Re: How Early is Too Early? Inside the PWR
The New Year is officially here and this round of non-conference games are behind us. It's time to begin to look at the PairWise seriously. "But it's only January!" I hear you say. In the eight years prior the first PWR after holiday tournaments and NC games has accurately predicted 74% of the eventual field. In every instance at least nine teams that were in the final field were in this PWR - and three times 12 teams that made the tournament were above the cut line.
What is the cut line? The number at which teams that are not conference winners make the field. Historically, that is 14; it has never been higher than 15 or lower than 13. This year the cut line should be 15 (only the AHA autobid will make the field) but with upsets in the conference tournaments that number could go down.
The first PWR of the New Year have included 82 of the 111 spots in the eventual tournament field. In addition, 32 teams have had the same seed in the NCAAs and 12 have held the same exact place in the standings. Prior to last year, only St Cloud had fallen from a #1 seed all the way out. Last year both Colorado College and Ferris State did it. Only three times has a team that wasn't a TUC now won a tournament invite.
The #1 and #2 overall seed have never fallen out of the tournament. Only the 2009 Cornell team fell as far as a #3 seed. In both 2004 and 2010 the top 2 seeds finished 1 and 2 in the final rankings. Great news for both Yale and North Dakota. #3 Denver should feel safe, but the Pioneers have fallen from the PWR twice before. Of the other current tournament teams, RPI has the greatest reason to feel nervous. No team has made its initial PWR appearance in the same year they've entered the field without an autobid. The 2006 Lake Superior State, 2007 Bemidji State and the 2010 Union squads all failed to make the tournament in their first showing.
With that, the current PairWise rankings and bracketology:
1 Yale (EC)
2 North Dakota (WC)
3 Denver U (WC)
4 New Hampshire (HE)
5 Boston Coll (HE)
6 Minn-Duluth (WC)
7 RPI (EC)
8 Michigan (CC)
9 NE-Omaha (WC)
10 Miami (CC)
11 Notre Dame (CC)
12 Wisconsin (WC)
13 CO College (WC)
14 AK-Fairbanks (CC)
15 Maine (HE)
---
16 Merrimack (HE)
17 Union (EC)
18 Boston Univ (HE)
19 Dartmouth (EC)
20 Princeton (EC)
21 Western Mich (CC)
22 Minnesota (WC)
23 Northern Mich (CC)
24 MSU-Mankato (WC)
25 Bemidji State (WC)
Code:
[B]Bridgeport Manchester St Louis Green Bay[/B]
Yale BC Denver North Dakota
Michigan UNH Duluth RPI
NE-Omaha Wisconsin Notre Dame Miami
AHA Champ CO College Alaska Maine
There aren't any blatant attendance issues, but the numbers in Green Bay can be boosted significantly by moving Bucky and Michigan there. That also allows us to put 2 ECAC squads in the regional hosted by the ECAC. St. Louis is going to be a black hole for attendance (who the hell thought having a regional in a 19,000+ capacity building was a good idea?) but hopefully Notre Dame's presence will be worth something. Denver and Alaska aren't going to draw significant fans anyway, so let them drag down the St. Louis regional. (Sorry, but it's true, and it's how the committee would think.)
The new brackets look like this:
Code:
[B]Bridgeport Manchester St Louis Green Bay[/B]
Yale BC Denver North Dakota
RPI UNH Duluth Michigan
NE-Omaha Miami Notre Dame Wisconsin
AHA Champ CO College Alaska Maine
Statistically speaking, this will look very similar to the final brackets in March.
