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davekay1971
03-08-2013, 03:17 PM
Time to start playing the "no respect" card.

ESPN.com's front page currently with a picture of Sheed looking glum and K looking ticked with the headline "Cinderella's Revenge. Could this be the year a No. 16 seed takes out a No. 1? We're looking at you, Duke." The article in an inside access one, which I don't pay for, but the headline should be a banner to the Duke players: you just got called overrated.

I'm not sure what in the world would make ESPN think Duke, with Ryan back, is particularly vulnerable to a staggering upset compared to the other current projected 1 and 2 seeds. But there we are. Print it out and wallpaper the locker room it, Coach.

Merlindevildog91
03-08-2013, 03:34 PM
Time to start playing the "no respect" card.

ESPN.com's front page currently with a picture of Sheed looking glum and K looking ticked with the headline "Cinderella's Revenge. Could this be the year a No. 16 seed takes out a No. 1? We're looking at you, Duke." The article in an inside access one, which I don't pay for, but the headline should be a banner to the Duke players: you just got called overrated.

I'm not sure what in the world would make ESPN think Duke, with Ryan back, is particularly vulnerable to a staggering upset compared to the other current projected 1 and 2 seeds. But there we are. Print it out and wallpaper the locker room it, Coach.

Having paid absolutely no attention to ESPN's bracketology other than what I saw on Twitter, my first thought in seeing this was, "When did they finally decide we were deserving of a number 1 seed?"

BlueDevilBrowns
03-08-2013, 03:48 PM
Time to start playing the "no respect" card.

ESPN.com's front page currently with a picture of Sheed looking glum and K looking ticked with the headline "Cinderella's Revenge. Could this be the year a No. 16 seed takes out a No. 1? We're looking at you, Duke." The article in an inside access one, which I don't pay for, but the headline should be a banner to the Duke players: you just got called overrated.

I'm not sure what in the world would make ESPN think Duke, with Ryan back, is particularly vulnerable to a staggering upset compared to the other current projected 1 and 2 seeds. But there we are. Print it out and wallpaper the locker room it, Coach.


Well, I just read the article you mention and to briefly summarize, it uses statistical models to "prove" that Duke is the most likely of potential #1 seeds to be defeated this year by a #16 seed. They give Duke an 85% chance of beating a #1 seed, significantly lower than all other current top teams except one other.


What's interesting to me is in the comments section, a reader calls out ESPN for not including Duke's metrics With-Kelly and Without-Kelly. An ESPN representative responded by saying "we're trying to figure out whether our model can do a with-Kelly/without-Kelly thing at some point."


How lame.

I'm not a stat-head or a computer expert but I'm pretty sure it's not very hard to simply delete the 13 games Kelly didn't play from the data and compare the results.

toooskies
03-08-2013, 04:01 PM
A telling quote from the article on the ESPN home page's linked article:

Our dream scenario: Canisius storms out of the MAAC to take on Duke, where the Golden Griffins would have a 41.5 percent chance of pulling an all-time shocker.

Any system that proposes that an 18-12 team from the MAAC conference has a 40% chance of beating a 26-4 team from the ACC is worthless. Except not literally worthless; it's designed to sell ads.

Do not be mistaken, writers don't always write to tell the truth; some write to get a reaction. This is mostly the second. (It may have a nugget of truth in it; but that truth is simply, Duke is a "Giant" nearly every year, and we have similar statistical profiles every year. If we lose early, it significantly affects the data.)

Kedsy
03-08-2013, 04:09 PM
I'm not a stat-head or a computer expert but I'm pretty sure it's not very hard to simply delete the 13 games Kelly didn't play from the data and compare the results.

Actually, it's got to be WAY more complex than that. First of all, the rest of the team's performance (without Ryan) shouldn't be 100% discounted, second of all, most good ratings systems connect every game to every other game in myriad ways. How can you adjust the ratings for competition if you simply eradicate 13 games from the system? And even if you have an answer for that, my guess is most computer models won't have an easy way to remove games like that anyway. Finally, if you take away those 13 games, you take away almost all of Duke's conference schedule, and you'd be comparing apples-to-oranges with Duke's mostly non-conference schedule against most teams full schedule including conference games, and the overall reliability of the ratings would go down.

As far as what chance Duke has to be upset by an yet-to-be-determined #16 compared to other #1 seeds, it would seem to hinge on their computer ranking compared to the other #1s. Duke is currently #1 in RPI and #2 in BPI (behind Louisville, who most people aren't talking about as a #1 seed anyway). In Pomeroy and in Sagarin, Duke is #6, behind Indiana, Gonzaga, and Kansas, so if that was the system used than you'd think the odds would be highest on Duke losing to a yet-to-be-named opponent. Seems weird that ESPN would use Pomeroy rather than its own rating system, but that must be what they're doing, right? Even then, without seeing the analysis, 85% sounds off.

hurleyfor3
03-08-2013, 04:36 PM
Without Kelly and as a #1, I would in fact agree. Not that we'd lose to a 16, but that we'd have the highest probability of doing so. Although in the real world we would likely drift down to #3 or 4 territory.

JasonEvans
03-08-2013, 04:51 PM
One thing worth pointing out is that as the NCAA tournament continues to expand and make the #16s play in "play-in games," it raises the chances of a #1 seed being upset because they teams who end up occupying the #16 seeds get better and better.

Before the advent of the play-in game in 2001, the #16s were the 4 worst teams in the tournament. If you were a #1 seed then, at best, you were playing one of the bottom 4. Then from 2001-2010, they added one play in game and the #16s became the 5 worst teams in the tournament. At that point one of the #1 seeds was forced to play a team that would have been a #15 seed in the past. Since 2011, we have had even more play-in games, two of which involve the bottom 4 teams in the tourney. This means that two of the #1 seeds are playing teams that would have been #15 seeds in the past. The other two #1 seeds are playing teams that were good enough to beat a #16 seed, an indication that they may be better than anticipated.

I think the dual play-in games has created a scenario where an upset of a #1 seed is inevitable and will happen some time soon. We have raised the quality of the teams playing the #1 seeds, perhaps significantly. As a result, the odds of an upset creep higher, even if it is only by a tiny bit.

For 27 years we have had #16 seeds playing #1 seeds. The #1 seeds are 108-0 in those games. While I am quite familiar with the rules of statistics that say past results do not affect the odds of a future event happening (flip a coin 10 times and even if it has hit heads 9 out of ten, the odds of a heads on the next toss are still 50-50), I tend to think that the fact that we have gone 108 games without the ultimate upset perhaps says we are "due" for it to happen. We stack the odds against the #1 seeds more and more each year. It will happen someday.

-Jason "that said, 85% chance that Duke will lose to an unknown #16 seed... that seems a tad crazy" Evans

hurleyfor3
03-08-2013, 05:02 PM
For 27 years we have had #16 seeds playing #1 seeds. The #1 seeds are 108-0 in those games. While I am quite familiar with the rules of statistics that say past results do not affect the odds of a future event happening (flip a coin 10 times and even if it has hit heads 9 out of ten, the odds of a heads on the next toss are still 50-50), I tend to think that the fact that we have gone 108 games without the ultimate upset perhaps says we are "due" for it to happen. We stack the odds against the #1 seeds more and more each year. It will happen someday.

Actually 112 such games in 28 tournaments.

For there to be a 50% chance of no 16-over-1 upsets in 112 games, the chance of the #16 winning an individual game must be less than or equal to 1 minus the 112th root of one-half. This is .00617, meaning the (geometric) average 16 seed has less than a .617 of 1% chance of winning. This sounds about right to me.

[/math geek]

SilkyJ
03-08-2013, 05:19 PM
Time to start playing the "no respect" card.

...The article in an inside access one, which I don't pay for

Maybe I'm so numb to all the Duke hate at this point that I'm seeing things upside down, but I don't think this is a fair example of the typical duke hate/no respect card. I'm an insider and read the article, and as others pointed out they ran a quant/statistics model and the computer said we are the most vulnerable "giant" i.e. potential 1 seed. Each year after the brackets come out, ESPN runs this model (or at least something very similar) and lists out their most likely upsets. This is the same thing, except run a few weeks early. No biggie.

