Well the Harvard/Cornell comparison could be as simple as one had to play a Big Ten team in a "banner" year for the Big Ten and one got an NCHC opponent in what looks like a real down year for that league. My only real gripe in the bracket was not placing Harvard in Fargo.
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Latest pairwise rankings
- Thread starter Speed Kills
- Start date
FredsDeadFriend
New member
I don't agree. The score may not have ended in such a big blowout, but the Gophers weren't playing horribly the first 30 minutes, instead I think Canisius was playing great and a style that worked to neutralize the Gopher's high powered offense up to that point. But they knew that they had to keep it close and their PP defense was no where near as good as UMn's PP defense. Had the 5 minute major gone against UMn, worst case scenario they come out of it down 3-1 but still score at least 2 more goals in the 3rd and come out with the win. They were not limited to scoring on the PP and eventually figured out Canisius' style of play and adapted. UMn has great defense and a pretty good goalie, too, so like I said, had the major gone against them, I am sure that they would have limited the damage to maybe one goal, a deficit they could overcome vs any team in the country, including Canisius.
FredsDeadFriend
New member
The PWR is a horrible ranking system, it's basically nothing more than the RPI. I've kept track over the years and with the exception of a few rare slight differences, the PWR ranking almost always ends up identical to the RPI or whatever they call it now. But it's at least not a mystery, coaches know what they need to do to make it into the NCAA tourney and there is no human bias that keeps deserving teams out.
It may have been better or more just to use the Krach and have 6 B1G teams in the tourney this year, but who outside of MSU & NDm would have wanted that? Maybe SpeedKills? The Forum would never have heard the end of it. lol
Not to make this into a commentary thread on the system (although it seems we always get one), the way to scheme the system is for your entire conference to play the lower ranked teams (not the higher ranked teams) in the other conferences, and beat them at an 80% rate. That doesn't make your entire conference better than any other conference. But it does mathematically give you an advantage for the way the RPI and the KRACH are calculated.
I'm anxious to see this "NPI" thing that the committee is probably going to use next year. But, I'm afraid they are going to ruin it by continuing to use a 'Quality Wins Bonus". That's just a stupid math idea. The fact that you beat a high ranking team is already calculated into any decent system, so you don't need a QWB.
It still may be true. I wasn't comparing Harvard to Ohio State. I was comparing them to SCSU. I also referenced that Ohio State was a much tougher opponent than Minnesota State. Minnesota may be better off playing St. Cloud than tOSU as tOSU has played like the best team in the tournament so far. It is not a given that the higher seeded teams are better and that the second round opponent will be the 2 seed for an overwhelming #1 seed. Had St. Cloud been matched with tOSU in Bridgeport they likely would be sitting home now and perhaps Harvard would have matched up differently with Mankato. That is why I referred to not complaining about getting different matchups.
Nobody wants to see 6 teams from one conference in a 16 team field even if it is your own conference. Perhaps they need a limit and bypass until a different conference team comes up. Every Power Conference 5th or 6th place team is not necessarily better than a 3rd or 4th place team from another Power Conference. Look at Basketball where they gave out 8 to the B1G and by the time it was down to 15 they had none left.
FredsDeadFriend
New member
No, I have to disagree. As much as few wanting to see any one conference getting a ton of reps in an NCAA Championship tourney, efforts to limit or manipulate things to prevent dominance by one conference are mostly bullsh1t and few people like that kind of sh1t. I will admit that for the good of the sport, it's not total bullsh1t as no one wants to see an all-WCHA women's Frozen Four or an all-B1G or all-NCHC or all-ECAC Men's Frozen Four, but there is only so much the powers in charge should be doing. The Powers that Be in women's hockey have tried for a very long time to manipulate the system to prevent the WCHA from dominating the NCAA tournaments and almost without exception it's rarely prevented the WCHA from winning the Natl Title and I've done the work, the research and can prove without a doubt they've gone out of their way to try to limit the WCHA from dominating. Maybe they simply knew that if they put the Top 2-4 WCHA teams on the opposite side of the bracket from each other they'd end up with an all WCHA Natl Title game or if they spread 3 or 4 teams out among 3-4 Regionals they'd get an all WCHA Frozen Four? It's happened on the Men's side and they quickly learned not to spread the WCHA teams out like that again. They did spread out B1G teams and got 3 B1G teams into the Frozen Four the one year, they spread out the Minnesota teams and got 3 into the Frozen Four the one year. So this year they crammed all 3 Minnesota teams into the same region this year. I'm not saying it's a horrible sin or anything like that, although their decisions have lacked consistency, which is not good. Now it's not been outright manipulation every year on the women's side, sometimes the chips simply fall the right way, with the Badgers being #1 and UMn #4 in the PWR or vice versa, allowing for them to be paired up before the Championship Game, but some years it's been pure manipulation to ensure the WCHA teams meet up as early as possible in the tourney, at least on the women's side. It's been less needed on the men's side, especially after the B1G starting up led to the breakup of the WCHA as it divided up the Western powers amongst 3 different conferences instead of two while the East remained in their 2 conferences and added some quality teams to them.
