Russell Jaslow
Registered User
They are not underdogs. Stop it, Bartman.
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SUNYAC 25-26 The start of a new era
- Thread starter dmac1103
- Start date
It helps the team get up for the game.....but now with the higher NPI after the win, I'll have to come up with other motivators.
Russell Jaslow
Registered User
You sound like a Yankees fan. I know. I am one.
I’m actually a Mets fan but since they are leaving the team faster than we can sign replacements, I might have to consider the Yankees. It’s been pointed out that even if Hobart beats Manhattanville Saturday our NPI might drop us a notch or two, so thank goodness we may claim underdog status again.
Actually this should happen: *Team's NPI has been adjusted to remove negative effect from defeating weak opponent.
Russell Jaslow
Registered User
Which is exactly why people can't take the NPI too seriously this early like you could with PWR.
Makes sense, I never really paid much attention until the NCAAs when it impacted seedings and home ice scheduling, despite my attempt to spin the underdog scenario.
Lord_Zubin
Puck Flattsburgh!!!
The 4th edition of the D3 At-Large Bid Watch/SUNYAC Roundup is here and a little late. Part of me forgot to do it yesterday, the other part was the website not loading for me half the time. Oops. Anyways, just when you thought it couldn't get any weirder, Salve Regina happened. We will get to that later.
The SUNYAC went 3-4 in the non-conference since my last post. Definitely not good, but the data is somewhat skewed by the fact that Hobart and Buff St were 5/7 games that were played. Hobart went 2-0 and Buff St got 1 win vs bad Hiram and 2 losses vs nationally ranked Trine so I would imagine the lions share of the results don't change the math all that much. With all that the SUNYAC is now sitting at an 0.522 win% in OOC matchups, which is still 4th in the nation behind the NESCAC, NCHA, and the WIAC. The race for 4th place has gotten as tight as possible as the UCHC and the CNE are right behind them with a 0.521 and 0.52 win% respectively. Those 3 conferences are seperated by 2 thousands of a percent. Absolutely insane. The SUNYAC split is still the same with Hobart and Oswego at the top and then everyone else, while I'm knocking St John Fisher down into the 2nd tier of the UCHC as they got absolutely mollywopped by Geneseo, so now the top tier of the UCHC is for now Utica, Geneseo, and Chatham.
Notable Wins:
#14 UCHC Utica upsets #4 SUNYAC SUNY Oswego at home. For those who know about Oswego's lack of success in the Utica Aud against any team really in the past decade, you could very easily say this game wasn't an upset but a foregone conclusion that Utica was going to win. While that is true, the math doesn't not care of factor info from previous years so despite being down in the 3rd period, Utica capitalizes on 2 major mistakes to get their 1st signature win of the season, while Oswego's misery in the Aud continues.
Unranked UCHC Naz ties #6 NESCAC Hamilton on the road. The UCHC receives a big pickup from an unlikely source. The NESCAC had just re-inserted themselves into the multi-bid conversation 2 weeks ago. But with the reputation the league has for beating up on each other, a result like this to the current bell of the ball in the NESCAC has the potential to make things much more complicated, especially if things tighten up.
Unranked Independent Salve Regina upsets #13 NESCAC Bowdoin on the road. You might be surprised to see the Salve Regina their situation for the past year or so. As I said before, we will cover them very soon.
Notable Losses/Ties
#4 SUNYAC SUNY Oswego loses to #14 UCHC Utica on the road. Already been mentioned, but still has to be noted here
#6 NESCAC Hamilton ties unranked UCHC Nazareth at home. Already been mentioned, but still has to be noted here
#13 NESCAC Bowdoin loses to Independent Unranked Salve Regina at home. Already been mentioned, but still has to be noted here.
Weekly Winner: The Salve Regina Seahawks
Yes. You read that right. The Salve Regina Seahawks, the same team that 4 months ago didn't have a coach, a conference, or even more than 12 games on their schedule for this year. They were a program left for dead, with almost 0 chance of ever recovering. Why am I talking about them now? Well, its because at the end of the semester, with one of the 10 easiest schedules in the entire country, they're currently sitting at #5 in the NPI and as D3hockeynews put it 1st barring a disaster, they will be hosting a home game in the 1st round of the National Tournament.