And the computer clearly does not have a high enough WRC (white raven coefficient). We are undefeated with Ryan Kelly. I don't expect that to change any time soon--as in this year :)

tommy
03-08-2013, 05:28 PM
One thing worth pointing out is that as the NCAA tournament continues to expand and make the #16s play in "play-in games," it raises the chances of a #1 seed being upset because they teams who end up occupying the #16 seeds get better and better.

Before the advent of the play-in game in 2001, the #16s were the 4 worst teams in the tournament. If you were a #1 seed then, at best, you were playing one of the bottom 4. Then from 2001-2010, they added one play in game and the #16s became the 5 worst teams in the tournament. At that point one of the #1 seeds was forced to play a team that would have been a #15 seed in the past. Since 2011, we have had even more play-in games, two of which involve the bottom 4 teams in the tourney. This means that two of the #1 seeds are playing teams that would have been #15 seeds in the past. The other two #1 seeds are playing teams that were good enough to beat a #16 seed, an indication that they may be better than anticipated.

I think the dual play-in games has created a scenario where an upset of a #1 seed is inevitable and will happen some time soon. We have raised the quality of the teams playing the #1 seeds, perhaps significantly. As a result, the odds of an upset creep higher, even if it is only by a tiny bit.

For 27 years we have had #16 seeds playing #1 seeds. The #1 seeds are 108-0 in those games. While I am quite familiar with the rules of statistics that say past results do not affect the odds of a future event happening (flip a coin 10 times and even if it has hit heads 9 out of ten, the odds of a heads on the next toss are still 50-50), I tend to think that the fact that we have gone 108 games without the ultimate upset perhaps says we are "due" for it to happen. We stack the odds against the #1 seeds more and more each year. It will happen someday.

-Jason "that said, 85% chance that Duke will lose to an unknown #16 seed... that seems a tad crazy" Evans

Jason, either I'm misunderstanding what you're saying, or else I think you may be misunderstanding, or more likely inadvertently misstating the way this works.

The expansion to a 68 team tournament means this: Teams 65 through 68 play each other, and the two winners advance to face #1 seeds. So those two #1 seeds play teams that wouldn't have made the top 64, meaning they're the equivalent of #17 seeds. Yes, because those teams would've received automatic bids anyway, they would've acutually been #16 seeds in the old days, but nevertheless they are teams not considered by the committee to be in the Top 64 (i.e. the "real" top 16 seeds) in this tournament.

The other two #1 seeds play teams designated as #16 seeds as well, so they're teams 63 and 64. Basically, there are six #16 seeds, and the bottom four of them play off to get into the field. But no #1 seeds have to play a #15 seed, or any team rated by the committee as being overall #s 59 through 62, which correlates to a 15 seed. Note: normally, the #15 seeds would be overall #s 57 through 60, but everyone gets bumped down two spots because of the peculiar way this tournament is structured, with six #12 seeds instead of four.

For the same reason, when the tournament had a 65 team field, none of the #1's played a team that would've been a #15. They all played a 16, or perhaps the lone true #17 seed (the #65 overall team).

All that being said, I do agree that the chances of a #1 losing its opener are rising, but I think it's because the small conference teams who are those #16s are becoming better and better, while the elite teams (the #1's) are not as good as they were in years past. Or even close.

-jk
03-08-2013, 05:50 PM
Actually 112 such games in 28 tournaments.

For there to be a 50% chance of no 16-over-1 upsets in 112 games, the chance of the #16 winning an individual game must be less than or equal to 1 minus the 112th root of one-half. This is .00617, meaning the (geometric) average 16 seed has less than a .617 of 1% chance of winning. This sounds about right to me.

[/math geek]

I was there for Mississippi Valley State. Whew!

It almost happened to us. It will happen to someone someday. Just hope it isn't us - but if we continue get more 1 seeds than most (a nice problem to have!), odds are...

-jk

toooskies
03-08-2013, 05:54 PM
Jason, either I'm misunderstanding what you're saying, or else I think you may be misunderstanding, or more likely inadvertently misstating the way this works.

The expansion to a 68 team tournament means this: Teams 65 through 68 play each other, and the two winners advance to face #1 seeds. So those two #1 seeds play teams that wouldn't have made the top 64, meaning they're the equivalent of #17 seeds. Yes, because those teams would've received automatic bids anyway, they would've acutually been #16 seeds in the old days, but nevertheless they are teams not considered by the committee to be in the Top 64 (i.e. the "real" top 16 seeds) in this tournament.

The other two #1 seeds play teams designated as #16 seeds as well, so they're teams 63 and 64. Basically, there are six #16 seeds, and the bottom four of them play off to get into the field. But no #1 seeds have to play a #15 seed, or any team rated by the committee as being overall #s 59 through 62, which correlates to a 15 seed. Note: normally, the #15 seeds would be overall #s 57 through 60, but everyone gets bumped down two spots because of the peculiar way this tournament is structured, with six #12 seeds instead of four.

For the same reason, when the tournament had a 65 team field, none of the #1's played a team that would've been a #15. They all played a 16, or perhaps the lone true #17 seed (the #65 overall team).

All that being said, I do agree that the chances of a #1 losing its opener are rising, but I think it's because the small conference teams who are those #16s are becoming better and better, while the elite teams (the #1's) are not as good as they were in years past. Or even close.

I think the confusion lies in referencing them as 16 seeds. Instead, think of the four worst automatic-bid conference winners. The quality of the automatic conference winners doesn't change based on how many at-large teams are invited to the tournament to fill up the bracket. In the days of a 64-team bracket, those four teams would all play against 1 seeds. In a 68-team bracket, two of those four teams play the 1 seeds (and they're coming off a win), and the 5th and 6th worst conference winners are playing 1 seeds instead of the teams which were eliminated.

A-Tex Devil
03-08-2013, 06:18 PM
Wasn't there a statistic last year that Nicholls St beating Mizzou was as big as any 16 over 1 seed upset would have been? Or maybe it was less statistically probable than any of the 16s beating any of the 1s last year. Don't remember.

But that was essentially as close to a 16-1 (statistically) as we've seen.

sagegrouse
03-08-2013, 06:32 PM
I think the confusion lies in referencing them as 16 seeds. Instead, think of the four worst automatic-bid conference winners. The quality of the automatic conference winners doesn't change based on how many at-large teams are invited to the tournament to fill up the bracket. In the days of a 64-team bracket, those four teams would all play against 1 seeds. In a 68-team bracket, two of those four teams play the 1 seeds (and they're coming off a win), and the 5th and 6th worst conference winners are playing 1 seeds instead of the teams which were eliminated.

The automatic qualifiers, by definition, are the bottom of the field. It doesn't matter how many at-large bids are given, and the number of automatic qualifiers has been fixed at 31 (I believe) for the past few years.

With the scheme at work now, the four #1 seeds will play two #15 seeds and two #16 seeds, based on a 64-team field and assuming the better teams advance from the first round. Here's why:

The outcome of the 68-team field is that the four #1 seeds play four of the worst six of the automatic qualifiers. Of these six, two get a bye and the other four play a first-round game to advance to the second round, reducing these six teams to four. If the two better teams win every time (not likely), then the #1 seeds are, in effect, playing teams that in a 64-team field would have been two #15's and two #16's.

Everybody got it? End of discussion?

It will be a final exam question.

sagegrouse

theschwartz
03-08-2013, 06:33 PM
My biggest takeaway from the article: ESPN is getting desperate for page hits and trying to get readers to sign up for Insider. There's definitely a mismatch between the alarmist headline/picture and the sobering, data-heavy content of the article. I'm guessing the writer of the article and the writer of the headline were not the same person. Probably the headline writer read the article, saw that the model gives Duke the highest chance of falling to a 16-seed, got excited, and plastered a negative Duke headline to give all the Duke-lovers and Duke-haters--pretty much the entirety of college basketball fandom--a reason to click and/or subscribe to Insider. Honestly, it's savvy marketing. Would as many people have clicked the link if it was Gonzaga or Georgeotown on the cover? Definitely not. What about Kansas or Indiana, two great but also flawed teams? Probably not.

