Joe Lunardi’s Updated Bracketology
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Utterly absurd how they deal with all this criteria. I do have a bit more respect for the SC on how they do this. Don't really AGREE with some of the criteria (I'm not convinced keeping top conference teams in separate brackets is the most important factor when trying to see who the best team is..), but still..
I've asked this before, and will probably ask it again around SS, but how does the criteria ranking go again?
It updates whenever the sites update theirs. Most sites aren't updating every single day. Even Lunardi is only doing twice a week at this point.
Oregon hasn't played since Saturday so I'm not sure why it would vary greatly
This was just updated today on the NCAA site: March Madness bracket: How the 68 teams are selected for the Division I Men's Basketball Tournament
The selection committee:
JOE ALLEVA LSU
JOE CASTIGLIONE OU
JANET CONE UNC ASHEVILLE
TOM HOLMOE BYU
MARK HOLLIS MSU
BERNARD MUIR STANDFORD
BRUCE RASMUSSEN CREIGHTON
PETER ROBY NORTHWESTERN
JIM SCHAUS OHIO U
KEVIN WHITE DUKE
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Thanks, But I like it better when I make @The_Answer1313 do it. This will be like the 3rd time Ive asked this year lol.
I agree. Honestly I care very little if two conference teams meet up with each other. I'd much rather have a more balanced bracket.
So basically they seed the teams 1 through 68 and go one by one.
There's really only a few bracketing rules but as you go down the seed lines u quickly realize just how little room the SC has to place teams where they want to. It becomes a real pain in the neck when u get around the 6 through 11 seeds as you having to place teams in the same conference in different regions to avoid them matching up and u also have to factor non conference matchups as well.
I'm prob oversimplifying this but:
1) The top four teams in each conference on the top four lines MUST go into different regions.
2) The host school cannot go to a location where it's played more than 3 home games.
3) If same conference teams play three times, they can't meet until the Elite 8
4) If same conference teams play twice, they can't meet until the Sweet 16
5) If a same conference team plays once, they can meet as early as Second Round.
6) Teams can't play each other 1st round if they met in the regular season.
There are other minor ones but that's basically the gist of it.
Once you have the complete seed list, you can basically go through the seed 1 by 1 and see WHY they placed teams where they do. I've done this for every bracket since 2010. Very rarely do I get stuck and wonder why the SC sent teams where they do. And those rare times I'm probably just missing something. They have software which shows distance from sites and their software automatically blocks out regions they can't go to as well as potential alerts. I'm doing it all by hand so I might just miss something. It happens. Last bracket Lunardi had USC and Monmouth pairing up. The only problem with that is those two teams already played each other twice in the regular season. He admitted he goofed on Twitter. It's real hard when u have to look at matchups and make sure those teams arent paired together
Oh and then u have this one added rule for this season
So apparently people were upset about weakest 1 paired with weakest 2 and so on.......so this season they added a rule to try and balance the bracket out.
I question whether they are really gonna do this tho. I have a hard time believing they are going to take a 2 seed out of their natural region just to balance things out.
It's like NCAA u either do one thing or another..........make it strictly geography or make it strictly S-Curve. If u do it by location more teams will stay closer to home but you'll have an unbalanced bracket........if u go S-Curve location is gonna be all over the place but the brackets are gonna be balanced (or as balanced as they can be if they get the seed list order correct).
I don't care what they choose but wish they'd pick one.
So apparently people were upset about weakest 1 paired with weakest 2 and so on.......so this season they added a rule to try and balance the bracket out.
I question whether they are really gonna do this tho. I have a hard time believing they are going to take a 2 seed out of their natural region just to balance things out.
It's like NCAA u either do one thing or another..........make it strictly geography or make it strictly S-Curve. If u do it by location more teams will stay closer to home but you'll have an unbalanced bracket........if u go S-Curve location is gonna be all over the place but the brackets are gonna be balanced (or as balanced as they can be if they get the seed list order correct).
I don't care what they choose but wish they'd pick one.
