comments about the ncaa tournament...
failure to remain introspective is the downfall of many useful constructs.
this statement remains true when we consider the ncaa tournament. because this year, the tourney committee failed in many regards.
if we want to just pencil the number one seeds into the sweet 16, we shouldn't have any pretense about it. really, we shouldn't even play the games.
no offense, but putting kansas in omaha makes the game essentially a home game; unlv and kent state wouldn't have much of a chance anyway, but playing the game on the road doesn't help.
north carolina/indiana or north carolina/arkansas might be pretty competitive on a neutral court; however, in raleigh we might as well mail it in. so too with ucla/byu in anaheim: i like byu as much as the next guy, but it's simply not that feasible to think of them winning that game.
in some respects, i don't like this component of the tournament at all: one reason why is that number one seeds are generally pretty close to number twos: tennessee, a number two, beat memphis, a number one; duke, a number two, beat north carolina, a number one; texas beat kansas AND ucla... and, well, you get the point.
but number two seeds don't get the breaks. texas and tennessee get to play in sketchy second round sites: texas faces austin peay and memphis fans, while tennessee has the undesirable scene of louisville and south alabama fans. duke gets to go to d.c. with the prospect of wvu fans, while georgetown can saunter down to raleigh only having to worry about davidson fans and unc fans turning on them.
so why do number one seeds largely get to avoid having their arenas turn on them? it's anybody's guess. ohio state ran into the problem of rupp arena turning on them last year, but they were regarded as a 'weak' number one seed. memphis has sort of the same issue this year, although it's anybody's guess as to why they're a weak number one. here's a dirty secret: memphis is the best second-half team in the country.
let's look at some evidence:
memphis 46, cincinnati 37 (+9, 10)
memphis 33, houston 22 (+11, 9)
memphis 46, gonzaga 41 (+5, 8)
memphis 41, uconn 29 (+12, 11)
memphis 42, georgetown 31 (+11, 14)
memphis 42, arizona 39 (+3, 13)
memphis 38, usc 29 (+9, 4 in ot)
memphis 53, siena 34 (+19, 42)
memphis 38, uab 35 (+3, 2)
*memphis 28, oklahoma 28 (0, 10)
*memphis 27, tennessee 32 (-5, -4)
here, i arbitrarily showed some statistics that suggest that memphis performs extremely well in the second half against good teams: the margin of victory is the second number. even if the game is close at the half, it seems likely that memphis can extend the lead in the second half.
more arbitrary analysis....
if any team is weak among the high seeds, i would bet on stanford, a team that keeps a lot of
games unnecessarily close and could run into problems against teams that are either more explosive or have better guard play, i.e., marquette, kentucky, or cornell. if i could bet on one more team, it might be north carolina, a team that could have serious problems with notre dame.
no, really, give me luke harangody right now over tyler hansborough.
and is this the year of the weak four seeds? washington state and vanderbilt both seem unlikely to beat the #1's in their region, while pitt and uconn play with extremely high variance. i wouldn't be surprised if all four seeds were eliminated before the third round, although i have uconn penciled in pretty strongly.
here are my most likely upsets for each type of matchup (i.e., 5/12, etc.)
16/1: portland state over kansas: big sky champ gets no love, but they could make the game interesting for awhile.
15/2: umbc over georgetown: danger zone game for the hoyas- any small conference team with good guard game could make the game interesting.
14/3: all of these games could be interesting: the 14s are very good. but i'll go with boise state over louisville, if only because of contrasts in style and louisville's propensity to (gulp) not play .
13/4: winthrop over washington state: washington state has trouble putting teams away, which is why i think winthrop has a chance in this one.
12/5: all of them? no, let's go with just one: temple over michigan state.
11/6: st. joe's over oklahoma is a very good bet, if only because st. joe's is pretty hot right now... so too is kansas state over usc, since the game is played in omaha.
10/7: i don't like davidson at all over gonzaga, so let's go with st. mary's over miami, or better yet, usa over butler.
9/8: these games aren't really upsets, but i think three are virtual coin flips: arkansas/indiana, byu/a & m, and kent/unlv.
if i could take one team out of the tournament and put one team in, i would put illinois state in and take villanova out. if i could put one more team in, i'd replace arizona with virginia tech. arizona in at 14 losses is sort of silly, and what exactly does villanova's resume consist of?
final four picks!!! louisville, memphis, ucla, kansas, with memphis winning it.
this statement remains true when we consider the ncaa tournament. because this year, the tourney committee failed in many regards.
if we want to just pencil the number one seeds into the sweet 16, we shouldn't have any pretense about it. really, we shouldn't even play the games.
no offense, but putting kansas in omaha makes the game essentially a home game; unlv and kent state wouldn't have much of a chance anyway, but playing the game on the road doesn't help.
north carolina/indiana or north carolina/arkansas might be pretty competitive on a neutral court; however, in raleigh we might as well mail it in. so too with ucla/byu in anaheim: i like byu as much as the next guy, but it's simply not that feasible to think of them winning that game.