I would also love to see the with/without-Kelly numbers. I'm sure you'll be looking at two completely different teams and their prospects in the Tourney based on that analysis - the dichotomy is significant enough that it's worth the effort for one of ESPN's myriad analysts. And honestly, if you're determined to say that Duke--or any team really--is the weakest potential 1-seed, it's a cinch to rig your model to push that argument and say that there's a good chance that a 1-seed will lose in the 1st round. I'm very curious what their "secret sauce" is. Probably a metric to see what draws the most traffic. As an ex-Excel jock, I can definitely say that if I wanted to drive to a certain conclusion, I could easily build a model with the right variables that gets me there.

The article states that there's less than a 15% chance that Duke gets upset in the 1st round (and that's including the without-Kelly results). That's still pretty low. The bottom line is, A LOT of things would have to go wrong for Duke for that to happen. For Duke to have a 14.3% chance of losing to a 16-seed and a 41% chance for Canisius to beat Duke, the independent probability of Canisius beating a 1-seed would have to be really high, even when you factor in secret sauces and style of play and all those other variables that the writers probably used. Again, you can get the numbers to tell you anything if you try hard enough and don't have to show your model to anyone.

JasonEvans
03-08-2013, 06:37 PM
I think the confusion lies in referencing them as 16 seeds. Instead, think of the four worst automatic-bid conference winners. The quality of the automatic conference winners doesn't change based on how many at-large teams are invited to the tournament to fill up the bracket. In the days of a 64-team bracket, those four teams would all play against 1 seeds. In a 68-team bracket, two of those four teams play the 1 seeds (and they're coming off a win), and the 5th and 6th worst conference winners are playing 1 seeds instead of the teams which were eliminated.

Exactly.

Tommy, you are looking at it from top down and thinking that rather than inviting the top 64 teams, we now invite the top 68. As tooksies points out, my way of looking at it is to go from the bottom up... because no matter how large you expand the at-large field, the bottom is still the bottom. That bottom is made up of automatic qualifiers who will always be there and the quality of those teams cannot be changed by the number of automatic qualifiers. So, rather than playing the 4 worst automatic qualifiers, the #1 seeds are now playing 4 of the 6 worst automatic qualifiers. What's more, they are assured of playing the 2 best of those 6 who are not in the play-in games... and the other 2 they play are teams that won a play-in game thereby indicating they may be stronger than anticipated. I think a strong case can be made that the quality of the teams facing the #1 seeds is significantly higher than 4 or 6 or especially 10 or 20 years ago.

Yes, as you point out there are now 68 teams in the tournament and, in theory, these teams at the bottom are therefore seeded lower (some of them are de-facto #17 seeds) than the #16 seeds of the past. But, that is because we have grown the middle of the tournament and does not have a practical impact on the quality of the bottom 12 or so teams in the Dance. All expansion has done is force the #1s to play better and better automatic qualifiers.

Does that make more sense? Sorry if it is confusing.

-Jason "I am sure someone is going to point out some massive fatal flaw in my argument because I consider Tommy a very smart poster and if I confused him, odds are excellent my entire theory is bad" Evans

hurleyfor3
03-08-2013, 06:37 PM
Nah, I'm pretty sure their "model" consisted of asking Doug Gottlieb.

Olympic Fan
03-08-2013, 06:54 PM
I'm not going tio debate statistical models, but I would make one obnservation:

Of all the potential No. 1 seeds, Duke is among the LESS likely to lose to a marginal team. This season -- even counting the 13 games without Kelly -- Duke has not lost to anybody in the RPI range that the 16s will be. Duke's worst loss was to No. 86 Maryland.

On the other hand, we have a potentia No. 1 in Kansas that lost to No. 235 TCU.

We have potential No. 1 Georgetown losing to No. 127 Souh Florida

We have potential No. 1 Miami (although that's a lot less likely now) losing to No. 163 Wake Forest.

tommy
03-08-2013, 07:55 PM
Exactly.

Tommy, you are looking at it from top down and thinking that rather than inviting the top 64 teams, we now invite the top 68. As tooksies points out, my way of looking at it is to go from the bottom up... because no matter how large you expand the at-large field, the bottom is still the bottom. That bottom is made up of automatic qualifiers who will always be there and the quality of those teams cannot be changed by the number of automatic qualifiers. So, rather than playing the 4 worst automatic qualifiers, the #1 seeds are now playing 4 of the 6 worst automatic qualifiers. What's more, they are assured of playing the 2 best of those 6 who are not in the play-in games... and the other 2 they play are teams that won a play-in game thereby indicating they may be stronger than anticipated. I think a strong case can be made that the quality of the teams facing the #1 seeds is significantly higher than 4 or 6 or especially 10 or 20 years ago.

Yes, as you point out there are now 68 teams in the tournament and, in theory, these teams at the bottom are therefore seeded lower (some of them are de-facto #17 seeds) than the #16 seeds of the past. But, that is because we have grown the middle of the tournament and does not have a practical impact on the quality of the bottom 12 or so teams in the Dance. All expansion has done is force the #1s to play better and better automatic qualifiers.

Does that make more sense? Sorry if it is confusing.

-Jason "I am sure someone is going to point out some massive fatal flaw in my argument because I consider Tommy a very smart poster and if I confused him, odds are excellent my entire theory is bad" Evans

Well first of all, thanks for the compliment. Appreciated.

But maybe not deserved. Because your post made me think more about this, and you're right! The bottom six auto qualifiers, had the tourney only included 64 teams, would've been four 16's and two 15's. The two which would've been 15's but are now 16's will theoretically be the two 16's that don't have to play-in, and instead are matched up directly with a #1, while the four that would've been 16's anyway play-in, with the two winners advancing to play #1's also.

So in that sense yes, two #1 seeds in today's tournament have to play teams in the first round that would've been 15's back in the day. Good call.

Only other thing I would say is that, despite that reality, I'm not sure how much greater it makes the chances of a #1 losing its opener than what the chances would've been under the old sytem. Two #1's are still playing teams that would've been 16's under the old system -- matchups in which the #1 has never lost -- while two are playing teams that would've been 15's. So as a whole, the #1's play two 15's and two 16's instead of four 16's. Of course it makes it a little more likely than if all four were playing 16's, but keeping in mind that there have only been six times that a 15 has beaten a 2, including the two from last year, and given the fact that theoretically the 1's are going to be some degree stronger than the 2's, it seems like the do-the-math statistical increase in the likelihood (which I'll leave to someone smarter than I) wouldn't be all that much of a bump.

It seems that we agree that the real driver of the increased chances of a 16 beating a 1 is the improvement in the quality of players and the quality of play that the 16's are bringing to the table, and I wouldn't be surprised if you also agree that the frequency of the creation of true powerhouse #1 seeds, those more impervious to huge upsets, has diminished over the years too.

striker219
03-08-2013, 08:32 PM
Nah, I'm pretty sure their "model" consisted of asking Doug Gottlieb.

And if Doug isn't around they can just ask Digger, assuming they can get him to stop sniffing his highlighters long enough to form a coherent sentence.

NashvilleDevil
03-08-2013, 09:16 PM
All of us know that if Duke wins at UNC and wins the ACC tourney then gets a 1 seed every talking head will say another team was more deserving of the seed.

-bdbd
03-08-2013, 09:37 PM
Maybe I'm so numb to all the Duke hate at this point that I'm seeing things upside down, but I don't think this is a fair example of the typical duke hate/no respect card. I'm an insider and read the article, and as others pointed out they ran a quant/statistics model and the computer said we are the most vulnerable "giant" i.e. potential 1 seed. Each year after the brackets come out, ESPN runs this model (or at least something very similar) and lists out their most likely upsets. This is the same thing, except run a few weeks early. No biggie.

And the computer clearly does not have a high enough WRC (white raven coefficient). We are undefeated with Ryan Kelly. I don't expect that to change any time soon--as in this year :)

Question: Do they always, after running these calculations, then publish them with the big headline in their for-pay section, highlighting the supposed second-most vulnerable potential 1-seed? If not, then that would make this inconsistent with prior practices and, thus, disrespectful to the Duke BB team. But as was said above, anything to sell ad space... :rolleyes:

JasonEvans
03-08-2013, 09:57 PM
Question: Do they always, after running these calculations, then publish them with the big headline in their for-pay section, highlighting the supposed second-most vulnerable potential 1-seed? If not, then that would make this inconsistent with prior practices and, thus, disrespectful to the Duke BB team. But as was said above, anything to sell ad space... :rolleyes:

Yes, they have done this every year for the past half decade plus. It is their "Giant Killers" article that is quite frequently highly touted on the site. Despite the joking belief that Digger and/or Gottleib play some part in it, I believe they always use fairly advanced analytics and stats to come up with the teams that they think are potential "giant killers" and the ones they think are potential upset victims. It is not some "lets figure out a way to make Duke look bad" kind of thing.

