Officer Pete Malloy
Footballguy
The farm? Bet it on Cal Poly.
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NCAA HOOPS THREAD! -- K petitions to get Maui Jim Maui Invitational moved to Transylvania (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter Good Posting Judge
- Start date
Frostillicus
Footballguy
The only thing on your list Ohio State does well is the defense. They don't pass well, they don't hit the offensive glass at all, and they are a horrendous perimeter shooting team. The big worry I'd have is that Ross gets in that middle spot in the zone and hits a ton of jumpers, but I don't think he can penetrate from there given Syracuse's inside defense. I actually think Syracuse got a nice draw because nobody in that end of the bracket can shoot.
Bruce Dickinson
Footballguy
Didn't follow the women's side this season. Just looked at UConn's game results for the first time.UConn women are huge favorites against the field this year (-400). Crazy. (?)
They didn't play a close game - their smallest MOV was a roadie at RPI 7 that they won by 11.But get this: they aren't #1 in the women's RPI. Notre Dame is undefeated with a similar curbstomping MOV against a tougher schedule.
Haven't seen either team play, but just knowing that leads me to believe UConn -400 against the field is a no-play.
Nipsey
Footballguy
Bruce Dickinson
Footballguy
Bracket Project had UK as a 6-seed. They finished the regular season 18th in RPI and 17th in KenPom.
Frostillicus
Footballguy
You know Syracuse much better than me, obviously, but as a Big Ten guy I've seen a lot of Ohio State and I don't see them beating Syracuse at all. Maybe if the Orange cant' score and it's a 50-44 game or something, but that's about it.
timschochet
Footballguy
Tough seeding for UCLA. If they can survive Tulsa and VCU, they have to play Florida. That matchup never seems to work out well for the Bruins...
Scoresman
Footballguy
Using tournament statistics that date back 30 years and using a number of qualifiers and disqualifiers based on them at various stages of the tournament, I've come up with a Final Four of:
S - Florida
W - Arizona
E - Villanova
M - Duke
The championship game under this model is Arizona over Villanova.
I'm not sure how I feel about this, but I've used this model of picking the Final Four and Champ or something similar for a number of years now, and finish my bracket pools in the money almost every year.
S - Florida
W - Arizona
E - Villanova
M - Duke
The championship game under this model is Arizona over Villanova.
I'm not sure how I feel about this, but I've used this model of picking the Final Four and Champ or something similar for a number of years now, and finish my bracket pools in the money almost every year.
scoobus
Footballguy
Steve Tasker
Footballguy
Was hoping the OSU/Cuse games would be at night....have tickets but can't make it to the afternoon games. Oh well, if they both win, Saturday will be fun...
Captain Quinoa
Footballguy
Agree (for now) on Florida, Arizona, and - as much as I hate it - Duke. I just can't get behind Nova. I think I'm still scarred from picking the '94 team that lost in the first round to Weber St.
MSU is gonna be a tough out in that region. Not sure what to make of Iowa St.
cheese
Footballguy
Sure, but a 50-44 game has a GREAT chance of happening in that game. I think OSU needed to avoid all teams that will make them score to win and they basically did that. I don't think OSU has a great shot of making it very far, but I don't think the draw is the problem.Frostillicus said:
Long Ball Larry
Footballguy
Do you have any opinions on statistically fair and appropriately rewarding scoring systems for running the bracket?Scoresman said:
Captain Quinoa
Footballguy
Anyone see a 12/13 that can win a couple games? I usually pick one to the Sweet 16 but I think the 4's are too strong this year. Maybe SFA?
Spartans Rule
Footballguy
The past few years UConn and ND have both been in the Big East and would usually play 3 really tough games with each other. This year with ND in the ACC it's a mystery.Bruce Dickinson said:Didn't follow the women's side this season. Just looked at UConn's game results for the first time.Good Posting Judge said:UConn women are huge favorites against the field this year (-400). Crazy. (?)
But get this: they aren't #1 in the women's RPI. Notre Dame is undefeated with a similar curbstomping MOV against a tougher schedule.
Haven't seen either team play, but just knowing that leads me to believe UConn -400 against the field is a no-play.
