Bracket first impressions | Page 4 | The Boneyard

Bracket first impressions

Okay, now that North Carolina men beat San Diego St. by about 100 in the play in game maybe we can stop the kvetching? If the Heels shouldn't have been there, what does that say about the Aztecs?
 
FanInNC said:
Ok … can someone explain how this shook out? Why wouldn’t it be :

2/3 State Notre Dame
2/3 Duke LsU
2/3 TCU Okla
2/3 UConn UNC
Expand ...
They have a “principle” where the top 4 teams from a conference are supposed to put in separate regionals if they're in the top 4 seed lines. But as noted above, the distribution of SEC and ACC teams in the top 3 seed lines made it impossible to fully follow this principle.

But the committee works from top to bottom, so it looks like they followed this principle as long as they could until they were forced to violate it.

When they got to #9 Notre Dame, they followed their principle and moved them to the regional with Texas and TCU. Next up was #10 LSU, which was put in the UCLA-NC State regional. Next was #11 Oklahoma, placed with USC-UConn.

And finally, that left UNC nowhere to go but into the SC-Duke regional.
 
Last edited:
nwhoopfan said:
Okay, now that North Carolina men beat San Diego St. by about 100 in the play in game maybe we can stop the kvetching? If the Heels shouldn't have been there, what does that say about the Aztecs?
Expand ...

(Edited ) a tarheel
 
Last edited:
FanInNC said:
Ok … can someone explain how this shook out? Why wouldn’t it be :

2/3 State Notre Dame
2/3 Duke LsU
2/3 TCU Okla
2/3 UConn UNC
Expand ...
This would've been preferable to a potential UNC/Duke Part 3. LSU is hobbled, relatively small, and can't defend.
 
Plebe said:
They have a “principle” where the top 4 teams are supposed to put in separate regionals if they're in the top 4 seed lines. But as noted above, the distribution of SEC and ACC teams in the top 3 seed lines made it impossible to fully follow this principle.
But the committee works from top to bottom, so it looks like they followed this principle as long as they could until they were forced to violate it.
When they got to #9 Notre Dame, they followed their principle and moved them to the regional with Texas and TCU. Next up was #10 LSU, which was put in the UCLA-NC State regional. Next was #11 Oklahoma, placed with USC-UConn.
And finally, that left UNC nowhere to go but into the SC-Duke regional.
Expand ...

Something is still confusing. The rankings you listed have:

9. Notre Dame
10. LSU
11. Oklahoma
12. North Carolina

Notre Dame couldn't be in same region as #8 NC State (ACC).
LSU couldn't be in same region as #2 South Carolina (SEC).
Oklahoma couldn't be in same region as #3 Texas (SEC).

So, the committee needed to procedurally bump Notre Dame down first and foremost. Why they didn't place ND in #2 South Carolina's region (bumping them down one spot) leaves me scratching my head. Instead, they bumped them down two spots into #3 Texas' region.

LSU was procedurally bumped up one spot to #9; that makes perfect sense.

After that, all they had to do was flip flop Oklahoma (bumped down one spot) and North Carolina (bumped up one spot). Instead, they bumped North Carolia up two spots which resulted in them bumping Notre Dame down two spots.

Perhaps I'm missing something obvious.
 
southie said:
So, the committee needed to procedurally bump Notre Dame down first and foremost. Why they didn't place ND in #2 South Carolina's region (bumping them down one spot) leaves me scratching my head. Instead, they bumped them down two spots into #3 Texas' region.
Expand ...
Because that would have put them in the same region as Duke, which is also an ACC team.
 
Plebe said:
Because that would have put them in the same region as Duke, which is also an ACC team.
Expand ...

But the committee still ended up placing another (lower-ranked) ACC team, North Carolina in the same region as Duke.