Folks, when we show angst over stuff like this, it only makes us look paranoid and lame. Duke will prove this wrong on their own... or they won't and we can all go compliment the author of the article on his prescience.

-Jason "that said, yes, ESPN is in the business of selling ads" Evans

DU82
03-08-2013, 10:04 PM
Am I correct in saying that the four play-in game automatic bids are determined by conference, rather than by team? I seem to remember reading that. If there's a surprising team in a bad conference, then it's likely to be a little higher ranked. (Please correct if I'm wrong.)

Also, having a win under your belt helps a lot. Look at the tournament results, with lower seeded teams (seemingly) winning a bit more often. Some of the coaches comment that it makes a difference (probably because they're trying to explain an upset loss that they just suffered.)

Kedsy
03-08-2013, 11:05 PM
I was there for Mississippi Valley State. Whew!

It almost happened to us. It will happen to someone someday.

There have been eight #1 vs. #16 matchups as close or closer as 1986 Duke/Mississippi Valley State. Four of those were one possession games (1989 Georgetown 50, Princeton 49; 1989 Oklahoma 72, ETSU 71; 1990 Michigan State 75, Murray State 71 (OT); and 1996 Purdue 73, Western Carolina 71). Two more were two possession games (1985 Michigan 59, Fairleigh Dickinson 55; 1989 Illinois 77, McNeese State 71). As recently as 2012, #1 Syracuse beat #16 UNCA by just 7 points.

Games that close obviously could have gone either way, so the 112 to 0 stat is misleading if people try to read into it that it's impossible for a #16 to beat a #1. It's really just random chance that has kept it from happening one or more times already.

That said, and I've said this before in this thread, I can't imagine any legitimate number crunching that would give a #16 seed a 15% chance of beating a #1, much less a 40% chance. That seems absurd to me.

JasonEvans
03-08-2013, 11:20 PM
Am I correct in saying that the four play-in game automatic bids are determined by conference, rather than by team? I seem to remember reading that. If there's a surprising team in a bad conference, then it's likely to be a little higher ranked. (Please correct if I'm wrong.)

I've never heard this and would be shocked if it were the case. Every so often a team from a lousy conference will rise up and show itself to be really good. For example, the Ivy league was a perennial #16 seed conference for a long time, but then Princeton and then Penn and then Cornell and now Harvard have shown that Ivies can compete with the big boys. I can't think of any reason why you would predetermine the #16 seeds any more than saying the Big East, Big Ten, ACC, and Big 12 winners automatically got #1 seeds. Judge a team based on their body of work, not on the conference's past performance in the tourney.

-Jason "I think certain conferences do often fall into the play-in game, but that is because they are usually the worst conference, not because it is predetermined" Evans

shereec
03-08-2013, 11:25 PM
The thing is, last year I think one of the play-in winners ended up with a 12 seed rather than a 16. What's up with that?

Deslok
03-08-2013, 11:42 PM
I believe the play in teams were originally selected based upon the (lack of) strength of their conference in RPI numbers. But that isn't the case now. Here (http://www.ncaa.com/sites/default/files/files/BracketPrin-Proc10-5-10.pdf) is the guideline for the bracket, and it just talks about ranking the teams 1-68.

tommy
03-09-2013, 02:25 AM
I think the confusion lies in referencing them as 16 seeds. Instead, think of the four worst automatic-bid conference winners.


The automatic qualifiers, by definition, are the bottom of the field.

I fully admit I was wrong about one aspect of this earlier in the thread, but nevertheless, I don't think this is correct. Of course, let me know if I'm wrong. But I don't believe that there's anything by way of rule that says that the four worst automatic bid conference winners are automatically 16 seeds. I know it always works out that way, but theoretically, it could happen that the auto bid winners from lesser conferences just happen to be better than those last few at-large teams from the larger conferences or mid-majors or wherever they come from, and the committee recognizes this and seeds accordingly. I know it's not happening this year, but just to use this year as an example, what if the committee felt that Hi Point, NC Central, Norfolk State and Mercer were actually better than Virginia, Tennessee, Villanova, or Kentucky or whoever else is the last at-large team invited. In that situation, I don't think there's anything preventing Virginia, Tennessee, Villanova, and Kentucky from being 16 seeds and Mercer and Hi Point from being 15's or higher -- wherever the committee believes they should be seeded.

Dev11
03-09-2013, 09:12 AM
The thing is, last year I think one of the play-in winners ended up with a 12 seed rather than a 16. What's up with that?

There are 4 play-in games, two featuring the four worst auto bids, and two featuring the four worst at-large bids. The worst at-large bids generally fall on a 12 or 13 seed.

JasonEvans
03-09-2013, 10:03 AM
I fully admit I was wrong about one aspect of this earlier in the thread, but nevertheless, I don't think this is correct. Of course, let me know if I'm wrong. But I don't believe that there's anything by way of rule that says that the four worst automatic bid conference winners are automatically 16 seeds. I know it always works out that way, but theoretically, it could happen that the auto bid winners from lesser conferences just happen to be better than those last few at-large teams from the larger conferences or mid-majors or wherever they come from, and the committee recognizes this and seeds accordingly. I know it's not happening this year, but just to use this year as an example, what if the committee felt that Hi Point, NC Central, Norfolk State and Mercer were actually better than Virginia, Tennessee, Villanova, or Kentucky or whoever else is the last at-large team invited. In that situation, I don't think there's anything preventing Virginia, Tennessee, Villanova, and Kentucky from being 16 seeds and Mercer and Hi Point from being 15's or higher -- wherever the committee believes they should be seeded.

You are correct in theory but there has never been an at-large team seeded lower than #13, I think. Auto-qualifiers always make up the bottom 12 or so teams in the dance... every year. We are not close to having an at-large team be at that level. If we were, then your notion of the "top 68 teams" as opposed to my description of "the bottom 6" would be more appropriate. But, as previously mentioned, we are not even close to having that conversation yet. When you consider that teams with RPI/Pom rankings in the 50s often do not get at-large bids but we generally end up with multiple auto-qualifiers who rank lower than 100, some lower than 150, you see how far we have to go to get to at-large teams being considered on par with the lowest of the auto-qualifiers.

-Jason "the odds are excellent that ACC cellar-dweller Va Tech will be ranked much higher in the computer rankings than some teams that auto-qualify this year" Evans

tommy
03-09-2013, 12:24 PM
You are correct in theory but there has never been an at-large team seeded lower than #13, I think. Auto-qualifiers always make up the bottom 12 or so teams in the dance... every year. We are not close to having an at-large team be at that level. If we were, then your notion of the "top 68 teams" as opposed to my description of "the bottom 6" would be more appropriate. But, as previously mentioned, we are not even close to having that conversation yet. When you consider that teams with RPI/Pom rankings in the 50s often do not get at-large bids but we generally end up with multiple auto-qualifiers who rank lower than 100, some lower than 150, you see how far we have to go to get to at-large teams being considered on par with the lowest of the auto-qualifiers.

-Jason "the odds are excellent that ACC cellar-dweller Va Tech will be ranked much higher in the computer rankings than some teams that auto-qualify this year" Evans

Right. I checked the rules actually, and there is nothing prohibiting the scenario I have set forth, but it hasn't happened in real life. And it will be awhile before it happens in a big way.

I will say, though, that as the level of play in those lower level conferences improves, and as the qualifications of the bubble teams get weaker and weaker, as they seem to do each year (much lamenting on the internets about the "soft bubble" getting softer every year -- meaning 'these teams just aren't that good. They don't belong.') I do think more of those lower level conference champs may challenge the seeding levels of the bottom at-large invitees.

