Re: RPI 2013 Part V: Who Wants Screech?
Looks like the cheering instructions for the weekend are:
- All favorites, except
- OSU over Notre Dame. An OSU win drops Nt below RPI in most scenarios, making up for the chance they might win the tourney
- Mk over Wisconsin. If Wisconsin gets two wins, we're probably toast. So nip it in the bud.
- I found a couple scenarios where Colorado College winning is better than losing. I'm tempted to pick CC and let a WCHA powerhouse knock them out.
- Brown over Union for 3rd place
The weird one is Mercyhurst over UConn. It pushes UConn over the cliff and vaults Robert Morris(!) way up. It's definitely weird and probably bad, so stick with UConn. Anyone else see anything notable?
This is close to being right. Definitely looking for a pair of Union losses in AC, or at least a loss to Yale and a tie in the consolation game. And we're rooting for higher seeds almost across the board, which is not a bad spot to be in.
The OSU-ND game is a little bit dicey. Could go either way on that, Notre Dame would drop anyway as long as Miami beats Michigan (and eliminates the Wolverines as a TUC). Under the best conditions, RPI can get away with having an upset tournament winner (13th being a possibility means they could make the tournament even with as many as 3 upsets out of 5), but Miami/Notre Dame would pretty much guarantee that wouldn't happen.
Colorado College beating North Dakota means you're losing a bit of insurance in a league where there are a number of options that wouldn't be considered upset winners.
Also, I'd take Mercyhurst over UConn, only because I have yet to find a scenario where Robert Morris makes the tournament at RPI's expense, and Mercyhurst was an opponent this year (their wins provide more of an RPI boost).
FWIW, the "non-upset" tournament champions are as follows:
AHA: Niagara
CCHA: Miami or Notre Dame
ECAC: Quinnipiac or Yale
HEA: UMass-Lowell or Boston College
WCHA: St. Cloud State, Minnesota, North Dakota, or Minnesota State.
Basically, rooting for these teams wherever possible, plus a few other things elsewhere (with the noted possible exception of Notre Dame). Yale, Lowell, and BC are especially important, given the teams they are playing next. Minnesota State winning would be very nice, too.
As an aside, Brown winning the ECAC tournament would wreck the entire bracket pretty good, owing to the fact that they are hosting the Providence regional.