It looked like they played them at USC and then met up on a neutral court.........maybe for some tournament. Yeah 3rd place game in a tournament in Kissimmee FL during Thanksgiving
It happens a few times every year it seems.
Actually this season OK St. not only played Long Beach St twice but played them back to back games
Actually this season OK St. not only played Long Beach St twice but played them back to back games
You're right, in regard to Oregon and UK. Just as a general principle, it's good to keep in mind that there is a lag with bracket matrix.
I mean, at some point, criteria are going to cancel out criteria. You can't have that many rules without conflict.
Personally I think it should be seeded heavily by ranking and only moderately by location (making sure some high seed doesn't walk to the Final4 in their back yard). I know that may make it tougher for fans to see the game, and might take away from Kentucky's home court advantage sometimes.. but it makes the most sense. Tournament isn't about fans attending, especially when you can argue that tournament is better enjoyed with a few TVs at home... it's about finding out who the best team is.
I agree and honestly since they introduced the pod system they can still have teams play close to home the opening round games. It would really just be the regional games that are affected if they go strictly by ranking.
And your right about criteria cancelling out.........that's why previously they had in the rules they were allowed to move teams up a seed or down a seed. Because eventually they just had to. During the mock media thing last week tho they said schools were bothered by that. So now I think they are able to relax some criteria to keep teams on their true line.......which seems the fair way to do it.
A few years back they had to do this to BYU. Now BYU is a special case to begin with since they can't play on Sundays. So that limits their first round sites 50% and limits their regions 50%. Say they are an 11 seed. Well they need to get paired with a 3 seed. What if all 3 seeds are playing in Friday/Sunday sites? They really have no choice but to move BYU up or down a seed.
So u do run into crazy things like that from time to time
Duke winning two straight 1 point games vs Virginia and North Carolina was bad for us and good for us. It made our win against them look that much better but Duke just passed us on the S-Curve for seeding last night with that win.
UK has a 4 seed resume right now. Not sure why everything thinks it should be higher. Needed to win the game at Kansas to have been higher and not lost at Tennessee or Auburn.
The South Carolina win looks worse after they lay an egg at Missouri so that hurt us.
UK has a 4 seed resume right now. Not sure why everything thinks it should be higher. Needed to win the game at Kansas to have been higher and not lost at Tennessee or Auburn.
The South Carolina win looks worse after they lay an egg at Missouri so that hurt us.
I just looked at the RPI for the first time after the Duke win. I was shocked to see we moved up that far all the way to 9th. We were sitting at 14 to start the night and didn't even play and moved all the way to 9th.
We passed Dayton because they lost and North Carolina fell below us because they lost and Duke won (pushing us up) and it seems that Duke win pushed us above a few other teams (WVU, SMU) and Iowa loss coupled with Duke win pushed us above them.
9th in the RPI with that loss at Auburn, with that loss to Ohio State, At UCLA, at Tennessee and that missed chance at Kansas.
So if we had beat Kansas and just not lost to Tennessee and Auburn we might be is sitting in the top 3 in the RPI right now.
All this said now that we are 9th the pressure is on to keep winning and those 3 road games are all pitfalls.
http://warrennolan.com/basketball/2016/nitty-clear
We passed Dayton because they lost and North Carolina fell below us because they lost and Duke won (pushing us up) and it seems that Duke win pushed us above a few other teams (WVU, SMU) and Iowa loss coupled with Duke win pushed us above them.
9th in the RPI with that loss at Auburn, with that loss to Ohio State, At UCLA, at Tennessee and that missed chance at Kansas.
So if we had beat Kansas and just not lost to Tennessee and Auburn we might be is sitting in the top 3 in the RPI right now.
All this said now that we are 9th the pressure is on to keep winning and those 3 road games are all pitfalls.
http://warrennolan.com/basketball/2016/nitty-clear
Do you remember RPI being so volatile so late in the year? I really don't pay much attention to those indexes, to be honest as I think they over simplify the team comparison and folks try to make them transitive. I just don't recall them jumping around so much.
See, right after saying that you didn't know why everyone thought we were a 3 seed, you admitted that you hadn't even looked at RPI.
