Pairwise Ranking

[Chris 02]

Disregarding the home and away bonus points, we need at least 0.0057 of bonus added to our RPI per neutral win (OSU and Notre Dame) to get ahead of St. Cloud.  

Of course the only reason this is all necessary is if Colgate wins ECACs.  Anyone else besides us or them and they take up another at-large spot.  Similar if there's an upset in the CCHA or Hockey East (pretty sure that a WCHA team that's already in will win their tournament).  

[ugarte]

[Q]ben03 Wrote:

 As discussed above (too lazy to check) ... does the bonus system put us ahead of St. Cloud?
Thus, we would be the last team out  but I could be wrong ...
 [/Q]

Oooo. Good point.  I may have spoken too soon.  Maybe the amount of the bonus matters, but the hypo numbers Jason Moy ran keep SCSU as the first team out.

[Chris \'03]

Let's wait and see what happens to SCSU's RPI if/when they bow out of the WCHA playoffs this week at Minnesota.

[Chris 02]

[q]Let's wait and see what happens to SCSU's RPI if/when they bow out of the WCHA playoffs this week at Minnesota. [/q]

I doubt it'll go up, but I really can't see it dropping all that much.

[calgARI '07]

Many people are forgetting that just about every single team is going to lose in the next two weeks.  If Cornell sweeps this weekend, and goes 1-1 next weekend, with Harvard upsetting Brown weekend, it is very possible to get an at large big.  I think I'd rather just win the ECAC than have to worry about it though.

[ugarte]

[Q]calgARI '07 Wrote:

Many people are forgetting that just about every single team is going to lose in the next two weeks.[/q]Yeah, but most teams are either (a) so far ahead that they don't really matter or (b) playing higher quality teams than we are.  We need the bubble teams to lose now.

[q]I think I'd rather just win the ECAC than have to worry about it though. [/Q]
Amen, brother.

[KeithK]

Random playoff factoid.  We've played four CCHA teams this, two of which are bubble teams, and thr four are facing off this weekend.
- Bowling Green at Ohio State
- Western Michigan at Notre Dame
The two bubble teams we need to lose are part of our SoS, but so are their opponents so these games are a wash wrt our SoS.

I don't know why I found this so interesting, but there it is.

[dss28]

So Keith, in layman's terms, is that good for us, bad for us, or does it not matter  (sorry, I still get easily confused by all the pairwise stuff... but I'm working on it!!)?

[ugarte]

[Q]dss28 Wrote:

 So Keith, in layman's terms, is that good for us, bad for us, or does it not matter  (sorry, I still get easily confused by all the pairwise stuff... but I'm working on it!!)? [/Q]We want the bubble teams to lose, so losses by OSU and Notre Dame are good for us.

But we played OSU and Notre Dame, so if they lose our SOS goes down - which is bad for us.

But we also played their opponents - WMU and BGSU - so if they win, our SOS improves, which is good for us.

So the SOS is a wash which is, neutral.

Therefore[/u] we return to a situation in which losses by Notre Dame and OSU are good for us.

Thank you and good night.

[dss28]

Okay, I'm following what you're saying... But since we beat both OSU and ND in the Everblades and early in the RS we did not beat both WMU and BGSU, wouldn't it be better for us for OSU and ND to win?  Or does the "order" in which we played the teams not matter... ie, we "didn't win" at the beginning of the season when we played MWU and BGSU, but then as the season went on and we began to gel as a team we beat other teams (OSU, ND)... do later-in-the-season wins "count" more?  (not including playoff games, which obviously count more than RS games ;-) )

I'm not sure if I'm making sense... sorry.

::pop::

[ben03]

you have severely managed to over-think this wins help ... losses hurt ... order does not matter.;-)

[dss28]

Haha... gotcha.  

I'm bored and waiting for 7pm to come around... this overanalysis is the work of an extremely idle brain ;-)

But, my question was also: if a team (or teams) we beat managed to beat a team we didn't beat, doesn't that help us?  Or does it not matter?

[jkahn]

The winning percentage of the teams we played against figures into our RPI.  Since we played WMU twice and NDame once, it helps our RPI if WMU wins.  Also, since we are close behind NDame in PWR, our only shot a passing them is probably to have WMU win.  On the other hand, if NDame stays in the top 15, we get bonus points, which might help us in comparison to some other teams.  So, the answer is, it depends on what all the other results are also.  I think rooting for WMU is the better bet.
Since we played Ohio State twice and BGSU once, OSU victories help our RPI and BGSU wins hurt it, but on the other hand, we may need to pass OSU in PWR to get in also, so rooting for BGSU might be the better bet.  Again, it depends on everything else.
Between Ohio State, NDame and St. Cloud, we'd have to pass 2 of 3 for sure, (and if Colgate doesn't win the ECACs make that 3 of 4 including Colgate) so if both ND and OSU win, we've got no chance without an autobid.
At this point, just about everything would have to break right for us to have a remote chance at sneaking in without winning the ECACs, including a necessary sweep of Clarkson.  So, let's just win our games and not worry about the rest.

[KeithK]

What everyone has said is pretty much right.  FWIW I think we root for ND and OSU to lose because they're bubble teams and we need bubble teams to drop for us to have a prayer.  Jeff's probably right regarding the multiple game effect with OSU and WMU, but the negative RPI effect of OSU losing prob is washed out by the more direct effect on their RPI.

This whole excercise would be a lot more worthwhile if we'd just beaten WMU twice and BGSU.  I haven't checked to see if Whelan has his What if? script running or not, but I suspect that if we  had those extra four points we might be solidly on the bubble instead of hoping to get on the bubble.

[KeithK]

The order of games no longer matters at all.  It used to matter before they abolished the Last 16/Last 20 category in the PWR.  But ti wouldn't have mattered here anywya, since all of our RS non-conf games will be more than 20 games old by the end of the season.

I don't think the transitive property doesn't help in the rankings (A > B > C > A)