in some respects, i don't like this component of the tournament at all: one reason why is that number one seeds are generally pretty close to number twos: tennessee, a number two, beat memphis, a number one; duke, a number two, beat north carolina, a number one; texas beat kansas AND ucla... and, well, you get the point.
but number two seeds don't get the breaks. texas and tennessee get to play in sketchy second round sites: texas faces austin peay and memphis fans, while tennessee has the undesirable scene of louisville and south alabama fans. duke gets to go to d.c. with the prospect of wvu fans, while georgetown can saunter down to raleigh only having to worry about davidson fans and unc fans turning on them.
so why do number one seeds largely get to avoid having their arenas turn on them? it's anybody's guess. ohio state ran into the problem of rupp arena turning on them last year, but they were regarded as a 'weak' number one seed. memphis has sort of the same issue this year, although it's anybody's guess as to why they're a weak number one. here's a dirty secret: memphis is the best second-half team in the country.
let's look at some evidence:
memphis 46, cincinnati 37 (+9, 10)
memphis 33, houston 22 (+11, 9)
memphis 46, gonzaga 41 (+5, 8)
memphis 41, uconn 29 (+12, 11)
memphis 42, georgetown 31 (+11, 14)
memphis 42, arizona 39 (+3, 13)
memphis 38, usc 29 (+9, 4 in ot)
memphis 53, siena 34 (+19, 42)
memphis 38, uab 35 (+3, 2)
*memphis 28, oklahoma 28 (0, 10)
*memphis 27, tennessee 32 (-5, -4)
here, i arbitrarily showed some statistics that suggest that memphis performs extremely well in the second half against good teams: the margin of victory is the second number. even if the game is close at the half, it seems likely that memphis can extend the lead in the second half.
more arbitrary analysis....
if any team is weak among the high seeds, i would bet on stanford, a team that keeps a lot of
games unnecessarily close and could run into problems against teams that are either more explosive or have better guard play, i.e., marquette, kentucky, or cornell. if i could bet on one more team, it might be north carolina, a team that could have serious problems with notre dame.
no, really, give me luke harangody right now over tyler hansborough.
and is this the year of the weak four seeds? washington state and vanderbilt both seem unlikely to beat the #1's in their region, while pitt and uconn play with extremely high variance. i wouldn't be surprised if all four seeds were eliminated before the third round, although i have uconn penciled in pretty strongly.
here are my most likely upsets for each type of matchup (i.e., 5/12, etc.)
16/1: portland state over kansas: big sky champ gets no love, but they could make the game interesting for awhile.
15/2: umbc over georgetown: danger zone game for the hoyas- any small conference team with good guard game could make the game interesting.
14/3: all of these games could be interesting: the 14s are very good. but i'll go with boise state over louisville, if only because of contrasts in style and louisville's propensity to (gulp) not play .
13/4: winthrop over washington state: washington state has trouble putting teams away, which is why i think winthrop has a chance in this one.
12/5: all of them? no, let's go with just one: temple over michigan state.
11/6: st. joe's over oklahoma is a very good bet, if only because st. joe's is pretty hot right now... so too is kansas state over usc, since the game is played in omaha.
10/7: i don't like davidson at all over gonzaga, so let's go with st. mary's over miami, or better yet, usa over butler.
9/8: these games aren't really upsets, but i think three are virtual coin flips: arkansas/indiana, byu/a & m, and kent/unlv.
if i could take one team out of the tournament and put one team in, i would put illinois state in and take villanova out. if i could put one more team in, i'd replace arizona with virginia tech. arizona in at 14 losses is sort of silly, and what exactly does villanova's resume consist of?
final four picks!!! louisville, memphis, ucla, kansas, with memphis winning it.
posted by mike at 10:44 PM
4 Comments:
correction: final four picks: louisville, memphis, wku, kansas, with wku clobbering louisville!!!!!!!!!!!
The gym turned on OSU last year?
Now Rupp had the odd position of having three local teams (Louisville, Xavier, and OSU) assigned to it last year, so OSU (the farthest away of the three) didn't completely dominate the gym - merely two thirds of it. The Louisiville fans were largely backing Xavier, but there were still plenty of fans for that obnoxious O-H-I-O cheer to go around. Ohio State did have a local court. It's hard to say the gym "turned" on Ohio State - well, up until the heretofore still uncalled flagrant foul on Greg Oden.
Anyway the situation at Rupp was anomalous and can't be used as an example for anything. This would be like putting UNC, Davidson, and Wake Forest all at the same site for a slate of 2nd round games...
Although you're point stands...
The idea of the pod system was to reduce travel time for schools and hopefully make things cheaper. Higher seeds are given preference however - and, it pretty much makes sense to reward the regular season standouts. However, this usually amounts to screwing over some smaller school who has to travel and really could use a break on travel expenses. You think UNC can't afford drop a few bucks on travelling? Oh well... there are worse injustices...
could i have got my predictions more wrong?
i'm sending my condolences dear...
Post a Comment
<< Home