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Username Post: Holy Cross        (Topic#22201)
palestra38 
Professor
Posts: 32685

Reg: 11-21-04
Re: Holy Cross
11-29-18 01:43 PM - Post#267528    
    In response to PennFan10

I hear both of you but Strength of Victory as a tiebreaker is used only (as far as I am aware) where the teams have different schedules. In baseball, for example ties within divisions are broken by a playoff game, not strength of victory. No 2 football teams have the same schedule and they use it as the 4th tiebreaker. Here, it's pretty clear that the strength of a team is demonstrated more obviously by who you lose to---as witnessed by NCAA selections where nothing is worse than a bad loss. And the Ivies have never distinguished between 2 tying teams, even if one has won both head to head matches. In terms of significance, among teams who lost 2 games each, the loss to a really bad team as Harvard did has much more meaning than 1 loss to the 3rd best team.

Of course, the playoff was going to be at the Palestra anyway, so all of this discussion is moot. But in a balanced schedule, the stronger team is the one whose losses are better.

 
PennFan10 
Postdoc
Posts: 3579

Reg: 02-15-15
11-29-18 02:03 PM - Post#267537    
    In response to palestra38

That's actually not correct. If you look at the tiebreakers across conferences, in most instances you compare head to head results and then compare records against the next best teams in the conference in descending order.

ACC tiebreaker:
https://www.syracuse.com/acc/index.ssf/2016/02/acc...

SEC Tiebreaker:
http://www.secsports.com/article/11098238/tour name...

A10 Tiebreaker:
http://www.atlantic10.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_...

Big 12:
http://www.big12sports.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM...

on and on and on it goes. Who you beat is more important than who you lost to.



 
HARVARDDADGRAD 
Postdoc
Posts: 2685

Loc: New Jersey
Reg: 01-21-14
11-29-18 02:06 PM - Post#267538    
    In response to PennFan10

Guys, we've been through this all before and nothing will change either of our perspectives.

Good Luck!

Hope to see you all at Yale in March.

 
mobrien 
Senior
Posts: 389

Loc: New York
Reg: 04-18-17
Re: Holy Cross
11-29-18 04:19 PM - Post#267563    
    In response to PennFan10

Penn finally returns to relevance, gets gifted home-court advantage in the Ivy tournament despite being the 2-seed, barely ekes out a win when we didn't have our two best players for the second half ... and you're talking smack about that? Interesting choice.

 
PennFan10 
Postdoc
Posts: 3579

Reg: 02-15-15
11-29-18 04:35 PM - Post#267565    
    In response to mobrien

Hmmmm. Interesting post. Don't think I was talking smack. Your post, however, could be categorized by some as inflammatory.

 
palestra38 
Professor
Posts: 32685

Reg: 11-21-04
Re: Holy Cross
11-29-18 04:59 PM - Post#267570    
    In response to mobrien

Look forward to the season as well. See you at Harvard.

 
mrjames 
Professor
Posts: 6062

Loc: Montclair, NJ
Reg: 11-21-04
Re: Holy Cross
11-29-18 08:35 PM - Post#267583    
    In response to palestra38

While I don’t disagree with the sentiment around at-large bids for this season, it’s important to separate what the committee will do from objective measures of resume strength. By those objective measures, Harvard’s 10-11 squad should have been the first Ivy ar-large team, finishing with a positive Wins Above Bubble rating.

At present, if Harvard had gone 2-1 in its close games (UMass, URI and USF) instead of 1-2, it would have a positive WAB again.

This is obviously wholly different than what the committee decides to do, which tends to be to find every excuse to let a major conf team in (eg counting Tier I wins instead of considering record in Tier I games) and keep a mid-major out (eg citing too few Tier I wins even if the Tier I record is strong in a small sample). I can’t imagine this behavior will change any time soon. That being said, if you don’t have teams that objectively deserve to be in, then it doesn’t matter if the behavior changes.

My point on this subject always tends to be that we actually have had a situation where a team objectively deserved to be in based on resume and will likely have more in the future. But I don’t believe the committee will ever be savvy enough to understand and accept these facts. Thus I would agree that a second bid is a bit of a pipe dream for now.

 
HARVARDDADGRAD 
Postdoc
Posts: 2685

Loc: New Jersey
Reg: 01-21-14
11-29-18 10:22 PM - Post#267588    
    In response to mrjames

Uh, I fear that the committee is in fact too savvy ....to cut a mid major a break

 
AntiUngvar 
Masters Student
Posts: 530

Age: 69
Loc: New York City
Reg: 07-23-18
Re: Holy Cross
11-29-18 10:48 PM - Post#267591    
    In response to mobrien

O'B: They've been to the tournament eleven times in the last quarter century. I'd say there's quite a bit of not so recent and recent relevance for you, there!


 
PennFan10 
Postdoc
Posts: 3579

Reg: 02-15-15
11-29-18 11:02 PM - Post#267592    
    In response to AntiUngvar

Mr James,

Are you not arguing for the tie breaker to be about who you beat and then in your very next post arguing for the NCAA selection committee to consider the wins AND losses of teams against Tier I teams?

Am I missing something?

 
westcoast 
Senior
Posts: 302

Reg: 03-08-16
11-29-18 11:56 PM - Post#267597    
    In response to PennFan10

Yes, there is no contradiction. If you look at Tier 1 wins only, the committee might rate a Power 5 team with a 4-8 record against Tier 1 opponents higher than a mid-major team that went 2-1 in Tier 1 games.

 
mrjames 
Professor
Posts: 6062

Loc: Montclair, NJ
Reg: 11-21-04
11-30-18 08:58 AM - Post#267602    
    In response to westcoast

Correct - there is no contradiction, because in one circumstance (a true round robin), the number of games played at each level is equivalent, thus number of wins implies number of losses and thus record at each level. In the other circumstance (uneven NCAA scheduling), performance against the best teams has to be focused on wins and losses, because the number of games team to team played against that competition varies. For instance, if in the Ivies last year, Harvard played 10 games against the No. 3 team and Penn played 2 games, for the tiebreaker, you'd still want to understand performance against the next best team first, but by looking at wins only, a 3-7 Harvard might win a tiebreak over a 1-1 Penn team. Similarly, if all NCAA teams played the same number of Tier I and Tier II games, you wouldn't need to concern yourself with record, just wins, because wins would imply record.

Where there would be a contradiction is if I said that the committee really focuses heavily on Tier III and Tier IV losses more than wins or record against Tier I (and to a lesser extent II). We know that bad losses are mostly ignored in the selection process relative to the nauseating level of discussion surrounding those Tier I wins (and not record in Tier I wins, just counts of wins).

 
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