Are you saying that based on the team rankings, they first most moved #9 Notre Dame away from #8 NC State, and left them put in Texas' region (even though #11 Oklahoma and #12 North Carolina would have to be bumped, as well)? So, the end result was ND gets bumped down 2 spots, and UNC gets bumped up 2 spots and ends up 1 spot ahead of fellow ACC-team ND on the 3-seed line? Seems like they over-complicated things.
 
southie said:
But the committee still ended up placing another (lower-ranked) ACC team, North Carolina in the same region as Duke.

Are you saying that based on the team rankings, they first most moved #9 Notre Dame away from #8 NC State, and left them put in Texas' region (even though #11 Oklahoma and #12 North Carolina would have to be bumped, as well)? So, the end result was ND gets bumped down 2 spots, and UNC gets bumped up 2 spots and ends up 1 spot ahead of fellow ACC-team ND on the 3-seed line? Seems like they over-complicated things.
Expand ...
Yes, that's what I meant when I said, "But the committee works from top to bottom, so it looks like they followed this principle as long as they could until they were forced to violate it."

It's stated in the committee's "principles and procedures" document that they place teams in the bracket from top to bottom, from 1 to 68 (I forget the exact wording, so paraphrasing). So it kinda makes sense they would follow this principle with teams 9, 10 and 11 until they were left no other choice with team 12.
 
nwhoopfan said:
Okay, now that North Carolina men beat San Diego St. by about 100 in the play in game maybe we can stop the kvetching? If the Heels shouldn't have been there, what does that say about the Aztecs?
Expand ...
Idk about the particulars of their resume vs whoever they beat out, but predictive strength and performance in the tourney is not the same as earning the bid.

Imaginary season where Lauren Betts and every other UCLA starter suffers injury on opening night, Bruins go 15-15, then every starter is 100% day after Big Ten Tourney. That UCLA team would almost certainly cruise to victory in a play in game, but that wouldn’t mean they deserved to be there.
 
JstVisiting said:
Idk about the particulars of their resume vs whoever they beat out, but predictive strength and performance in the tourney is not the same as earning the bid.

Imaginary season where Lauren Betts and every other UCLA starter suffers injury on opening night, Bruins go 15-15, then every starter is 100% day after Big Ten Tourney. That UCLA team would almost certainly cruise to victory in a play in game, but that wouldn’t mean they deserved to be there.
Expand ...
Yeah makes sense. It just seems like more often than not the "don't deserve to be there" teams go out and do something like this. I did hear their resume was bad, especially record against Quad 1 teams. I just looked at West Virginia's schedule, I guess the resume is better by the metrics, but just looking at wins and losses it doesn't seem very compelling to me. Certainly not one of the bigger snubs of all time.
 
nwhoopfan said:
Yeah makes sense. It just seems like more often than not the "don't deserve to be there" teams go out and do something like this. I did hear their resume was bad, especially record against Quad 1 teams. I just looked at West Virginia's schedule, I guess the resume is better by the metrics, but just looking at wins and losses it doesn't seem very compelling to me. Certainly not one of the bigger snubs of all time.
Expand ...
I think it's just people hate North Carolina. I'm ok with that.
 
Washington looked good early but Columbia controlled most of 2nd half. 63-60 final. Columbia's coach made some adjustments. Coach Langley did nothing. Not impressed.
 
nwhoopfan said:
Washington looked good early but Columbia controlled most of 2nd half. 63-60 final. Columbia's coach made some adjustments. Coach Langley did nothing. Not impressed.
Expand ...
So ... not much consolation that Langley finally had a breakthrough season and got an at-large bid?

Actually, the committee ranked Columbia #41 and Washington #42, so this game played out almost perfectly chalk with a one-possession win for the Ivy representative.
 
Plebe said:
So ... not much consolation that Langley finally had a breakthrough season and got an at-large bid?

Actually, the committee ranked Columbia #41 and Washington #42, so this game played out almost perfectly chalk with a one-possession win for the Ivy representative.
Expand ...
It's certainly a step forward, but this was a winnable game that UW let slip away.