For example, the following teams from conferences generally considered to be lower tier, have the following RPI's:

Bucknell 53
Stephen F. Austin 61
South Dakota State 68
Stony Brook 69

I know there are some other conferences (8 or 9 of them by my quick count) that no matter who wins the conference tournament, they'll be a lot lower than that, and they'll be the 16's and 15's this year as usual. But why couldn't those four I named, if they make it, be seeded above (assuming they make it) teams like:

Virginia 73
Iowa 75
Charlotte 80
Xavier 81
Arkansas 84
Maryland 86

Kedsy
03-09-2013, 01:53 PM
I do think more of those lower level conference champs may challenge the seeding levels of the bottom at-large invitees.

For example, the following teams from conferences generally considered to be lower tier, have the following RPI's:

Bucknell 53
Stephen F. Austin 61
South Dakota State 68
Stony Brook 69

I know there are some other conferences (8 or 9 of them by my quick count) that no matter who wins the conference tournament, they'll be a lot lower than that, and they'll be the 16's and 15's this year as usual. But why couldn't those four I named, if they make it, be seeded above (assuming they make it) teams like:

Virginia 73
Iowa 75
Charlotte 80
Xavier 81
Arkansas 84
Maryland 86

Yeah, but those particular conference winners generally don't get 15 or 16 seeds. Last year, teams with similar resumes were Long Beach (#34 RPI, #12 seed); Harvard (#35 RPI, #12 seed); South Dakota State (#43 RPI, #14 seed); Ohio U (#46 RPI, #13 seed); Belmont (#58 RPI, #14 seed); New Mexico State (#59 RPI, #13 seed); Davidson (#64 RPI, #13 seed); and Montana (#74 RPI, #13 seed).

On the other hand, Loyola MD (#78 RPI) got a #15 seed and Long Island (#80 RPI) got a #16, so if teams like Charlotte, Xavier, Arkansas, or Maryland made the tournament, maybe your point would have some legs. I'll be shocked if any of those teams get selected at-large, however, so maybe not.

The rest of the #15 seeds last year were #91 RPI (Lehigh), #125 (Detroit), and #128 Norfolk State. The remaining #16 seeds had RPIs of #104, #108, #135, #144, and #189.

rsvman
03-09-2013, 02:17 PM
Wasn't there a statistic last year that Nicholls St beating Mizzou was as big as any 16 over 1 seed upset would have been? Or maybe it was less statistically probable than any of the 16s beating any of the 1s last year. Don't remember.

But that was essentially as close to a 16-1 (statistically) as we've seen.

I'm too lazy to look it up, but I'm pretty sure it was Norfolk State rather than Nichols State that pulled the upset over Missouri last year.

brevity
03-09-2013, 02:59 PM
I guarantee that most of you who posted on this thread have put more thought into the bottom teams of the bracket than the Selection Committee does. The first and last thing you need to know about them is this: they are lazy, and for the most part, they don't care.

If they care about anything, it's the bubble. They know that their spokesperson will get grilled (or at least receive some precooked grill marks) about who did and did not get in. They may get a question or two about the 1 seeds, which are usually a strange mix of teams that are good on Selection Sunday and teams that were good a week earlier. They will not be asked about the 15 or 16 seeds.

Someone more enterprising than I can look at the conferences that are represented by the 16 seeds. At best, I would suspect that each year they come from 6-8 conferences that are perenially at the bottom of the Conference RPI. An exception would be made for a team from a better non-BCS conference that has a losing or .500 record.

As for the original topic, it is inevitable that a 16 seed will beat a 1 seed. You can argue that, over time, the 16 seeds are getting better and the 1 seeds are getting worse. The abomination that is the 16a/16b play-in game means that the 16 seed is no longer winless, and has a tiny bit more momentum going into their Friday game. Add to that the general expansion of the field, which means that a couple of 16 seeds of today are comparable to the 15 seeds of yore. You know: Hampton, Coppin State, Richmond...

Mudge
03-09-2013, 04:03 PM
Actually, it's got to be WAY more complex than that. First of all, the rest of the team's performance (without Ryan) shouldn't be 100% discounted, second of all, most good ratings systems connect every game to every other game in myriad ways. How can you adjust the ratings for competition if you simply eradicate 13 games from the system? And even if you have an answer for that, my guess is most computer models won't have an easy way to remove games like that anyway. Finally, if you take away those 13 games, you take away almost all of Duke's conference schedule, and you'd be comparing apples-to-oranges with Duke's mostly non-conference schedule against most teams full schedule including conference games, and the overall reliability of the ratings would go down.

As far as what chance Duke has to be upset by an yet-to-be-determined #16 compared to other #1 seeds, it would seem to hinge on their computer ranking compared to the other #1s. Duke is currently #1 in RPI and #2 in BPI (behind Louisville, who most people aren't talking about as a #1 seed anyway). In Pomeroy and in Sagarin, Duke is #6, behind Indiana, Gonzaga, and Kansas, so if that was the system used than you'd think the odds would be highest on Duke losing to a yet-to-be-named opponent. Seems weird that ESPN would use Pomeroy rather than its own rating system, but that must be what they're doing, right? Even then, without seeing the analysis, 85% sounds off.


I think this 85% stat is getting mis-interpreted by some here... perhaps because BlueDevilBrowns (probably) mis-stated the meaning of the 85% figure in his post above (after he read the article which most of the rest of us have not done)-- he actually said that "Duke has an 85% chance of beating a number-one seed"... I think he meant to say "of being the number-one seed that is beaten"...

Here is where I think many are mis-interpreting: ESPN is not saying that Duke has an 85% chance of getting beaten by a #16 seed this year-- they are most likely saying that, of the four #1 seeds that are likely to be named this year, Duke has the highest probability of those four likely #1 seeds of being beaten by a #16 seed-- and that it is an 85% chance that, if one of the four #1 seeds is beaten (admittedly a very unlikely possibility), that it will be Duke and not one of the other three #1 seeds... so essentially, ESPN is (probably) saying that a #16 beating a #1 seed is very unlikely, but, IF IT HAPPENS, it will most likely happen to Duke... I still think this is poor logic (i.e.- agreeing with Kedsy here), as Duke has shown less propensity than most of the other likely #1 seeds to lose games to much lower-ranked teams (all of Duke's losses are to relatively good teams this year, while some of the other potential #1 seeds have baaaad losses-- as noted elsewhere in this thread)... but I don't think even ESPN is saying there is an 85% chance of any #1 seed being beaten, let alone an 85% chance of Duke being beaten, by a #16 seed.

JasonEvans
03-10-2013, 07:51 PM
Well, I am quite confident that we now know one of the teams that will be playing in the play-in games.

Liberty won the Big South conference tournament today. Ordinarily, the Big South produces a very low-seeded team, but Liberty is special. During the regular season, they were one of the worst teams in the conference. Their conference record was 6-10. Yet, somehow, they managed to win the conference tournament.

Liberty will enter the NCAAs with an eye-popping 20 losses, only the second team in NCAA history to do that. They were 15-20 on the season, and that is after winning 4 in a row to take the Big South tourney. Prior to the conference tourney, their best win was a victory over RPI #245 Western Carolina. They pulled off wins over RPI #191 Gardner Webb and #180 Coastal Carolina to win the BSouth tourney, giving them exactly 2 Top 200 RPI victories on the season.

Let me repeat that, they are going to the dance and they have not beaten a single team in the RPI top 175!! WOW!

Liberty checks in at #299 in the RPI. That a team like that could make the dance is almost unfathomable. It is beyond stunning.

But, congrats to the Flames! I'll be pulling for them to win their play-in game because incredibly unlikely stuff like this deserves a shot at a #1 seed.

-Jason "I am sure Seth is proud of his former teammates... even if none of them are still there" Evans

cf-62
03-10-2013, 09:50 PM
Jason, either I'm misunderstanding what you're saying, or else I think you may be misunderstanding, or more likely inadvertently misstating the way this works.

The expansion to a 68 team tournament means this: Teams 65 through 68 play each other, and the two winners advance to face #1 seeds. So those two #1 seeds play teams that wouldn't have made the top 64, meaning they're the equivalent of #17 seeds. Yes, because those teams would've received automatic bids anyway, they would've acutually been #16 seeds in the old days, but nevertheless they are teams not considered by the committee to be in the Top 64 (i.e. the "real" top 16 seeds) in this tournament.