Don't know what Notre Dame's odds are but if you get better than even money they might be worth a bet. Picking anyone other than UConn or ND would be silly.
Scoresman
Footballguy
I have many. Not sure what you mean.
Not through looking at each matchup, but one 5-12 I like is Harvard over Cincy. Seems to be the popular pick and it has the stats to back it up too.
Long Ball Larry
Footballguy
how many points should be awarded for each round. Like 2-4-8-16-32-64 or 1-2-4-8-16-32, etc.
I did 1-2-4-7-11-16 last year, with upset points in round 1. If I remember right, I read that 1-2-4-7-11-16 most evenly weights the totals of each round or something.
I want the rounds to be relatively equal in terms of potential points awarded but also reward the appropriate level of difficult.
edit: unrelated to picking teams, but you seemed like you might have a good handle on scoring distributions.
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Scoresman
Footballguy
Here's a second round potential upset alert. 8 seed Memphis over 1 seed Virginia.
Taking 8/9 seeds over the 1 seed in round 2 is a very risky proposition. Historically, 1 seeds are 101-15 against 8/9 seeds in round 2. However, Virginia has the qualities of being a 1 seed upset victim and Memphis has the qualities of 8/9 seed upsetter.
Would love the homer opinion of this potential matchup.
Taking 8/9 seeds over the 1 seed in round 2 is a very risky proposition. Historically, 1 seeds are 101-15 against 8/9 seeds in round 2. However, Virginia has the qualities of being a 1 seed upset victim and Memphis has the qualities of 8/9 seed upsetter.
Would love the homer opinion of this potential matchup.
Scoresman
Footballguy
Oh I see, gotcha. I like placing more value on upset picking and early round picks over picking the final champ so I tend to dislike the ones that double the points each round. 1-2-4-7-11-16 sounds pretty good to me.
Good Posting Judge
Footballguy
Frostillicus
Footballguy
We do our pool 1-2-3-5-7-10. Had one year where the guy who won didn't even pick the champion correctly.
Long Ball Larry
Footballguy
Not bad, I hate the ones so weighted on the champion. Feels like the first couple weekends are irrelevant. Though I suppose that there is a much higher degree of difficulty in picking the F4/champion.
MattFancy
Footballguy
Seems like a really tough tournament to predict. I think Florida and Arizona seem to be favorites to get to the Final Four. After those 2 teams, you could talk me into any teams seeded 1-6 in the East and any of the top 4 seeds in the Midwest.
Right now I have Florida, Michigan St, Arizona and Louisville in the Final Four, seems to be the popular pick. Not sure if I'm in love with those teams, but I honestly don't know.
Also don't really see a ton of big upsets. I think Harvard and North Dakota St are the 12-seeds to advance to the 2nd round. I like the Tennesee/Iowa winner and the NC State/Xavier winner to advance as well. But I don't really see any of those teams getting to the Sweet 16 with the exception of North Dakota St. Is Kentucky beating Wichita St in the 2nd round even considered an upset?
Really seems like a hard tourney to predict. Should be alot of fun to watch though.
Right now I have Florida, Michigan St, Arizona and Louisville in the Final Four, seems to be the popular pick. Not sure if I'm in love with those teams, but I honestly don't know.
Also don't really see a ton of big upsets. I think Harvard and North Dakota St are the 12-seeds to advance to the 2nd round. I like the Tennesee/Iowa winner and the NC State/Xavier winner to advance as well. But I don't really see any of those teams getting to the Sweet 16 with the exception of North Dakota St. Is Kentucky beating Wichita St in the 2nd round even considered an upset?
Really seems like a hard tourney to predict. Should be alot of fun to watch though.
MattFancy
Footballguy
swirvenirvin
Footballguy
Times are wrong for 3 of the Thursday games. Michign st plays at 4 I know..
