fresh look at bracketology

[dwaderoy2004]

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/index

two seperate articles by Pat Forde and Andy Katz.  Quite interesting...

[Dish]

Agreed. Very interesting reading and very insightful as to how the NCAA bracket works itself out. I'd love to see someone get access to make a documentary on it someday (not that the NCAA would ever let this happen). I wish I could be a professional bracketologist and get paid to sit in a room for 5 days, watching basketball and deciding who goes/doesn't go to the NCAA's.

[mu03eng]

Dude, that is some awesome stuff.  I find it very interesting how some of it works.  If you look at Katz's article he specifically talks about the seeding and who plays where.  In their mock bracket they have MU as a 2 playing the first two games in Chicago, and should they win they would then go out to San Jose.  Pitt is seeded as a 3 and gets Lexington, KY then East Rutherford.  Pitt would have the arguably better location placement with a lower seed.  Obviously Chicago is better for MU than Lexington for Pitt but then East Rutherford is a ton better than San Jose.

I could spend hours pouring over how the brackets breakdown and the logic.   Anyone else think a Selection Sunday video game would be huge.  You help figure out the seedings and then get to play the tournament to see how it breaksdown.  Could be interesting.

[dwaderoy2004]

yeah, you then start to weigh whether it would be better to be a two seed, or a three with the better placement.  makes you appreciate too why some teams seem to be seeded lower or higher than anticipated because of conference matchups and whatnot.  Katz said dennis Dodd (cbs.sportsline) and Mike DeCourcy (Sporting News) were also on the panel.  I'm hoping they both write articles as well...

good example was in 2003 when pitt was a 2, but we were the three playing in minneapolis.  i would say we had quite the fan advantage...

[Dish]

DeCoucry has his article up, and it is just as interesting as Katz's and Forde's. Great stuff indeed.

http://www.sportingnews.com/yourturn/viewtopic.php?t=175458

[ilovefreeway]

And according to the NCAA, we're BEast champs, go us!

[gtown100]

Maybe I am bias, but Georgetown is a 10 seed, one of the last 4 teams in???  We are 7-2 in conference.  Out of our 5 losses, 4 of them are top 20 in the rpi.  And although we have no Marquee wins, @ vandy, @ michigan, blowout of notre dame, and @ louisville are all pretty good, not to mention 3 are top 50 rpi.  and we are 7-2 now on the road overall.  Am I a rose-colored glasses gtown fan or were we jobbed a bit here?

[dwaderoy2004]

i don;t think the @ louisville was factored in.  all i can say is that apparently marquee wins are a big deal...

[gtown100]

obviously. if the third place team in the Big East is one of the last four in then our conference is far worse than even I could have dreamed.  I know we are down from last year...but yeesh.  I know you guys are thrilled with it, and understandably so.  I am just mind-boggled at the lack of the respect for the Hoyas.  I'll stop my rant now.

[BM1090]

Unless Gtown goes 2-5 in the rest of the BE games, they will be better than a 10. Dont worry, Things will even themsleves out

[rocky_warrior]

Two things to consider:

1) Katz says they used the results through "Tuesday, Feb. 7", so I assume he means Feb 6.  Which means that @UL wouldn't be counted yet.

2) They may have been considering something similar to what I posted a few days ago.  Now, I know I bash G'town in this a great deal (hey, trash talk is fun sometimes). But, I am nervous about the game on Sat - you guys are playing much better now.  Also, I was clearly wrong about Louisville.  With that disclaimer, here was my point:

OK, I wanted to stay out of this conversation until after the Rutgers game...but here's my two cents...

There was a thread I linked a week ago or so from the Hoya baords where they weren't impressed with Marquette this year.  Well, after looking at schedule's, I'm going to be the first to say I'm REALLY not impressed with Georgetown this year.

More than overall record, I think an opponents conference winning record is important to look at.  Sure Georgetown has a winning big east record, but of their opponents  in the 6-2 record, Notre Dame is the only one they've beat that has a winning record in the Big East.

Further, from their entire schedule,  they've only beaten 5 teams that are .500 or better in their conference: Vanderbilt, Fairfield, Oral Roberts, Michigan, and Notre Dame. 

So, how does MU stack up in a comparison like this.  We've beaten 13 opponents with at least .500 records in their conference (Idaho St, Tx Tech, Duke, Valpo, NW St, Del St, Oak, Morgan St, Sav St, WVU, UL, Pitt, Prov).  Now, I will grant you that Idaho St, Morgan St, and Sav St all have losing records overall, so maybe our total goes down to 10.

G'town has good big guys, but they simply don't have the guards to compete in the big east this year.  You could say their bigs are under performing as well - though I suspect it's from a lack of guards setting them up.  They've basically lost to any good team that came into their building, and they'll lose to Marquette as well.  It won't be a problem.  You read it here first

p.s. - They'll lose @UL tomorrow too...

[gtown100]

I know its a meaningless February bracketology, but its also something that will play in the mind of media people, poll voters, etc. 

Rocky, sure not opposed to some good ol' trash talking.  That's what sports is all about.  We are a MUCH different team then we were a few weeks ago.  When we lost a couple early in the season, people kind of forgot about us and wrote us off.  However, what people don't seem to realize is that 1. we lost 3 big-time contributors from last year (Bowman, Owens, Cook) and 2. Our offense takes a lot of work and practice to become cohesive.  But once it clicks, it is tough to stop.  If I were any other team in the country and had to name 5 teams that I would not want to play RIGHT NOW, 2 of them would be Marquette and Gtown.  I guess that's why something has to give on saturday!

[gtown100]

One more note about the bracket - Nova is a 6 seed????  Aren't they under .500 in conference?

[dwaderoy2004]

yeah, but they have their marquee win...they beat you gys on the road 

[rocky_warrior]

One more note about the bracket - Nova is a 6 seed????  Aren't they under .500 in conference?

Yes, but their SOS is great, and therefore their RPI is pretty good.  In fact, right now it's better than Marquette's.

Also, I should add to my G'town guards point - I just think your guards are to inexperienced - not that they aren't (or won't be) good enough.  Yes, your team has grown up this year, but so has ours.

You're right, something will have to give.  Somebody will lose their winning streak.  Can't Wait!

[gtown100]

Our guards are certainly not to the level of yours at Marquettes, however, I think many people would be shocked to see the consistency and numbers of our PG Jonathan Wallace.  He is 51% FG , 90% FT, and 49% 3FG.  Rick Majerus threw out an interesting stat in one of our games last week which said that he is a 180 shooter.  Meaning when you add those three stats up, you get more than 180.  J. Wallace is at 190, the highest of any starting guard in the COUNTRY.  I think Reggie Miller is the only player to ever do it in the NBA.

[jmayer1]

Steve Nash has also done that about 6 or 7 times in his career and is actually averaging 181 for his career.

That is a pretty cool stat, I had never heard someone refer to that before.

[Rocco]

Novak was at 191.8 last year! WoW!

[ecompt]

I think our Georgetown visitor has a great point. Georgetown would be the strongest 10 seed in history. If they beat us Saturday they will likely finish no worse than second in the conference and could go into the BETourney with 11 wins in their last 12 games. This is a very, very strong team.