The other two #1 seeds play teams designated as #16 seeds as well, so they're teams 63 and 64. Basically, there are six #16 seeds, and the bottom four of them play off to get into the field. But no #1 seeds have to play a #15 seed, or any team rated by the committee as being overall #s 59 through 62, which correlates to a 15 seed. Note: normally, the #15 seeds would be overall #s 57 through 60, but everyone gets bumped down two spots because of the peculiar way this tournament is structured, with six #12 seeds instead of four.

For the same reason, when the tournament had a 65 team field, none of the #1's played a team that would've been a #15. They all played a 16, or perhaps the lone true #17 seed (the #65 overall team).

All that being said, I do agree that the chances of a #1 losing its opener are rising, but I think it's because the small conference teams who are those #16s are becoming better and better, while the elite teams (the #1's) are not as good as they were in years past. Or even close.

Jason's analysis is correct. What makes yours slightly off is the fact that 16 seeds were not the 61st, 62nd, 63rd, and 64th best teams in america. They were the 61st - 64th best teams in the tournament, or put differently, the worst 4 teams in the tournament. Their RPI could be anywhere from 90 to 200 (or, as sometimes happens, even higher).

Now, those awful terrible teams, which you have labeled as the 17 seeds, are no longer likely to play the 1 seeds, but make no mistake, they are the EXACT SAME TEAMS that were the 16 seeds 5 years ago. Just as the teams now seeded 16 are THE TEAMS that were seeded at the 15 line in that time frame - and so on and so on. It's one of the reasons we had TWO 15 seeds win last year. Yes, Mizzou and Duke weren't at 100%, but the truth is that those weren't traditional 15's either.

Want proof that an expanded tournament makes harder games earlier? Look no further than the Big East Tournament. The 2 seed could reasonably be playing the 10 seed in the quarters, only to have the 10 seed be 10-8 during the regular season. Not what you expect from a 10.

And you end up with UConn running the table (I believe they were the 11 seed in the Big East Tournament).

So just like Richmond beat Syracuse and Santa Clara beat Arizona back when a 2-15 was essentially a slaughter game, I have no doubt that one of these 75 RPI teams that end up on the 16 line will topple a 1 seed.

tommy
03-11-2013, 04:42 PM
Jason's analysis is correct. What makes yours slightly off is the fact that 16 seeds were not the 61st, 62nd, 63rd, and 64th best teams in america. They were the 61st - 64th best teams in the tournament, or put differently, the worst 4 teams in the tournament. Their RPI could be anywhere from 90 to 200 (or, as sometimes happens, even higher).

Now, those awful terrible teams, which you have labeled as the 17 seeds, are no longer likely to play the 1 seeds, but make no mistake, they are the EXACT SAME TEAMS that were the 16 seeds 5 years ago. Just as the teams now seeded 16 are THE TEAMS that were seeded at the 15 line in that time frame - and so on and so on. It's one of the reasons we had TWO 15 seeds win last year. Yes, Mizzou and Duke weren't at 100%, but the truth is that those weren't traditional 15's either.


Thanks. Pretty sure I acknowledged upthread that Jason was right about this and I was wrong. One thing that I think you may have overlooked in your analysis, though, that I realized upon looking not only at Jason's post and the reasoning therein, but also in making the chart below: The teams labeled as "17" seeds, which I assume to mean teams 65 through 68, will in fact play #1 seeds if they win their "play-in" games. But so will teams 64 and 63 play #1 seeds in their first games -- they just don't have to play-in to get to that game against a #1. Now those teams, #s 64 and 63, are teams that would've been 15 seeds instead of 16's in the old system, because they are the 5th and 6th "worst" teams in the field. (nobody get offended - I don't mean anything by that term; they're still good teams). So the reality is that two of the #1 seeds now will play teams that would've been 15's under the old system but are 16's now. The other two #1's still will get to play teams that would've been 16's even under the old system; they just have to play in now to get there.

As a result of the expansion, then, two teams of each of the higher seed levels play teams that would've been one seed higher under the old system, and two teams of each higher seed level still play teams seeded exactly where they would've been under the old system. For instance, of the, say, #4 seeds, two of them still play #13's just as they always have, but two of them now play teams that would've been 12's under the old system.

Hopefully, if anyone cares, the chart below will illustrate this better than my words. The first column -- W1, W2, W3 etc. , and again, I apologize for the "W" designation, stands for "worst 1" (meaning lowest ranked team in the field) W2 is the team second from the bottom, W3 is the team third from the bottom, etc. The chart shows what seed each of those teams would've been facing in the 64 team era, and who they face now in the 68 team era.

As you see (hopefully) for example, two #1 seeds now play W5 and W6. Under the old system, W5 and W6 would've been 15's, not 16's. Two 5's are now playing W21 and W22, which under the old system would've been 11's instead of 12's. And so on.




Seed from Bottom

Seed in 64 team tourn.

Opponent in 64 team tourn.

Seed in 68 team tourn.

Opponent in 68 team tourn.



W1

16

1

16

1



W2

16

1

16

1



W3

16

1

16

1



W4

16

1

16

1



W5

15

2

16

1



W6

15

2

16

1



W7

15

2

15

2



W8

15

2

15

2



W9

14

3

15

2



W10

14

3

15

2



W11

14

3

14

3



W12

14

3

14

3



W13

13

4

14

3



W14

13

4

14

3



W15

13

4

13

4



W16

13

4

13

4



W17

12

5

13

4



W18

12

5

13

4



W19

12

5

12

5



W20

12

5

12

5



W21

11

6

12

5



W22

11

6

12

5



W23

11

6

11

6



W24

11

6

11

6



W25

10

7

11

6



W26

10

7

11

6



W27

10

7

10

7



W28

10

7

10

7



W29

9

8

10

7



W30

9

8

10

7



W31

9

8

9

8



W32

9

8

9

8





Boy, I hope I didn't screw this up!

JasonEvans
03-11-2013, 06:40 PM
Tommy, your analysis is correct that 2 of the #1s are playing what used to be #15s while two are playing what used to be #16s... but, even the #16s are #16s who have already beaten another #16. I see that as a sign that they are slightly better than the usual #16 seed. They are a bit more "proven" so to speak.

I may be wrong about that, but I see the present situation as #1 seeds playing two "traditional" #15s and two "better than usual" #16s. Does that make sense?

-Jason "I still doubt we see a #1 get upset in the first round this year" Evans

Olympic Fan
03-11-2013, 07:54 PM
Just want to clear up the confusion about the four play-in games.

As Dev11 noted, two of the games will feature the four lowest seeded teams in the tyournament and two of the games will feature the four lowest at-large teams.

This setup was a political compromise when the NCAA expanded from 65 to 68 teams. The single play-in game for the 65-team field always featured the two lowest seeded teams.

But those teams always came from a small handful of conferences. When the big boys (the major conferences) pushed to expand the tournament, the little guys fought back, knowing that they would be the ones stuck in the play-in games. They argued that every automatic qualifier should be seeded in the 64-team portion of the field and that the extra teams -- which would all be at large teams from major conferences (or at least mid-majors) should have to be the ones to endure the play-in game.

The current setup is a compromise between the two views -- four play-in games ... two filled with auomatic qualifiers from the weakest conferences ... two from borderline teams from the big conferences.

I'm sure Jason is right that Liberty will be one of the four teams in the play-in games to determine two of the No. 16 seeds. Virginia, if they get in, has a good chance to be in a play-in game for a 12 or 13 seed.

In fact, Virginia vs. Kentucky in Dayton could easily be one of the play-in games (okay, officially, they are first round games ... what used to be first-round games are now second round games. It's stupid -- but technically, Duke didn't lose a first-round game to Lehigh last year ... it was in the second round!)