I think we should be a 3 right now based on being 7 kenpom, 9 RPI, 11 Sagarin. That's an average of 9, which would be the first 3 seed.
A lot of you want to pull us down to the 4 line because of a couple road losses we shouldn't have taken. My argument is that those losses have already pulled us down - from 1 to 3.
I'm not sure why so many UK fans want to punish us more than is warranted. Maybe it's a defense mechanism. But the metrics have us on the 3 line now, though admittedly the margins are razor thin.
^^It's probably those people looking at biased Power rankings and polls. What, 15 in the polls? CBS has us at 20 in their power rankings? I'd say 3 seed myself. I do think that bad loss to Tenn is still fresh.
But, that memory might get nuked tonight though!![[cheers]](https://ct.yimg.com/mr/uploads/891/5628.gif "Cheers [cheers]")
But, that memory might get nuked tonight though!
Why would Duke necessarily pass us?
We are ahead in RPI. We are 5-1 vs. RPI top 50 to their 4-5. And most importantly, we beat them head to head on a neutral court.
I don't think anyone wants to punish us. I think there's a difference between what we think this team should be seed wise and what they are most likely going to be.
I think they should be a 3
But Lunardi and most people in the bracket matrix thing just don't agree.
Actually that's not true.............least not in Lunardi's
We are 13th. Duke while I'm not sure where they are on the line got sent out West first round games. So Lunardi doesn't feel Duke is ahead of us.
We are 13th. Duke while I'm not sure where they are on the line got sent out West first round games. So Lunardi doesn't feel Duke is ahead of us.
What I mean is that many of our fans want to take a glass half empty approach. Self-inflicted punishment.
Rather than focusing on the positives - our high rankings in various metrics, good record vs. other top teams, etc. - they choose to accentuate the negative - WE LOST TO AUBURN SO WE DESERVE WHATEVER WE GET!!!
We lost on the road to teams with RPIs 122 and 126. Kansas lost at #140. Oregon lost to #143 neutral site. Virginia lost at #118. Miami lost at #100 and to #136 at home. Dayton lost at #223 La Salle. North Carolina lost at #117 Northern Iowa. Iowa lost at #111 Penn State. These are all teams in contention for top-3 seeds. We're not the only team with bad losses. We have a very good overall resume. We're 5-1 against the top 50. Only Miami (7-1), Xavier (6-1), and Virginia (8-2) have comparable or better record against the top 50. And we've got three more shots to beat top-50 teams. Those road games at Texas A&M and Florida are going to go a long way toward determining our seed.
Yep. People tend to focus on the negatives. This board is hugely different depending on whether we win a game or lose a game. Lose a game we are heading to the NIT lol.
It's kinda crazy. And it's sad. People should listen to Cal and "enjoy the journey". This team is taking off and they have been since the Auburn game.
Whether we are are 3 or 4 right now matters little cause they way we are playing right now......we are playing like a 1 seed.
I'm with you for the most part on the conspiracy stuff. The level of paranoia around here has risen off the charts. It seems like the only topics of discussion when there aren't games are about who's out to get UK, who said something that should offend someone at UK, or who on the "enemies list" (which is pretty much everyone) received some kind of unjust praise.
However, I think you're picking the wrong targets in this thread, and the area where UK fans have some legit complaints probably has to do with where Cal's teams have been placed in the NCAA bracket, and how they've been seeded. I'll skip passing judgment on the 2010, 12, and 15 brackets- UK was an obvious 1 seed each of those years, #1 overall in 2 of them, and there wasn't a lot of leeway for the selection committee. Some UK fans want to take huge issue with who got put in UK's region those years- and 2010 didn't make me too happy- but there was a broader, non-UK logic at work (2010 was the first year that they decided to put geography blatantly ahead of S Curve, which resulted in the joke Duke South Regional, with UK getting WVa as a 2 seed) that dictated how the regions played out.
In 2011 and 2014, though, when the SC had some leeway, it sure seemed like they took the dimmest possible view of UK, and slid UK down to arrange high profile matchups. Every single metric available in 2011 and 2014 would have had UK higher than a 4 (especially a 4 matched with a very strong #1 overall seed) and 8 seed those years.
