oh the wailing and gnashing of teeth over that one!! But the likelihood of that happening equal the odds of free and open elections in North Korea.

Further, the MEAC and SWAC get invited to the basketball tournament. There are tons of schools better than those 2, but they get a shot.

And up until a few years ago, I'd argue that some of the D2s and upper D3s may have given Union a run.

 

[ARM]

Re: D1/D2 scheduling alliance for 2017-18

And up until a few years ago, I'd argue that some of the D2s and upper D3s may have given Union a run.

The year that Robert Morris upset Minnesota, the Colonials lost a game to Sacred Heart. RMU also won three games from SHU that season by a 27-3 composite, but that's hockey for you if a team decides to sit it's franchise goalie in a game that really doesn't mean anything to it.

Grant is right that the ultimate problem is that the PWR is so lousy that it constantly needs new patches because it has such trouble figuring out which teams are better than the others. But if you give a committee made up of a representative from each of four conferences wiggle room as to when to apply the formula and when to use something more subjective, why would they say, "What the NCAA Tournament really needs is Saint Anselm!" Because there would be some sense of obligation to include a "deserving" team in the field? I don't think so.

I don't think that there is any mystery here. But if Geraldo can stage an opening of Al Capone's vault, it is certainly within Grant's rights to write this story. I think we agree that there isn't much of a story here, but it is his call. Given all of the NCAA prediction columns he's given us over the years (BC >>>>> than everyone else), it isn't like this is a travesty in comparison.

 

[Arafel]

Re: D1/D2 scheduling alliance for 2017-18

That's the thing though, they don't have to. They're D-II teams, not D-I. And our tournament is specifically a D-I/D-II combined tournament. It's just dumb that they have them combined in the first place.

In your mind, purely as a hypothetical, what do the D-II teams need to do to qualify for the D-I/D-II national tournament?

Play at least a third of their schedule against at least mid-tier D-I teams, the Bemidjis, Vermonts, and Yales, plus a handful of better D-I teams, like BU, Colgate, OSU this year or UND in the past, and win at least 2/3rds of them. Then we can talk.

 

[shelfit]

Picky point. You don't need a D1 schedule to qualify. You need 20 games vs. D1 or D2 schools to qualify.

If the committee wants to disparage D2, then make it a D1 only tournament and F the D2s over like they do to the men.

I don't think there's any doubt the D2 schools don't stand a chance of ever qualifying for the National Collegiate tournament. It will always be a D1 tournament. To think otherwise is naïve.

 

[CARDS_rule_the_Burgh]

Oh for ****'s sake Grant, I'm literally embarrassed for you that you actually posted that tripe. Take it down before you destroy any semblance of being an actual journalist.

I agree with you on this... but that's primarily because he refers to Sarah Fraser by her her first name on subsequent references. The tone of her correspondence that he quotes does not seem to convey that he is likely on a first-name basis with her...

As for the content of his argument, I'm going to stay out of this debate.

 

[TonyTheTiger20]

Re: D1/D2 scheduling alliance for 2017-18

I agree with you on this... but that's primarily because he refers to Sarah Fraser by her her first name on subsequent references. The tone of her correspondence that he quotes does not seem to convey that he is likely on a first-name basis with her...

Sorry, there was one instance of me referring her to as "Sarah." This was an oversight and has been corrected.

 

[CARDS_rule_the_Burgh]

Sorry, there was one instance of me referring her to as "Sarah." This was an oversight and has been corrected.

I apologize. My post was intended to be joking in nature while pointing out a serious stylistic error. Upon further review, I sounded like a pretentious a-hole. Apologies.

 

[TonyTheTiger20]

I apologize. My post was intended to be joking in nature while pointing out a serious stylistic error. Upon further review, I sounded like a pretentious a-hole. Apologies.

Don't worry I didn't think anything of it! I did fix it though so thanks haha

 

[joecct]

Re: D1/D2 scheduling alliance for 2017-18

The NCAA NC hockey committee annual report.

http://www.ncaa.org/sites/default/files/Jun2017NCWIH_AnnualReport_20170725.pdf