NCAA Div I Tournament comments

First, congratulations and thanks to the selection committee for a job
well done!  Overall, this is the best job of selecting and seeding
teams that I have seen in the three (or so) years that I have been
seriously observing the process.

I will assume in the following comments that Rich Kern's RKPI index
is a valid simulation of the RPI index - if not, my apologies, but
any comments based on the RKPI index will be just so much hot air.
Furthermore, I have the BCR and AVCA rankings for last week, but not
for this week.

We have seen in the past that the RPI is not very well correlated with
the probability of a win for the higher ranked team - for example,
last year Notre Dame was seeded, and lost to Michigan State, who had
a better BCR ranking.  This time, only fourteen of the top sixteen
teams in the RKPI ranking were given seeds - Louisville and Notre Dame
being the exceptions.  Instead, Texas A&M (RKPI #21) and Washington
(RKPI #25) were taken.  Looking at the BCR (which, in my opinion, is
the best predictor of a win we currently have available - not that
it's perfect, of course!), fourteen of the top sixteen teams were
given seeds - Arizona (RKPI #23) and Loyola Marymount (RKPI #30) were
not; instead, #20 Illinois (RKPI #14) and #23 Texas A&M (RKPI #21)
were seeded.  Looking at the AVCA rankings, the first four seeds match
with their top four, and five and six were reversed (which makes a bit
of sense, as Kansas State lost last week, and might well drop), but
after that, things start to differ.  A table is better here than
a list - so set your reader to a fixed font:

   seeding  AVCA ranking  team  
   -------  ------------  ----------------------------
      7          9        Georgia Tech
      8          7        UCLA
      9         10        Nebraska
     10          8        California
     11         11        Penn State
     12         14        Washington
     13         19        Minnesota
     14         12        Colorado State
     15         18        Illinois
     16         24        Texas A&M

So AVCA's #13 (Santa Clara - BCR #19, RKPI #19), #15 (Loyola
Marymount - BCR #15, RKPI #30), and #16 (Northern Iowa - BCR #35,
RKPI #24) were not seeded.

On the other end of the scale, by my reckoning (using the BCR), the
committee did an excellent job.  There are seventeen guests in the
tournament (defined as teams which would not have made the tournament
if not for their automatic bid), of which threee were actually in the
top 64.  My method was to start from the lowest ranked (in the BCR)
team and go upwards, giving the following list:

   R   BCR  RKPI  Team
   64  243   143  Alabama A&M
   63  185   159  Manhattan
   62  181   152  Winthrop
   61  162    55  Pennsylvania
   60  158   117  Robert Morris
   59  150   134  George Mason
   58  138   129  Nicholls State
   57  131    91  UCF
   56  131    77  New Hampshire
   55  131    59  American
   54  126   105  Georgia Southern
   53   88    60  Wisconsin - Green Bay
   52   84   110  Valparaiso
   51   75   164  Murray State
   50   59    73  Dayton
   49   52    68  Sacramento State
   48   49    32  New Mexico State

The only reason to include the last three as guests is that (given
the other guests) if the tournament were selected solely by the BCR,
they would have given way to someone with a higher ranking.

The only team in the top 47 in the BCR which did not make the
tournament was Utah State, who was 18-12, going 10-8 in the Big West.
They beat Cal State Northridge in five at home last week, and then
lost to BYU in five at BYU - both of those teams made the tournament.
The team which did make the tournament instead was #48 Northwestern,
which lost to Indiana (at Indiana) in three last week, but then beat
Michigan State at home in three, and lost at home to Michigan in four.
Indiana did not make the tournament, but Michigan and Michigan State
did.  It has been that kind of season - there have been many upsets,
whichever ranking system you use.  I would have liked to see Utah
State in the tournament, but I glad I did not have to try to determine
which of the two teams deserved a bid!  I will say that given that
Northwestern is going to play the first round at Washington, Utah
State would not have had to travel as far!

This year's tourist awards go to Manhattan, who travels cross country
to meet Pepperdine in Malibu, and New Hampshire, who comes to USC
(but I saw them early this year at California, so they have won
a second trip to the coast).

As for the placement of teams, however, we do see that nine of the
sixteen first round hosts are east of the Rockies, with Florida,
Maryland, Penn State, and Kansas State hosting for the Gainesville
regional - note that #14 seed Colorado State is playing at Maryland!
But we do not have the gross indecencies of last year, when California
played Santa Clara and UCLA played Long Beach State in the first
round, and then California had to play UC Santa Barbara, and UCLA
had to play Pepperdine in the second round, while North Carolina
played South Carolina, Michigan State played Notre Dame, and Ohio
State played Louisville in the second round (if memory serves, and I
have not looked this up, none of the latter six teams were ranked as
high as any of the first four).

The worst first round match, based on the highest BCR ranking for the
underdogs, is #23 Kansas vs. #23 Long Beach State.  Playing at
Pepperdine, I would have to rate Kansas as the underdog.  The second
worst is #13 Arizona vs. #26 Wisconsin.  I'm picking Arizona to beat
both Wisconsin and host #23 Texas A&M.  Arizona has been improving
fairly steadily this season as their freshman setter has gained
experience.  They lost to #18 UC Santa Barbara this week, but the two
teams are only separated by fifty points in the BCR scoring, and there
is a 50 point home-field advantage, so the loss is not that
surprising.  Third is #30 Notre Dame vs. #26 Louisville.  Fourth is #26 Colorado
vs. #31 Michigan.

Going the other way, the worst first round match, based on the lowest
BCR ranking for the favorite, is #47 Brigham Young vs. #49 New Mexico
State; second is #42 Pittsburgh vs. #162 Pennsylvania; third is #39
Maryland vs. #131 American, and fourth is #35 Pacific vs. #42 San
Francisco.

If the first round goes according to the BCR ranking, the worst
second round matchups (based on the highest BCR ranking of the
underdogs) are:  #1 USC vs. #15 Loyola Marymount, #5 Georgia Tech vs.
#17 Florida A&M, #15 Minnesota vs. #18 UC Santa Barbara, and
#9 Washington vs. #19 Santa Clara.  Of these underdogs, only Loyola
Marymount could have expected to play a lower ranked team, based on
the BCR ranking.  The other real shaft, however, goes to #13 Arizona,
which has to play at #23 Texas A&M.

On the other end (based on the lowest BCR ranking of the favorites)
the only team which is not in the top sixteen is #20 Illinois vs. #26
Louisville.

So, to sum it up, the committee did a great job, and my
congratulations to them.

Let the games begin!

Mark

-- Go, Cardinal!