Excellent FT defense by Columbia, they held UW to 3-10 from the charity stripe. In a 3 point game...yeah, Dawgs should've won this one.
 
So through two games do we think these Ivy teams are better than Virginia Tech? Seems like they've had a respectable showing. In particular I didn't expect Washington to lose that one.
 
12au said:
In particular I didn't expect Washington to lose that one.
Expand ...
They tricked for a brief stretch late in the season, but letting winnable games slip away is what they do.
 
nwhoopfan said:
They tricked for a brief stretch late in the season, but letting winnable games slip away is what they do.
Expand ...
If they'd won their winnable games, what would their record and seed have been?
 
Plebe said:
If they'd won their winnable games, what would their record and seed have been?
Expand ...
There were some others that they held a lead fairly late but ended up losing by 8 or 10 or so, so I won't count those. But let's just say they beat LSU in OOC, Oregon on the road and USC at home. Two 1 point losses and a 5 point loss where they held a late lead. Only 3 game improvement but large jump in seed. Also Indiana they lost by 3 so that could've gone either way, but I think Hoosiers led almost the whole way so that's a little different than coughing up the lead.
 
Well I'm not the only board member feeling bad. I think @triaddukefan knew this was coming as soon as the brackets came out. In the other play in William & Mary beat High Point 69-63. At 16-18 The Tribe are suddenly one of the hottest teams in the country! You do not want to see them in your bracket!
 
nwhoopfan said:
Well I'm not the only board member feeling bad. I think @triaddukefan knew this was coming as soon as the brackets came out. In the other play in William & Mary beat High Point 69-63. At 16-18 The Tribe are suddenly one of the hottest teams in the country! You do not want to see them in your bracket!
Expand ...
William and Mary is officially the best 16-18 team to ever play in the NCAA tournament.
 
southie said:
Something is still confusing. The rankings you listed have:

9. Notre Dame
10. LSU
11. Oklahoma
12. North Carolina

Notre Dame couldn't be in same region as #8 NC State (ACC).
LSU couldn't be in same region as #2 South Carolina (SEC).
Oklahoma couldn't be in same region as #3 Texas (SEC).

So, the committee needed to procedurally bump Notre Dame down first and foremost. Why they didn't place ND in #2 South Carolina's region (bumping them down one spot) leaves me scratching my head. Instead, they bumped them down two spots into #3 Texas' region.

LSU was procedurally bumped up one spot to #9; that makes perfect sense.

After that, all they had to do was flip flop Oklahoma (bumped down one spot) and North Carolina (bumped up one spot). Instead, they bumped North Carolia up two spots which resulted in them bumping Notre Dame down two spots.

Perhaps I'm missing something obvious.
Expand ...

Tour mistake is in assuming that there was no agenda among any of the committee and that no one approached the chairman before the process started to lobby for team/conference/region. I've sat a few labor contract negotiating teams and while most members were there for the right reasons, there were always deals made by coalitions and when push came to shove, if there was no one present advocating for a particular issue it ended up in the wastebasket. I suspect that some worthy teams got tossed into the waste basket
 
William & Mary at Texas might be the biggest spread. Largest spread is currently UConn by 44.5.

I'm thinking 46.5
 
12au said:
So through two games do we think these Ivy teams are better than Virginia Tech? Seems like they've had a respectable showing. In particular I didn't expect Washington to lose that one.
Expand ...
Virginia Tech is better than Princeton. Columbia is more of a toss-up, IMO.

The real question here is, "are Washington and Iowa State really better than Virginia Tech?"
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Online statistics

Members online
170
Guests online
1,455
Total visitors
1,625
Totals may include hidden visitors.

Share This Page

Forum statistics

Threads
163,982
Messages
4,377,550
Members
10,167
Latest member
CTFan142


.
..
Top Bottom