[Lax] NCAA Prospects

[jtwcornell91]

Can someone please remind me who's got the auto-bids wrapped up?

The NCAA's "primary criteria" in evaluating won-lost record and strength of schedule (which are to be considered along with "eligibility and availability of student-athletes"--can you imagine if superstar injuries were considered in the NFL tiebreakers) are

(1) "results against teams in descending order, as determined by the column entitled normal RPI rank that is used during selections (e.g., vs. teams 1-5, 6-10, 11-15, etc.)."

(2) "Strength-of Schedule Index, based on the opponents' success ranking in the RPI that is used during selections."

(3) The column entitled normal RPI rank, based on the entire Division I schedule.  The RPI includes the Division I winning percentage, opponents' success, and the opponents' strength-of-schedule."

I hear tell that #3 is the straight-up 25/50/25 RPI, which is in the column "NCAA RPI" on http://slack.net/~whelan/lax/rpi.shtml ; we are #7 in that, behind Hopkins, Georgetown, Syracuse, Virginia, UMass and Princeton.

Also, #2 is apparently Opponents' Winning Percentage, in which we are also #7, behind Duke, Hopkins, Princeton, Brown, UMass, and Virginia.

#1 is probably most important against teams with which we're a wash in #2 and #3, which at the moment consists of Georgetown, Syracuse, Duke and Brown.  At the moment, using http://slack.net/~whelan/lax/current/crit.Cr.shtml as a guide, we are 1-1 against the top 5 in RPI, Georgetown is 0-0, Syracuse is 1-1, Duke is 1-2, and Brown is 0-2.  Against the top ten, we're 2-1, Georgetown is 2-1, Syracuse is 3-2, Duke is 1-2, and Brown is 2-3.  In the "secondary criteria", vs Georgetown we lost head-to-head and they have us 3-0 to 2-1 on common opponents, vs Syracuse we won head-to-head but they have us 3-0 to 1-2 on common opponents, Duke we didn't play and common opponents are a wash at 3-2, and Brown beat us head-to-head, but we have them 5-1 to 3-3 on common opponents.

To me this sounds like right now we're behind Georgetown and Syracuse (name-branding will make the committee spin the criteria so the Orange are ahead of us) and ahead of Duke and Brown.

That puts 6 teams ahead of us, of whom one (UMass) already has an AQ.  We should of course root for Princeton to beat Brown and take the Ivy AQ, since they're ahead of us anyway (although apparently Princeton moving into the top 5 would be bad for us).  Good news for us is that Hofstra, who are right behind us in the RPI, have already finished the season, so if we beat Hobart, we should stay clear of them.  Duke plays Penn, so you should probably hold your nose and root for the Quakers.

I defer to the lax gurus for an authoritative statement, but it looks to me like if we win and Princeton beats Brown (and I counted right) we should manage to snag the fifth or sixth at-large bid.  (If Brown wins, we could be in danger of being passed by Duke for the last bid.)

The committee meets Sunday afternoon.  I'll try to re-run the RPI numbers after today's results are in, but it may not be until late tonight.

[kingpin248]

Auto-bids:

GWLL - Fairfield

ECAC - Massachusetts

Ivy - Princeton (defeated Brown 12-10 today)

MAAC - Manhattan (defeated Mt. St. Mary's 9-8 today)

America East - Stony Brook (defeated Albany 8-6 today)

Patriot League - Hobart (they had higher RPI than Army and Bucknell, the two teams with which they were tied for the regular season crown at 5-1)

(nb: this post has been changing throughout the day as results have come in)

[peterg]

The six AQ's go to the Ivy, ECAC, Patriot, MAAC, Great Western and Amercia East conferences.  I think only two are decided at this point - UMASS won the ECAC (so Georgetown is in the at-large mix) and Fairfield won the GW.

As for the rest...

Ivy is between (sad to say) Brown and PU.  I think we need PU to win.
Patriot is between Army and...gasp!...Hobart.  We need CU to win.
Amercia East tournament winner will be in (Albany/Hartford/Stony Brook/Quinnipiac?)
MAAC tournament winner will be in (Manhattan/Mt. St. Mary's/Providence/St. Joseph?)

JHU, Syracuse are in no doubt.  Virginia and Georgetown are very likely.  The other two spots?  It's too complicated for my addled mind.  There are some good takes on it all in various places.  Here's what "CuseLaxRules" had to say on Syrcuse.com (this post, unlike most - 99.9% - there was reasonable, I thought), though it does not make it sound good for CU:

"Anyone up for some tourney talk? I know there's been a lot of it going around lately, but I'll throw my two cents in.

We can safely assume that JHU, SU, Georgetown, and UVa have all assured themselves of an at large bid, win or lose this weekend.

That leaves two at-large bids remaining between the following teams: Hofstra, Loyola, Cornell, Duke, Maryland. I'll give a synopsis on each team, in the order I think they should be considered for those 2 spots.

1. Hofstra: 11-3. Rankings: RPI 9, Media and Coaches 6. Top 5 wins: 0. Top 10 wins: UMass, Duke. Top 15 wins: UNC. Losses: Princeton, JHU, Loyola. Hofstra is a quality team with quality wins and losses.