Mal
03-12-2013, 07:39 PM
A. Can we all agree the play-in games are an abomination and should be disowned post haste? OK. Moving on...
B. It took a while for it to click for me that two of the #1 seeds actually had more difficult games, against what used to be #15 seeds; so if it's helpful for anyone else still struggling with it, just think of it this way: the four new teams in the expanded tournament are coming from big conferences and the two winners of their games end up slotted in at 12 or wherever. They just push everyone else downward in the S-curve. It's not that we've added 4 #17's from lower conferences and are making them play it off against the #16's.
C. The two #16's that get killed off are most likely to be two teams that had no business winning their weak conference tournament, and never would have had a chance against a #1. So we're strengthening the field of 64 that way, too. It's the surprise winners of the Sun Belt or CAA that used to populate two or three of the bottom seeds, leaving only one semi-legitimate 16 playing a 1. Now, we're most likely eliminating those guys before they even get to Thursday. Note that the winners of those play-in games are the two ultimate 16's that play the two 1's that don't get what used to be 15's. So, it's quite likely that in the average tournament, each of the #1 seeds has a tougher game than it would have under the old format, despite the fact that only two new teams are being added to the 64 team field out of the better conferences and displacing two bottom dwellers.
D. The reason this article was written, and the reason we're all reacting so harshly to it, is the simple fact that we, Duke, lost as a 2 seed to a 15 seed last year. It's still fresh in my memory, I can guarantee you that. But if it had just been Missouri last year suffering through that ignominious fate, no one would have turned their attention to "When will a 1 seed fall?"

throatybeard
03-13-2013, 01:02 AM
I'm too lazy to look it up, but I'm pretty sure it was Norfolk State rather than Nichols State that pulled the upset over Missouri last year.

This is correct. A-Tex may not be aware of it, but Norfolk State is in...Norfolk, and Nicholls State is in southern Louisiana. Maybe an hour past Baton Rouge--I was there once in 2004. The schools are over 1000 miles apart.

sporthenry
03-13-2013, 01:06 AM
A telling quote from the article on the ESPN home page's linked article:


Any system that proposes that an 18-12 team from the MAAC conference has a 40% chance of beating a 26-4 team from the ACC is worthless. Except not literally worthless; it's designed to sell ads.

Do not be mistaken, writers don't always write to tell the truth; some write to get a reaction. This is mostly the second. (It may have a nugget of truth in it; but that truth is simply, Duke is a "Giant" nearly every year, and we have similar statistical profiles every year. If we lose early, it significantly affects the data.)

Shucks, Canisius lost. I wonder who else has a 40% chance to beat us that can't beat Iona.

Udaman
03-13-2013, 10:11 AM
Really cool discussion. I had not thought of the expanded field as increasing the strength of the 16 seeds (and initially disagreed with JE's comments as well, but then realized that he was right)).

But that said.....I wouldn't be surprised if twenty years from now no #1 seed has lost to a 16 seed. While it is certainly possible, it's highly, highly unlikely. Why? Becaues the talent differential is just too great. The 16's are still mediocre teams at best and the #1's are typically the top 4 teams in the tournament. As far as I can see there are really only 3 scenarios where a #1 seed loses.

1) A star player on the #1 seed gets hurt early in the game. If Duke lost Plumlee or Kelly, or Indiana lost Zeller, for instance. It would have to happen early. It would cause the #1 seed to be emotionally stunned and give the lower seed confidence. Plus it takes one of the super talented players off the #1 seed, which makes the playing field more level.

2) A great matchup for the #16 seed. Princeton v. Georgetown was the best example of this. The Princeton team was the kind of offense that gave a (mostly) undisciplined Georgetown team fits). If you had a 16 seed that ran a zone defense, against a #1 seed with mostly outside shooters, then they could get cold, and get frustrated, and open the door for an upset. Or if a 16 seed had a lot of size and the 1 seed didn't. Something like that.

3) The #1 seed takes a win for granted. I'll say this and I think barring point #1 above....IF a 16 seed ever wins people will say, "We never saw that coming." It won't be when the media is talking up the potential upset. This is because a 1 seed can have a mental letdown against a 16 seed that they fully expect to beat. But if before the game everyone is talking up this as "the one time it could happen" then I think that massively lowers the chance. For instance, this year people will likely be dissing Gonzaga. They'll say that a 16 seed can beat a mid-major 1 seed. Gonzaga's coach will use that for motivation. There is ZERO chance of Gonzaga losing that game (in fact, I bet they easily cover the spread). Duke will also get talk, because they lost last year as the 15 seed and because of the ESPN article. Again, that will motivate them. No way will we lose. The game won't be close. We'll blow them out. So it will be Indiana, or Louisville (or the other #1 seed) that has the best chance of losing. And both of those teams have a ton of talent.

CDu
03-13-2013, 10:35 AM
Really cool discussion. I had not thought of the expanded field as increasing the strength of the 16 seeds (and initially disagreed with JE's comments as well, but then realized that he was right)).

But that said.....I wouldn't be surprised if twenty years from now no #1 seed has lost to a 16 seed. While it is certainly possible, it's highly, highly unlikely. Why? Becaues the talent differential is just too great. The 16's are still mediocre teams at best and the #1's are typically the top 4 teams in the tournament. As far as I can see there are really only 3 scenarios where a #1 seed loses.

1) A star player on the #1 seed gets hurt early in the game. If Duke lost Plumlee or Kelly, or Indiana lost Zeller, for instance. It would have to happen early. It would cause the #1 seed to be emotionally stunned and give the lower seed confidence. Plus it takes one of the super talented players off the #1 seed, which makes the playing field more level.

2) A great matchup for the #16 seed. Princeton v. Georgetown was the best example of this. The Princeton team was the kind of offense that gave a (mostly) undisciplined Georgetown team fits). If you had a 16 seed that ran a zone defense, against a #1 seed with mostly outside shooters, then they could get cold, and get frustrated, and open the door for an upset. Or if a 16 seed had a lot of size and the 1 seed didn't. Something like that.

3) The #1 seed takes a win for granted. I'll say this and I think barring point #1 above....IF a 16 seed ever wins people will say, "We never saw that coming." It won't be when the media is talking up the potential upset. This is because a 1 seed can have a mental letdown against a 16 seed that they fully expect to beat. But if before the game everyone is talking up this as "the one time it could happen" then I think that massively lowers the chance. For instance, this year people will likely be dissing Gonzaga. They'll say that a 16 seed can beat a mid-major 1 seed. Gonzaga's coach will use that for motivation. There is ZERO chance of Gonzaga losing that game (in fact, I bet they easily cover the spread). Duke will also get talk, because they lost last year as the 15 seed and because of the ESPN article. Again, that will motivate them. No way will we lose. The game won't be close. We'll blow them out. So it will be Indiana, or Louisville (or the other #1 seed) that has the best chance of losing. And both of those teams have a ton of talent.

I'd add a couple of scenarios:
4) a team is greatly underseeded at #16. Think Lehigh last year - #82 in Pomeroy yet got a 15 seed. A team in the 90-110 range getting a 16 seed could conceivably catch a #1 seed napping.
5) a good-shooting team just catching fire from 3 point range, jumping out to an early lead and causing the #1 seed to press too much and make mistakes.

That being said, I also wouldn't be shocked if we don't see a #1 lose to a #16 for a while longer.

Mal
03-13-2013, 03:40 PM
4) a team is greatly underseeded at #16. Think Lehigh last year - #82 in Pomeroy yet got a 15 seed. A team in the 90-110 range getting a 16 seed could conceivably catch a #1 seed napping.

I wasn't aware of this, but it meshes with my general sense during the game last year, which was "These guys are a 15? Really?"

Out of curiosity, where are the last 6-8 teams usually sitting in RPI or Pomeroy when the tournament starts? At first glance, 82 is, of course, a lot weaker than 64, but presumably the bulk of autobid winners from non-power conferences are well below the 64th best team, too. Where were the other 15's last year? Perhaps we were a victim of what's been described above, which is that we were playing what previously would have been a 14, but got slid downward because of the play-in winners at 12. (None of this, by the way, excuses the loss in my mind, of course)

I guess our best shot at a No. 1 seed losing would be a year in which the weakest conference's tournaments are all won by their regular season winners, so you have no Liberty and similar teams sneaking in there and being fed to the lions. That's the only scenario in which I could see a 16 going to an underseeded team (like Steven F. Austin coming in with their third Southland Conference title in a row, or something, leading to NCAA experience and less fear of the big dogs). When there are a bunch of upset conference tourney winners coming in from the America East or MEAC and places, there's less room for someone to be underseeded as a 16. If those conferences went the Ivy League route and dispensed with their tournaments, or just gave the invitation to their regular season champs, that might change things.

CDu
03-13-2013, 04:18 PM
I wasn't aware of this, but it meshes with my general sense during the game last year, which was "These guys are a 15? Really?"