How did they get here? Well, turns out the coached they fired was hated by EVERYONE so after hiring a new coach they decided to kill two birds with one stone and got an immediate invite back to their ex (the CNE) for next year. They were able to get an almost full schedule (24 games) in less than a month and that's where we all left them, congratulating them on starting their rebuild and hoping they could regain what they had lost. What none of us realized until now is in there rush to get a complete schedule , they might've just exposed the biggest flaw in the NPI, and are accidentally using it to their full advantage.
(A good chunk of info was posted b4 me in an tweet on d3hockeynews on twitter, no I am not calling it X. You should absolutely check their coverage on twitter and their website diiihockeynews.com out if you've never heard of them, gotta give credit where it is due)
For those who don't know, they're 6 D-2 hockey teams that exist. There is no national tournament for them, they just have a small conference playoff, and games played by D3 teams against D2 teams do not count towards the NPI and anything regarding the national tournament. And that right there is the major flaw. With those restrictions, it has been traditionally a struggle for D2 teams to fill out their schedules with non-conference games, as there's not much incentive to face them at all with the old math used for the tournament. Salve might've accidentally flipped that traditional weakness into D2's biggest strength with the new NPI. With only having 24 games scheduled, and 4 games against D2 teams, the NPI is only allowed to use Salve's 20 games vs D3 teams as part of it's calculations. Smaller sample size means any Salve win would shoot them up the rankings much higher compared to the other D3 teams. The inverse effect is that any loss would send them down the rankings much more drastically compared to other D3 teams.
So, if you play in a good conference or a top ranked team, you want the biggest sample size possible to mitigate the losses are they are essentially inevitable with your schedule. But, if you play in a bad conference or no conference like Salve, your schedule already stinks and you have a near 0% chance of ever getting an at large bid. When there's 0 risk, you might as well go for the reward. You schedule a bunch of D2 teams to drop the sample size, and bet on yourself to run the table. If you're lucky you just might find yourself at the top. That is on how accident, Salve Regina is #5 in the NPI. Granted, you have to run the table, but they have done that so far sitting at 12-1. They also still have 3 D2 games remaining, which means they've already played 12/20 or 60% of their eligible schedule before Christmas.
Another factor that is unique to Salve and to this year only is their independence status. That means no conference tournament to add to their sample. While some of the actual at large players might have to play an extra 2-6 games depending on which conference their in, we theoretically could see an 11 game gap in sample sizes between them and someone like Adrian who could lose the NCHA tournament after playing 6 games and 3 minigames.
One major caveat to all of this is that this situation is unprecedented in it's nature and its also extremely volatile. We just don't know how the math will shake out at the end, and Salve could also lose their next 4 games and make this all a moot point for now. Tufts and Geneseo are their next games, and its very plausible they lose both of them. Either way you look at it, its's either a 1) Fun and unique sports story or 2) A precursor to events for later. The MASCAC has 11 non-conference games this year, an opportune coach could easily take this to the max and just see how far this new loophole can be stretched for next year. The LEC could use it to a lessor degree to try and building their conference prestige quicker for their big 3. Heck pretty much every eastern team could take advantage of it. It will certainly be entertaining to watch.
Weekly Loser: The Oswego State Lakers
As much as 2 losses to Hobart and Utica aren't the worst results a team could having, the end of semester has been slim pickings, and with how they blew that Utica game, my beloved lakers are this weeks losers. They're still #6 in the NPI for now and if they can avoid the usual slump they have right about now, they just might still be in an at large position. Hobart, Geneseo, and possibly Babson (on the other side of the Oswego tournament) will be tough. Cortland and Buff St are 100% trap games, and you know Platty wants their revenge.
Summary:
I thought this would be a short and sweet edition, and then Salve came in and blew it all up. Hopefully by this time next month the NPI will be fully sorted out and I can no longer rely on the polls for accurate team ratings. NCHA still looking strong to keep their 3 bid status, while the UCHC, SUNYAC, CNE, NESCAC, and Salve Regina fight for those other 2 bids. The last major chunk of non-conference games is upon us, and it will be awesome to see where the dust settles.
