Last Modified: 2019 July 24
Joe Schlobotnik / joe@amurgsval.org
URL for this frameset: http://elynah.com/tbrw/tbrw.cgi?1998/pairwise.980322.shtml
This is what I predicted the night before the selection; follow this link to see what was actually done.
We've come to the end, folks. After 758 games between eligible Division I teams, the NCAA regular season has come to an end, and it's time for the NCAA selection committee to apply the selection procedure and seed the national tournament field of twelve. Using the final results from the Division I Composite Schedule on US College Hockey Online, we can calculate the pairwise comparisons among the various teams under consideration and predict how they might carry out this process. (For reference, compare the pairwise rankings and Ratings Percentage Index pages on USCHO) Here are the results of the pairwise comparisons:
Team PWR RPI Comparisons Won
1 Mich State 18 .621 NDBUMiBCOSCkWiNHCCYaPnNESCMDNMMeMmRP
2 North Dakota 17 .616 __ BUMiBCOSCkWiNHCCYaPnNESCMDNMMeMmRP
3 Boston Univ 16 .595 ____ MiBCOSCkWiNHCCYaPnNESCMDNMMeMmRP
4 Michigan 15 .583 ______ BCOSCkWiNHCCYaPnNESCMDNMMeMmRP
5 Boston Coll 14 .581 ________ OSCkWiNHCCYaPnNESCMDNMMeMmRP
6 Ohio State 13 .565 __________ CkWiNHCCYaPnNESCMDNMMeMmRP
7 Clarkson 11 .570 ____________ WiNHCCYaPnNESC__NMMeMmRP
8 Wisconsin 11 .560 ______________ NHCCYaPnNESCMDNMMeMmRP
9 New Hampshire 10 .559 ________________ CCYaPnNESCMDNMMeMmRP
10 CO College 9 .548 __________________ YaPnNESCMDNMMeMmRP
11 Yale 8 .543 ____________________ PnNESCMDNMMeMmRP
12 Princeton 7 .518 ______________________ NESCMDNMMeMmRP
13 Northeastern 5 .519 ________________________ SCMD__MeMmRP
14 St Cloud 5 .535 __________________________ MDNMMeMmRP
15 Minn-Duluth 4 .514 ____________Ck______________ NM__MmRP
16 Northern Mich 4 .528 ________________________NE____ MeMmRP
17 Maine 3 .527 ____________________________MD__ MmRP
18 Miami 1 .515 __________________________________ RP
19 RPI 0 .498 ____________________________________
First of all, there are 7 automatic bids to the tournament: Boston University, Yale, Michigan State and North Dakota are in for winning the regular season tournaments in their conferences. In addition, Wisconsin, Princeton and Boston College are in for winning their conference tournaments. (Michigan State won both the tournament and regular season championships in the CCHA.) The remaining five automatic bids are given out on the basis of the pairwise comparisons among teams. Here are the teams in the running for the five at-large bids:
Team lPWR RPI Comparisons Won
1 Michigan 11 .583 OSCkNHCCNESCMDNMMeMmRP
2 Ohio State 10 .565 CkNHCCNESCMDNMMeMmRP
3 Clarkson 8 .570 __ NHCCNESC__NMMeMmRP
4 New Hampshire 8 .559 ____ CCNESCMDNMMeMmRP
5 CO College 7 .548 ______ NESCMDNMMeMmRP
6 NorthEastern 5 .519 ________ SCMD__MeMmRP
7 St Cloud 5 .535 __________ MDNMMeMmRP
8 Minn-Duluth 4 .514 __Ck________ NM__MmRP
9 Northern Mich 4 .528 ________NE____ MeMmRP
10 Maine 3 .527 ____________MD__ MmRP
11 Miami 1 .515 __________________ RP
12 RPI 0 .498 ____________________
With the exception of the Clarkson/UMD comparison, the top five teams beat all the others, so it's easy to see they make the tourney. Here, then, are the qualifying teams (which happen to be the top twelve in the PWR):
West East
1 Mich State 5 .621 NDMiOSWiCC | 1 Boston Univ 5 .595 BCCkNHYaPn
2 North Dakota 4 .616 MiOSWiCC | 2 Boston Coll 4 .581 CkNHYaPn
3 Michigan 3 .583 __ OSWiCC | 3 Clarkson 3 .570 __ NHYaPn
4 Ohio State 2 .565 ____ WiCC | 4 New Hampshire 2 .559 ____ YaPn
5 Wisconsin 1 .560 ______ CC | 5 Yale 1 .543 ______ Pn
6 CO College 0 .548 ________ | 6 Princeton 0 .518 ________
Michigan State automatically receives a first-round bye in the regionals for winning both the CCHA regular season title and the CCHA tournament. The pairwise comparisons also tell us to give BU, BC and North Dakota byes. Going by the numbers, we should swap Yale and Princeton with Wisconsin and Colorado College. However, the NCAA wants to avoid regionals games between teams in the same conference. With three teams from each conference in the tournament, the way to prevent early intraconference games is to ship one team from each conference to the other region. Thus we need to ship out one CCHA team instead of a WCHA team; since Michigan is the host school and MSU guaranteed a bye, it must be Ohio State. Wisconsin wins the pairwise comparison with CC, and would be a bigger draw in the regionals in Ann Arbor, so they're the obvious choice to stay West. In the East, UNH is the lowest-ranked Hockey East team (the other two earned byes) so they should go West, presumably along with Princeton. This leaves a population in the regionals of:
West East
1 Mich State (C) 1 .621 ND | 1 Boston Univ (H) 1 .595 BC
2 North Dakota (W) 0 .616 | 2 Boston Coll (H) 0 .581
3 Michigan (C) 3 .583 WiNHPn | 3 Ohio State (C) 3 .565 CkCCYa
4 Wisconsin (W) 2 .560 NHPn | 4 Clarkson (E) 2 .570 CCYa
5 New Hampshire (H) 1 .559 __ Pn | 5 CO College (W) 1 .548 __ Ya
6 Princeton (E) 0 .518 ____ | 6 Yale (E) 0 .543 ____
The natural seedings in both regionals give no intraconference games in the first two rounds, so we are led painlessly to the following brackets:
5W New Hampshire (H) 6E Yale (E)
4W Wisconsin (W) 3E Ohio State (C)
1W Mich State (C) --+--2E Boston Coll (H)
|
2W North Dakota (W) --+--1E Boston Univ (H)
3W Michigan (C) 4E Clarkson (E)
6W Princeton (E) 5E CO College (W)
I think we can expect those to be the brackets with a fair degree of confidence, assuming the NCAA places as much emphasis on avoiding intraconference matchups as we think they do. We'll know in a few hours, at any rate.
Want to see a rundown of the reasons for these comparisons? Here it is, in all its 94k glory