While I can sort of see the point you are trying to make, I don't totally agree and I think you picked a bad example. The B1G absolutely deserved 8 teams in the CBB Big Dance. Outside of Purdue, they all basically lost when they were supposed to within reasonable expectations. A #9 seed beating a #8 seed is not an upset. A #10 beating a #7 seed is often considered a toss up as well. Same can be said for a #5 seed beating a #4 seed. Those types of matchups are toss ups for the most part.
StateofHockey78
New member
Oh no - I was giving you a little rib specifically about SCSU v Harvard. No dispute for me on OSU being better than Harvard even before this game, and no disagreement that the pairings being swapped were probably still going to result in a tough 2nd round matchup. It's always easy for someone like me to rub hindsight in your face. You had a thought, and it wasn't unreasonable in the context of the numbers.
MichVandal
Well-known member
Not for the fans of the winning teams. It's a lot less stressful to see your team dominate the other. And the next round looks promising.
MichVandal
Well-known member
Goalies have plenty of rest for those teams.
FredsDeadFriend
New member
In a normal or average/typical year, Q's 5-0 win would have been the most impressive performance of the day, this year it wouldn't qualify for the Top 4, lol.
Will be interesting to see how their game with OSU goes. My money is still on Q, but I bet they are sweating more today than they were a few days ago.
Will be interesting to see how their game with OSU goes. My money is still on Q, but I bet they are sweating more today than they were a few days ago.
MichVandal
Well-known member
If their D can handle OSU's forecheck system, it will be a closer game. If not, well.... But they are supposed to be the best defensive team in the country, so they can handle the puck in their zone.
FredsDeadFriend
New member
This is actually embarrassing. 36-3 now?
Kinda what I was thinking.
All right. So, in the regional which was populated EXACTLY how all of us would have done it if we had the change.....
BU, the overall #5 comes out of the region. Denver lost its chance when it couldn't beat the overall #13 seed. Again, no one had any arguments with this region.
And, in Fargo, Minnesota was impressive for the last half of the game on Thursday night, and workmanlike tonight (nice blast on that third goal, too). So, in spite of getting a less favorable draw than some of us would have given them, the overall #1 is headed to Tampa.
What about tomorrow? Well, all the teams playing are the ones who were the seeded favorites on Friday night, except for Ohio State's blitzkrieg win against Harvard. Perhaps, you say, OSU should have been playing SCSU instead of Harvard, but that's a different argument.
It's tough to complain about a Michigan v Penn State game. We all anticipated that one (Minnesota at Fargo, Quinnipiac in Bridgeport).
And, QU v OSU is fine, too.
Overall, the results have done the committee well, I'd say.
BU, the overall #5 comes out of the region. Denver lost its chance when it couldn't beat the overall #13 seed. Again, no one had any arguments with this region.
And, in Fargo, Minnesota was impressive for the last half of the game on Thursday night, and workmanlike tonight (nice blast on that third goal, too). So, in spite of getting a less favorable draw than some of us would have given them, the overall #1 is headed to Tampa.
What about tomorrow? Well, all the teams playing are the ones who were the seeded favorites on Friday night, except for Ohio State's blitzkrieg win against Harvard. Perhaps, you say, OSU should have been playing SCSU instead of Harvard, but that's a different argument.
It's tough to complain about a Michigan v Penn State game. We all anticipated that one (Minnesota at Fargo, Quinnipiac in Bridgeport).
And, QU v OSU is fine, too.
Overall, the results have done the committee well, I'd say.
StateofHockey78
New member
I'm sure they are getting all sorts of complaints about spreading out the B1G right about now....
I still don't think the committee got Harvard/SCSU right but I am happy with the attendance of both games today. Refreshing to see. And should be two more good crowds tomorrow.
Michigan and QU winning would produce the best FF to me. All will have won either RS or tournament titles in their league (BU won both).
Michigan and QU winning would produce the best FF to me. All will have won either RS or tournament titles in their league (BU won both).