The SUNYAC went 3-4 in the non-conference since my last post. Definitely not good, but the data is somewhat skewed by the fact that Hobart and Buff St were 5/7 games that were played. Hobart went 2-0 and Buff St got 1 win vs bad Hiram and 2 losses vs nationally ranked Trine so I would imagine the lions share of the results don't change the math all that much. With all that the SUNYAC is now sitting at an 0.522 win% in OOC matchups, which is still 4th in the nation behind the NESCAC, NCHA, and the WIAC. The race for 4th place has gotten as tight as possible as the UCHC and the CNE are right behind them with a 0.521 and 0.52 win% respectively. Those 3 conferences are seperated by 2 thousands of a percent. Absolutely insane. The SUNYAC split is still the same with Hobart and Oswego at the top and then everyone else, while I'm knocking St John Fisher down into the 2nd tier of the UCHC as they got absolutely mollywopped by Geneseo, so now the top tier of the UCHC is for now Utica, Geneseo, and Chatham.
Notable Wins:
#14 UCHC Utica upsets #4 SUNYAC SUNY Oswego at home. For those who know about Oswego's lack of success in the Utica Aud against any team really in the past decade, you could very easily say this game wasn't an upset but a foregone conclusion that Utica was going to win. While that is true, the math doesn't not care of factor info from previous years so despite being down in the 3rd period, Utica capitalizes on 2 major mistakes to get their 1st signature win of the season, while Oswego's misery in the Aud continues.
Unranked UCHC Naz ties #6 NESCAC Hamilton on the road. The UCHC receives a big pickup from an unlikely source. The NESCAC had just re-inserted themselves into the multi-bid conversation 2 weeks ago. But with the reputation the league has for beating up on each other, a result like this to the current bell of the ball in the NESCAC has the potential to make things much more complicated, especially if things tighten up.
Unranked Independent Salve Regina upsets #13 NESCAC Bowdoin on the road. You might be surprised to see the Salve Regina their situation for the past year or so. As I said before, we will cover them very soon.
Notable Losses/Ties
#4 SUNYAC SUNY Oswego loses to #14 UCHC Utica on the road. Already been mentioned, but still has to be noted here
#6 NESCAC Hamilton ties unranked UCHC Nazareth at home. Already been mentioned, but still has to be noted here
#13 NESCAC Bowdoin loses to Independent Unranked Salve Regina at home. Already been mentioned, but still has to be noted here.
Weekly Winner: The Salve Regina Seahawks
Yes. You read that right. The Salve Regina Seahawks, the same team that 4 months ago didn't have a coach, a conference, or even more than 12 games on their schedule for this year. They were a program left for dead, with almost 0 chance of ever recovering. Why am I talking about them now? Well, its because at the end of the semester, with one of the 10 easiest schedules in the entire country, they're currently sitting at #5 in the NPI and as D3hockeynews put it 1st barring a disaster, they will be hosting a home game in the 1st round of the National Tournament.
How did they get here? Well, turns out the coached they fired was hated by EVERYONE so after hiring a new coach they decided to kill two birds with one stone and got an immediate invite back to their ex (the CNE) for next year. They were able to get an almost full schedule (24 games) in less than a month and that's where we all left them, congratulating them on starting their rebuild and hoping they could regain what they had lost. What none of us realized until now is in there rush to get a complete schedule , they might've just exposed the biggest flaw in the NPI, and are accidentally using it to their full advantage.
(A good chunk of info was posted b4 me in an tweet on d3hockeynews on twitter, no I am not calling it X. You should absolutely check their coverage on twitter and their website diiihockeynews.com out if you've never heard of them, gotta give credit where it is due)
For those who don't know, they're 6 D-2 hockey teams that exist. There is no national tournament for them, they just have a small conference playoff, and games played by D3 teams against D2 teams do not count towards the NPI and anything regarding the national tournament. And that right there is the major flaw. With those restrictions, it has been traditionally a struggle for D2 teams to fill out their schedules with non-conference games, as there's not much incentive to face them at all with the old math used for the tournament. Salve might've accidentally flipped that traditional weakness into D2's biggest strength with the new NPI. With only having 24 games scheduled, and 4 games against D2 teams, the NPI is only allowed to use Salve's 20 games vs D3 teams as part of it's calculations. Smaller sample size means any Salve win would shoot them up the rankings much higher compared to the other D3 teams. The inverse effect is that any loss would send them down the rankings much more drastically compared to other D3 teams.
So, if you play in a good conference or a top ranked team, you want the biggest sample size possible to mitigate the losses are they are essentially inevitable with your schedule. But, if you play in a bad conference or no conference like Salve, your schedule already stinks and you have a near 0% chance of ever getting an at large bid. When there's 0 risk, you might as well go for the reward. You schedule a bunch of D2 teams to drop the sample size, and bet on yourself to run the table. If you're lucky you just might find yourself at the top. That is on how accident, Salve Regina is #5 in the NPI. Granted, you have to run the table, but they have done that so far sitting at 12-1. They also still have 3 D2 games remaining, which means they've already played 12/20 or 60% of their eligible schedule before Christmas.