Those are 2 of only 3 times I distinctly remember being flat-out pissed about how UK was treated on Selection Sunday. The other was 94, when I thought they completely ignored UK's SEC tournament win over Arkansas to purposely put UK and Duke in the same region. With 2 of my 3 remembered hose jobs being in the last 5 years, I do have some trepidation about this season. But I generally agree with you- UK just needs to keep winning. And with the volatility all across college basketball, I care far less this year about where UK goes, and who is in their region.
Yes, but I think you are just restating what we're all saying. Its a jumbled mess at the top this year. Also, you've got indexes jumping around significantly with each game. The picture we see now could change substantially in six games, not to mention the tournaments.
Bottom line is that the different between a 2 and a 4 seed this year is going to split hairs. A one seed is not going to be separated by any great degree. We're a 4. We likely won't be in in a few weeks. Comes down to whether we take care of business.
I hear what you are saying, but understand I don't buy into any of it. ZERO. No conspiracies.
So the pattern I see is not unlike what you've expressed. Folks agree that the paranoia is off the charts. Well, except for the area where they believe there is REALLY a conspiracy. If you step back and look across the board, its simply ridiculous. It would be comical but we start looking like an Indiana or a Louisville fan base. So comedy becomes embarrassment.
So let me put a non-conspiratorial spin on what you mention. First, the tournament is not "seeded" any more in the traditional sense of the best one seeds are exactly the best four teams. Same with second seeds, etc. They might tell you it is, but it isn't. Just as soon as they throw in the "regional" interest, that traditional seeding concept went out the window. They script match-ups. The problem we have is that we are simply the best team in the history of college basketball. We are a regional interest to everybody. Further, when we play a Duke or Louisville, there is a chance that the game will become nearly legendary. Don't believe that? Folks still talk about the Laettner shot, not just Kentucky or Duke fans.
So what does this mean? This seeding that folks are trying to make quantitative and clean is not. It becomes mushy. Contaminated by travel, regional interests, TV ratings, etc. a 3 might be a 4 if the matchup is better. A 4 that should be in the east might go Midwest due to travel or local interest. Is this a conspiracy? No. Does it happen more to Kentucky or Duke or whatever? Likely because those teams are a draw no matter where they end up.
True conspiracies are difficult. They are hard to hide from insiders. They are hard to keep secret in the public eye. They are expensive. And worst, they are very very risky. There is no conspiracy or anyone out to get UK via the tournament seeding. They are out to make money on UK. UK wants them to make money off UK. Nobody hides that. It will continue to be the case for as long the tournament is a profit center.
Whatever you want to call it, but we're basically ending up in the same place. The selection committee starts putting the bracket together, and says "well, if we slide UK down a line or 2, we can get them against undefeated Wichita State in the 2nd round". Okay, great- but that's not fair treatment to UK, whether you want to call it a conspiracy or not, and it is something that UK fans can justifiably complain and worry about. There is no clause about "shuffling things around to get a big TV matchup" in the NCAA's (listed) bracketing criteria.
They say they don't script matchups. Which means it can't be true unless there is a...
CONSPIRACY to keep quiet about it. So make up your mind what you want to believe.
Personally, I think there is BIAS more than conspiracy. That bias can change depending on the makeup of the committee, but pure impartiality never exists.
If I'm in that room, I'm biased for Kentucky. Im pointing, quite logically, to all the metrics that indicate that we are a 3 seed.
If you're in that room, you are saying, "Auburn. Tennessee. Punish us."
I don't believe the NCAA does this. I just don't agree at all
The don't even start the bracketing of teams until the entire seed list is completed.
Could they go back to the seed list and change things? Yeah sure I guess so.
Do they? No. I don't believe so.
So many policies and procedures it's hard for the committee to put teams in regions they want them to be in lol
ZERO conspiracy whatsoever.
The don't even start the bracketing of teams until the entire seed list is completed.
Could they go back to the seed list and change things? Yeah sure I guess so.
