NCAA lacrosse selection criteria

Here's a thread started by hymie on laxpower describing apparent changes in the NCAA's selection criteria for lacrosse:

[network.laxpower.com]

Reads like whom you play still trumps all else.

Blech. Meaningless dribble. They just threw more criteria at it so they could make up whatever they want to get Syracuse and Hopkins in.

>>> Selection Criteria. The men’s lacrosse committee will select and seed teams based on the criteria listed in Bylaw 31.3.3
• eligibility and availability of student-athletes.

Translation: If Hopkins' stud midfielder comes back from a strained knee late in the season and helps them to be on the bubble, they're in. If the ghost of Frank Resetarits comes back from injury to put Albany on the bubble, the committee in its wisdom - knowing northern schools really aren't yet at the caliber of the traditonal lacrosse powers, but maybe with another decade of grooming they might - can help Albany avoid an embarrassing potential first round loss by omitting them.

More seriously: The committee probably, almost certainly, is made up of well-meaning officials plus the elders-in-walkers who've gotten their reward after 30 years of lax committee obscurity. And they should have some room to maneuver to allow in a borderline team that they know has the chance to do well, or at least survive the first round. I think this has the potential to benefit northern schools more because we get a later start and develop momentum later on account of it being freakin' snowy until around March. Artificial turf and big field houses have done away with some of the disadvantages of being a Yankee lacrosse power. I was down in Virginia last weekend on college visits to some D-III powerhouses and flowers were already coming up.

billhoward
I was down in Virginia last weekend on college visits to some D-III powerhouses and flowers were already coming up.

A criterion is needed that gives a team selection credits in inverse proportion to when flowers come up on its campus.

billhoward
More seriously: The committee probably, almost certainly, is made up of well-meaning officials plus the elders-in-walkers who've gotten their reward after 30 years of lax committee obscurity.

Agreed. I humbly admit they are likely entirely well meaning people dealing with shitty criteria. But they also have their own personal built-in biases, as we all do.

And they should have some room to maneuver to allow in a borderline team that they know has the chance to do well, or at least survive the first round.

No, play by the same rules as everyone else. The NHL/MLB/NFL/NBA commish can't get a team into the playoffs because their star was out half the season and they didn't win enough games.

I think this has the potential to benefit northern schools more because we get a later start and develop momentum later on account of it being freakin' snowy until around March.

To darn bad . Play your early games away in the south, build a dome, or simply become Syracuse. Or, get a 'last 8' criteria or something (SoS weighted even) that gives credit for late-season surges. Then its the rule everyone's playing by. But fuzzy judgments aren't called for or needed. College hockey and every professional sport everywhere prove it.

Other advantages: Doesn't Syracuse graduate around say April 15? No classes the last month and a half of the season.

DeltaOne81
No, play by the same rules as everyone else. The NHL/MLB/NFL/NBA commish can't get a team into the playoffs because their star was out half the season and they didn't win enough games.

Bud Selig certainly *could* try a stunt like this - best interest of the game clause and all. (Lord knows he has had more than his share of stupid ideas.) But such a move would be very obvious - standings printed in the local paper are pretty hard to miss. There would be such outrage from the fan and media community and the sport would presumably lose dollars as a result. In lax they've got the fig leaf of a convoluted selection criteria that is enough to make the majority of fans not see how absurd and biased the rules are. Plus, I doubt there's enough of a dollar effect for the powers that be to care that much. The bias certainly doesn't hurt revenues/interest from Maryland/irginia area lax fans.

Good to see they're going backwards. Average RPI of wins? Average RPI of losses? If they're hell bent on subjectivity, the only way this is at all helpful is if the committee is made up of non-lacrosse types and the teams are coded. That way a bunch of folks who don't follow lax can seed the tournament blindly. Then they could fudge without (or at least with very limited) bias. Tell them to pick the top 16 teams and rank them. Then tell them the autobids. Of course it's much more likely they'd just get an objective system that doesn't treat SOS as the be all and end all before they do something like this.

In sum, congratulations UVA, SU, JHU, Duke, Maryland, Navy, etc. you've been invited to the 2009 tournament. The rest of you can fight for the other 10 or so spots.

Syracuse has classes???

I don't think those two teams will need any help this year.

billhoward
Other advantages: Doesn't Syracuse graduate around say April 15? No classes the last month and a half of the season.

Syracuse graduation is 2 weeks before ours. (or maybe 1... but not earlier than 2.)

Flyers1037

billhoward
Other advantages: Doesn't Syracuse graduate around say April 15? No classes the last month and a half of the season.

Syracuse graduation is 2 weeks before ours. (or maybe 1... but not earlier than 2.)

Let me see if I can find that...

Ah - Saturday, May 9, 2009

Robb

Flyers1037

billhoward
Other advantages: Doesn't Syracuse graduate around say April 15? No classes the last month and a half of the season.

Syracuse graduation is 2 weeks before ours. (or maybe 1... but not earlier than 2.)

Let me see if I can find that...

Ah - Saturday, May 9, 2009

I would think that what really counts is end of classes and end of exams. For SU, it's April 28 and May 6. respectively. For Cornell it's May 2 and May 15.

Robb

Flyers1037

billhoward
Other advantages: Doesn't Syracuse graduate around say April 15? No classes the last month and a half of the season.

Syracuse graduation is 2 weeks before ours. (or maybe 1... but not earlier than 2.)

Let me see if I can find that...

Ah - Saturday, May 9, 2009

Actually, it was really hard. That's why you had to do all the work for me and I just got to click a link. No typing involved, thanks for that!