Scoresman
Footballguy
Blind Tiger
Footballguy
On the other hand...Kentucky had 10 losses playing in the 7th worst conference in the country (slightly ahead of the American Athletic Conference), hasn't beaten a tournament team in 18 games and has a total of three wins against tournament teams. Only 1-6 in top 25 play. Before UK starts crying about their seed and having to play Wichita State they need to actually play and win the game against K-State who was 6-3 in top 25 play and has beaten 7 tournament teams.Bruce Dickinson said:Bracket Project had UK as a 6-seed. They finished the regular season 18th in RPI and 17th in KenPom.sporthenry said:
Scoresman
Footballguy
What do people see in North Dakota St? They're not one of my obvious 5-12 upsets mainly because they don't have the recent tournament experience. 12 seeds who were in the previous year's tournament have a .579 win percentage vs. 5 seeds so that's one of the key things to look for. Oklahoma also does not show signs of a typical 5 seed underavhiever.
Captain Quinoa
Footballguy
Scoresman
Footballguy
Don't like them at all. They have the same lack of tournament experience as ND State, plus not enough frontcourt scoring to put them in the group of 12 seed overachievers. VCU was also underseeded making that upset even more unlikely.
The only 5-12 upset I like this year so far is Harvard. Usually, at least 2 of these matchups stand out to me. Has me a bit worried because in order for your bracket to be realistic as possible, you'll need about 9-11 upsets total to be in line with the average number of them from the last several years..
Mr. Irrelevant
IBL Representative
A couple of ways to get around this. The easier method is to offer upset bonuses for the first couple of rounds (CBS allows you to add the value of the seed, not the difference, so in that case my scoring by round usually looks something like 10+seed, 20+seed, 35+seed, 60+seed, 100, 150).
A more unusual idea, but one that I've found works really well in larger pools, is just to split the pot three ways ... say 15% to the leader after the 1st weekend (one payout, unless there's a tie), 25% at the F4 (split 15%/10%), and 60% at the end (split 30%/20%/10%). The key is working the payouts such that there's a meaningful reward for the first weekend of action, while not preventing the wire-to-wire miracle bracket that you see every few years from landing the lion's share of the cash.
Captain Quinoa
Footballguy
TLEF316
Footballguy
Their best player is a VERY young junior (started for the U-19 national team last summer) named Elfrid Payton. He's a really nice player with a pretty versatile game. 19 points, 6 boards, 6 assists and 2.3 Steals per game) Good wingspan and excellent in transition (which should help, as Creighton likes to play fast). The only problem is he has no jump shot to speak of. Poor FT shooter as well. I'm interested to see what this kid does for next year. If he's close to graduating, (allowing him to finish up over the summer) I could see him jumping ship to a bigger program for his senior year and becoming the hottest transfer recruit on the market. He could also enter the draft.
They've also got 2 pretty good (albeit low volume) outside shooters and a beast of a sophomore PG (6'9 245, averages 18 and 10).
I've seen them play 2 or 3 times and was pretty impressed. I think they're really solid. But I don't like this matchup for them. I guess they'll try Payton on McBuckets, but I think he might be too small.
If ULL was a 12 seed instead of a 14, I think they'd be dangerous. But its tough to justify picking them against the most efficient offensive team of the KenPom ERA
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PlasmaDogPlasma
Footballguy
As down as I've been on the SEC all year, Tenn finished strong and UK may be starting to realize their talent level. I could see either or both doing some damage.
shuke
Black Ice Skeptic
Scoresman
Footballguy
My data is at work so I don't have them handy but the way I do this is to take data from a blog I subscribe to which has historical data from about 30 years of tournament history. I then have a spreadsheet which has the stats of all 68 teams in this year's tournament and compare the matchups to their historic counterparts. I also use kenpom data.
For example, I know that in round 2, 1 seeds have a 101-15 record against their 8/9 opponents, making it almost bracket suicide to take an 8 or 9 there. That alone is valuable information. Then you can drill down further to look at the 15 8s and 9s that won and see that they all had previous year tournament experience, have a certain scoring margin minimum, have won a certain number of games in their last 10, and get at least XXX% of their points from their guards (exact numbers are at work, sorry). Apply that to this year, and 8 seed Memphis has these characteristics, so if you're inclined to see Virginia exit quickly, there's your backup.
Scoresman
Footballguy
shadyridr
Footballguy
good stuff. Would like to hear more tomorrow
KingPrawn
Footballguy
Kenny Powers
Footballguy
Hopefully Nipsey hasnt busted out the Cuse train this year because theyre going down early.