Do they? No. I don't believe so.
So many policies and procedures it's hard for the committee to put teams in regions they want them to be in lol
ZERO conspiracy whatsoever.
Fair? There's no fair. That went out in grade school. But on the other hand, its the most fair it can be. Almost nobody is excluded from the tournament or a chance to play into the tournament. It is a single elimination tournament. There is only one winner. Everybody else is a loser. To be the last one standing is simple. Just have to keep winning.
And you are right, there is no clause. But it happens. You know who doesn't care? The University of Kentucky. Money, money, money. That's what that tournament is about. Rough game, Basketball.
There is no conspiracy.
I've heard "regional match up" mentioned several times. They sure as hell don't make it a secret.
And I agree, you are biased. I have no problem with that. The thing is, neither of us will EVER be in that room. So the question becomes, are we trying to predict actual outcome or are we trying to discuss what you wish the outcome would be. If the latter, you have to check that bias at the door. What I hear you saying is "Pretend we're a 3" because you want to ignore everything that says otherwise. What I'm saying is, at this point, they'll likely consider us a 4 if I consider all the factors.
Hey, no problem if you like to pretend. I liked Harry Potter too.
You've got to stop. What I said was that I am biased for Kentucky, and I can LOGICALLY point to metrics that support my position. They aren't pretend. They do exist. We are 9th in RPI. We are 7th in Kenpom. We are 5-1 vs. RPI top 50.
If I, like you, were biased AGAINST Kentucky, I could focus on the Auburn and UT games and say those losses are SO BAD that we deserve to drop to a 4.
And it would be a drop. Because the most supported metrics say we are a 3.
No matter how much you blather on to the contrary.
Are we really close to being a 4? Sure. Absolutely. We are splitting hairs.
The people in that room are splitting hairs. They all have certain biases and advocate for particular teams according to that bias.
Just as I am LOGICALLY advocating for UK, and you are EMOTIONALLY advocating against them.
But, but, but those losses were SO BAD! Ignore the metrics...those losses should count double!
Yeah, so many policies and procedures that they can justify doing anything they want.
No one's going to convince me that the SC in 2014 didn't get near a potential UK/Wichita State matchup and say "($)oooooh!". I even think it effected UL that year, because they then saw a potential UL/Wichita State or UL/UK game. No one (and I mean no one) was predicting UK at 8, and no one was predicting UL at 4 that year. It's possible, even likely, that EVERYONE can be off on that type of thing, but it becomes suspicious when everyone's off and the NCAA ends up with a couple of potential huge profile, huge national interest games.
I agree that the SC doesn't go in with the idea of creating certain games. That's impossible, without it being blatantly transparent. I think they're opportunistic, though, and they'll adjust where they can for maximum attention.
And maybe kybassfan is right, and we have to accept it as part of the $$$$ culture of the NCAA, but I still don't see why I have to be happy about it.
With Kentucky currently a #7 Realtime RPI, #9 on Kenpom and #11 Sagarin RPI we would be #3 seed today. Some of the media today still go back to the Auburn loss and that still hurts us today even though we are playing way better since that loss. IF we continue to win these 2 games this week we should hit the Top 10 and be for sure a #3 seed and some will even have us moving up to #2 Seed eventually if we can win tonight and at A&M Saturday. Like Coach Cal has said over many times we have to continue to win and everything will take care of itself. If we can win out these 6 games and do extremely well in the SEC Tourney we should move to a #2 Seed in the South Region in Louisville. We do still have to get by with the 1st and 2nd Round games in the NCAA Tourney. I believe if we can end up as a 2 or 3 Seed we should be in the South Region and possibly the Sweet 16 and Elite 8 games in Louisville if we win in the 1st and 2nd round games. That would be the best for us to be in the South Region and possibly in Louisville. That would give us a big Advantage to get to another Final Four!
See that's just not true
http://bracketmatrix.com/matrix_2014.html
People WERE predicting UK an 8 seed. People WERE predicting UL a 4 seed. That link shows what people predicted right before the bracket came out. According to the people that do this, the SC had both DEAD ON
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