Out of curiosity, where are the last 6-8 teams usually sitting in RPI or Pomeroy when the tournament starts? At first glance, 82 is, of course, a lot weaker than 64, but presumably the bulk of autobid winners from non-power conferences are well below the 64th best team, too. Where were the other 15's last year? Perhaps we were a victim of what's been described above, which is that we were playing what previously would have been a 14, but got slid downward because of the play-in winners at 12. (None of this, by the way, excuses the loss in my mind, of course)

I guess our best shot at a No. 1 seed losing would be a year in which the weakest conference's tournaments are all won by their regular season winners, so you have no Liberty and similar teams sneaking in there and being fed to the lions. That's the only scenario in which I could see a 16 going to an underseeded team (like Steven F. Austin coming in with their third Southland Conference title in a row, or something, leading to NCAA experience and less fear of the big dogs). When there are a bunch of upset conference tourney winners coming in from the America East or MEAC and places, there's less room for someone to be underseeded as a 16. If those conferences went the Ivy League route and dispensed with their tournaments, or just gave the invitation to their regular season champs, that might change things.

It's a bit tough to gauge using Pomeroy, as I can only see end of season numbers. But Lehigh was a good 40 spots ahead of the next #15 seeds (#120 Detroit and #126 Loyola Md) and even further ahead of the last #15 (#201 Norfolk St). They were also ahead of one of the #11s (Colorado St) and one of the #13s (Montana). And at #82 in Pomeroy, they were closer to a #9 (#75 Southern Miss), a #11 (#74 Colorado), and even a #6 (#69 San Diego St).

Lehigh was really more like a #13 or #14 in most years (though that year all of the #14s were in the top-70 oddly enough). For comparison, in 2011, Memphis was a 12 with a Pomeroy rank of 87. The nearest 15 was #117 in Pomeroy (Akron). In 2010, the top #15 seed was #158 (Morgan St).

Olympic Fan
03-13-2013, 04:45 PM
I see that Long Island U is projected as a 16 seed -- not sure if they would be one of the two 16s forced into a play-in game, but since they are an Eastern team and are a likely No. 16, I think it's very possible they could be Duke's first opponent, assuming Duke ends up No. 1 in the East.

I mention this because it would be such a neat thing if Duke and LIU were matched against one another.

LIU used to be a great power, coached by Clair Bee. They were the superpower when Duke and LIU met on New Year's Day, 1944 in Madison Square Garden. It was a terrific game, won by the Blackbirds 59-57 in overtime. LIU was such a power than even the narrow loss was perceived as one of the game's that marked Duke's coming of age as a basketball power -- before that, Duke got such little respect that even Eddie Cameron's 22-2 Southern Conference champs in 1942 were passed over for both an NCAA and NIT bid.

I was also Duke's first ever game in the Garden ...

That's the only time Duke and LIU have ever met.

tbyers11
03-13-2013, 04:49 PM
It's a bit tough to gauge using Pomeroy, as I can only see end of season numbers. But Lehigh was a good 40 spots ahead of the next #15 seeds (#120 Detroit and #126 Loyola Md) and even further ahead of the last #15 (#201 Norfolk St). They were also ahead of one of the #11s (Colorado St) and one of the #13s (Montana). And at #82 in Pomeroy, they were closer to a #9 (#75 Southern Miss), a #11 (#74 Colorado), and even a #6 (#69 San Diego St).

Lehigh was really more like a #13 or #14 in most years (though that year all of the #14s were in the top-70 oddly enough). For comparison, in 2011, Memphis was a 12 with a Pomeroy rank of 87. The nearest 15 was #117 in Pomeroy (Akron). In 2010, the top #15 seed was #158 (Morgan St).

I remember thinking last year that Lehigh was either a strong 14 or a low 13 seed based on KenPom before the game. After seeing how we looked without Ryan Kelly, Duke was more like a weak #3 or a strong #4. So the committee had a well matched set of teams just had them on the wrong seed line :(

Looking back at last year's fan match data, which is a snapshot of the ratings on the day the game took place, he had Duke as an 82% favorite over Lehigh while the other #2-#15 matchups: Missouri/Norfolk St, Ohio St/Loyola (Md) and Kansas/Detroit were 96%, 95%, and 92%, respectively, in favor of the 2 seed. We still should have beaten Lehigh about 4 out of 5 times but the upset wasn't as huge as many made it seem.

Kedsy
03-13-2013, 04:54 PM
I wasn't aware of this, but it meshes with my general sense during the game last year, which was "These guys are a 15? Really?"

Out of curiosity, where are the last 6-8 teams usually sitting in RPI or Pomeroy when the tournament starts? At first glance, 82 is, of course, a lot weaker than 64, but presumably the bulk of autobid winners from non-power conferences are well below the 64th best team, too. Where were the other 15's last year? Perhaps we were a victim of what's been described above, which is that we were playing what previously would have been a 14, but got slid downward because of the play-in winners at 12. (None of this, by the way, excuses the loss in my mind, of course)

Below is the entire field from last year, with PRE-tournament rankings from RPI, Sagarin, and Pomeroy. Lehigh, for example was #86 in Pomeroy (rather than #82), and was by far the best of the 15s. That said, based on Pomeroy there were a whole bunch of odd seeding decisions, like Memphis (#9 in the country) as a #8 seed or Wisconsin (#6 in country) as a #4 seed. How about Belmont (#23) as a #14 seed and Florida State (#21) as a #3 seed? Interestingly, if you go by RPI instead of Pomeroy (which is probably what the committee did), the best #16 seed (Long Island, RPI of 80) was better than Lehigh (RPI 92).



Region Seed Team RPI Sagarin Pomeroy
E 1 Syracuse 1 6 7
E 2 Ohio St. 7 1 2
E 3 Florida St. 11 21 21
E 4 Wisconsin 23 8 6
E 5 Vanderbilt 19 20 16
E 6 Cincinnati 42 36 31
E 7 Gonzaga 25 32 32
E 8 Kansas St. 48 22 22
E 9 Southern Miss 21 67 71
E 10 West Virginia 57 35 42
E 11 Texas 50 23 27
E 12 Harvard 35 45 39
E 13 Montana 74 98 94
E 14 St. Bonaventure 72 62 51
E 15 Loyola-Maryland 78 139 128
E 16 UNC Asheville 104 121 121
M 1 North Carolina 4 5 5
M 2 Kansas 6 4 4
M 3 Georgetown 15 13 12
M 4 Michigan 13 30 25
M 5 Temple 20 37 36
M 6 San Diego St. 26 53 52
M 7 St. Mary's 28 38 43
M 8 Creighton 24 31 34
M 9 Alabama 36 27 29
M 10 Purdue 47 29 24
M 11 N.C. St. 49 42 44
M 12 California 37 25 28
M 12 South Florida 52 73 66
M 13 Ohio 46 74 72
M 14 Belmont 58 24 23
M 15 Detroit 125 123 115
M 16 Lamar 108 110 102
M 16 Vermont 135 140 120
S 1 Kentucky 2 2 1
S 2 Duke 5 12 17
S 3 Baylor 8 14 14
S 4 Indiana 17 9 11
S 5 Wichita St. 12 10 10
S 6 UNLV 18 28 33
S 7 Notre Dame 39 43 40
S 8 Iowa St. 33 33 30
S 9 Connecticut 32 34 35
S 10 Xavier 41 55 59
S 11 Colorado 62 84 75
S 12 VCU 38 54 46
S 13 New Mexico St. 59 61 63
S 14 S. Dakota St. 43 59 55
S 15 Lehigh 91 93 86
S 16 Miss. Val. 144 249 258
S 16 W. Kentucky 189 208 189
W 1 Michigan St. 3 3 3
W 2 Missouri 10 7 8
W 3 Marquette 9 16 18
W 4 Louisville 14 19 20
W 5 New Mexico 27 17 13
W 6 Murray St. 22 47 45
W 7 Florida 30 15 19
W 8 Memphis 16 11 9
W 9 Saint Louis 31 18 15
W 10 Virginia 53 26 26
W 11 Colorado St. 29 83 76
W 12 Long Beach St. 34 40 37
W 13 Davidson 64 69 68
W 14 Iona 40 49 57
W 14 BYU 45 39 50
W 15 Norfolk St. 128 198 213
W 16 Long Island 80 167 165