2. Loyola: 9-3. Rankings: RPI 12, Media 9, Coaches 11. Top 5 wins: 0. Top 10 wins: Duke, Hofstra. Losses: Syracuse, Georgetown, BUTLER. The Butler loss could be what keeps this team out of the tourney. If they beat JHU Saturday they're in. Otherwise they're on the bubble. Wins over fellow bubble teams Duke and Hofstra should help, but their RPI ranking is the worst out of all the bubble teams, which could come back to haunt them.

3. Duke: 7-6. Rankings: RPI 8, Media 8, Coaches 7. Top 5 wins: Virginia. Top 10 wins: Maryland, twice. Losses: Loyola, UNC, Georgetown, PU, Virginia, Hofstra. SOOO many losses, but more top quality wins than the other bubble teams, which is a complete result of the ACC Tourney. Duke needs Loyola to lose and Princeton to win on Saturday, or else I don't think they'll be able to pull it off.

4. Cornell: 9-3. Rankings: RPI 7, Media 11, Coaches 10. Top 5 Wins: Syracuse. Top 10: 0. Top 15 wins: Yale. Losses: Princeton, Georgetown, Brown. Cornell is living off their Cuse win...without that they aren't even in this discussion. In another year that may be enough to get them in, but not this year. Their strong RPI is the only thing keeping them afloat right now.   [NOTE THAT PENN STATE IS NOW IN THE TOP 15 WHICH IMPROVES CU's STANDING SOMEWHAT]

5. Maryland: 8-4. Rankings: RPI 14, Media 7, Coaches 9. No top 5 or 10 wins. Top 15 wins: UNC, Navy, Yale. Losses: Virginia, JHU, Duke(twice). Poor RPI, no top 10 wins spells trouble for a team many consider the best of the bubble teams. I just don't think they've done enough to be placed ahead of the first three teams on the list, and at least Cornell has a big win to fall back on.

If Princeton loses to Brown, they lose the Ivy AQ and get put in the at-large mix. IF THAT HAPPENS, Princeton's line would look like this: Record: 7-5 (Current) Rankings: RPI 6, Media 3, Coaches 4. Top 5 wins: 0. Top 10 wins: Cornell, Hofstra, Duke. Top 15 wins: 0. Losses: Syracuse, Virginia, JHU, Brown, Yale. If this happens, I would place Princeton behind Hofstra for sure, despite their head to head thrashing. If Loyola beats JHU, PU falls in behind them and ahead of Duke, Cornell, and Maryland, which would mean no tournament appearance for the defending national champions."

I figure that by the time I try to figure out what we need to have happen to get CU in, all the games will be over and I'll have a splitting headache.  So I'm heading to Geneva to root hard.

Let's Go Red.

[Greg Berge]

Sorry to be slow about this, but didn't the loss to Brown eliminate Cornell no matter what?

[jeh25]

No. If the committee uses the actual method outlined in the handbook, we have a good shot at the last at-large AQ if we win and princeton wins.

However, the committee also has an ad-hoc "which team do we like the best" tiebreaker. So the question becomes how much do you trust the committee?

[kingpin248]

Red finish at 10-3.

Final from Providence - Princeton 12, Brown 10

Hopkins defeats Loyola 8-4.

I think there's an error on the LaxPower composite schedule - Duke and Penn aren't playing today.  Neither Duke nor Penn lists the game.

[bigredtuba]

Sweet. That's the best possible outcome for today. Root for SU to cream G'town.

[Ben Doyle 03]

delete message. . .double post

[Ben Doyle 03]

Syracuse - 15
Georgetown - 14       final


It looks like all the cards played out the way we needed them too, now we have to wait & hope we get in over Duke or Loyola. . .we shall see

[jtwcornell91]

Anyone got a score for the Dartmouth-Harvard game?  There's no result on laxpower, and lax.com has 0-0 as the score.

[jeh25]

Game didn't start until 7. Can't find a webcast. Guess you'll just have to wait.

[Greg Berge]

When will they announce the field?

[zg88]

For JTW:

Harvard 7 - Dartmouth 6

http://forums.laxpower.com/read.php?f=1&i=25834&t=25834

[kingpin248]

For JTW: Harvard 7, Dartmouth 6

For Greg: Tomorrow afternoon at 3:30 PDT.  It will be on Empire Sports (on DirecTV ch. 626 and Dish Network ch. 432).  NCAAchampionships.com also mentions something about an Internet cast.  I haven't seen a link anywhere on their site.  There is an audio link on Empire's site, so listening shouldn't be a problem.

[zg88]

For Greg:

(From the LaxPower Forum):

Since the Swami is never wrong...  ::rolleyes::

Author: Swami 
Date:   05-03-02 21:39

The NCAA Lacrosse Selection Show is on this Sunday, 6:30 PM. The show will be aired over Empire Sports Network for New York area cable viewers. Empire Sports is also carried over DirecTV Channel 626.

Empire audio simulcasts its entire schedule, so you will be able to listen to it over the Internet by going to Empire's web site at http://www.empiresports.com/index.shtml

...And... other sources:

Author: radiomike 
Date:   05-04-02 10:39

Also, WWW.WEOS.ORG and NCAACHAMPIONSHIPS.ORG