Another factor that is unique to Salve and to this year only is their independence status. That means no conference tournament to add to their sample. While some of the actual at large players might have to play an extra 2-6 games depending on which conference their in, we theoretically could see an 11 game gap in sample sizes between them and someone like Adrian who could lose the NCHA tournament after playing 6 games and 3 minigames.
One major caveat to all of this is that this situation is unprecedented in it's nature and its also extremely volatile. We just don't know how the math will shake out at the end, and Salve could also lose their next 4 games and make this all a moot point for now. Tufts and Geneseo are their next games, and its very plausible they lose both of them. Either way you look at it, its's either a 1) Fun and unique sports story or 2) A precursor to events for later. The MASCAC has 11 non-conference games this year, an opportune coach could easily take this to the max and just see how far this new loophole can be stretched for next year. The LEC could use it to a lessor degree to try and building their conference prestige quicker for their big 3. Heck pretty much every eastern team could take advantage of it. It will certainly be entertaining to watch.
Weekly Loser: The Oswego State Lakers
As much as 2 losses to Hobart and Utica aren't the worst results a team could having, the end of semester has been slim pickings, and with how they blew that Utica game, my beloved lakers are this weeks losers. They're still #6 in the NPI for now and if they can avoid the usual slump they have right about now, they just might still be in an at large position. Hobart, Geneseo, and possibly Babson (on the other side of the Oswego tournament) will be tough. Cortland and Buff St are 100% trap games, and you know Platty wants their revenge.
Summary:
I thought this would be a short and sweet edition, and then Salve came in and blew it all up. Hopefully by this time next month the NPI will be fully sorted out and I can no longer rely on the polls for accurate team ratings. NCHA still looking strong to keep their 3 bid status, while the UCHC, SUNYAC, CNE, NESCAC, and Salve Regina fight for those other 2 bids. The last major chunk of non-conference games is upon us, and it will be awesome to see where the dust settles.
bakdraft21
Well-known member
well with Bart firmly entrenched in the YAC,it will be a tough road to get that auto bid, but NOT impossible, the top dog has to get knocked down sooner or later, after that I would think next yr etc, Oz has to schedule a really tough non-conference schedule to get a shot at the at large bid if they cant get by Bart and the rest of the YAC....Let's Go Laker!!!
Tom Coughlin
5x NCAA Champ/2x Super Bowl Champ
The NCHA tourney format is:
Quarterfinal: 2 + mini
Semifinal: 1
Final: 1
So the max is 4 + a mini. The minigame does not count towards the NPI.
Tom Coughlin
5x NCAA Champ/2x Super Bowl Champ
The "D2 loophole" is a fun thought experiment, but I highly doubt that is why Salve scheduled 4 games against D2 teams. They were almost certainly just desperate to fill out their schedule.
Lord_Zubin
Puck Flattsburgh!!!
Ahh just the 1st round is 2 games ok. And yeah I knew the mini games don't count. So a 9 game gap could open between salve and other at large teams. 25 regular season games plus 4 conference playoff games.
Lord_Zubin
Puck Flattsburgh!!!
Agreed which is why I said they accidentally discovered it. If this plays out in there favor though, it may no longer be an accident in the future. We will have to wait and see.
We all know what can happen in the SUNYACs..Many times the favorite has gone down, even with home ice.
PrezdeJohnson09
Proud supporter of Osmirwich hockey
This is all fine and dandy...but until there is more data and/or Salve Regina has the inevitable losses coming to 1 or 2 stronger programs, this will all be for not. I think this a lot of hot air over a situation that will almost assuredly work itself out. And as another poster implied, Salve didn't actively want to schedule D2 games, they probably did what they had to survive to try and get closer to a full schedule since they had to schedule 25 non-conference games instead of of the 6-9 most have to get.
Tom Coughlin
5x NCAA Champ/2x Super Bowl Champ
And if they do run the table, you could make an argument that 19-1 is worthy of an at large bid even with a weak SOS.
Lord_Zubin
Puck Flattsburgh!!!
I sure hope it will be all for naught, I want oz to get an a large bid and i dont want to type another essay. Alas, this is this situation we're currently in and it is fascinating to talk about the very least.