D1 Men NCAA Tournament

[wgdsr]

you guys should read the q&a from the committee chair last friday in the balto sun.
been on the committee for several years, tells him the drill...
rpi is gonna drive everything (even though is not a criterion!!!) in making groupings of teams, then they'll use other stuff...
gonna be done by saturday night basically, the game on sunday (actually more, but guess he doesn't think can affect the rpi that they're using to separate teams with minute rpi differences... "hey, denver didn't play lehigh"... i guess the ivy game won't change rpi & measurables either... gotta get done early) will then give them a chance to work/double check what's left of their brackets so they can head home early.

also admits it's different stuff every year.

i'd be stunned if i wasn't completely not surprised.
my head hurts.

[ICGrad]

Ha! I had forgotten that one. Wgdsr put it the same way---they're making it up as they go.

And again: Coach's bonuses and six figure jobs are on the line. I have no clue why they all accept this nonsense.

But it's even worse than that. While undeserving Hopkins teams get invited year after year, almost without regard to how terrible their record is, teams like Rutgers in 2016 (who had a significantly better record than Hopkins and beat them twice) are left out. Kids who work their asses off and do everything they need to do to get an at-large berth are denied year after year as the criteria shift and slide to ensure Hopkins and their ilk get in.

[CU77]

Coach's bonuses and six figure jobs are on the line. I have no clue why they all accept this nonsense.

I think it's because they don't know what, exactly, to ask for.

The ones at schools with hockey ought to go out for a beer with the hockey coach. They might learn something interesting.

[Fanlax999]

Ha! I had forgotten that one. Wgdsr put it the same way---they're making it up as they go.

And again: Coach's bonuses and six figure jobs are on the line. I have no clue why they all accept this nonsense.

But it's even worse than that. While undeserving Hopkins teams get invited year after year, almost without regard to how terrible their record is, teams like Rutgers in 2016 (who had a significantly better record than Hopkins and beat them twice) are left out. Kids who work their asses off and do everything they need to do to get an at-large berth are denied year after year as the criteria shift and slide to ensure Hopkins and their ilk get in.

you never go really wrong picking hopkins to go vs, say, rutgers on any given year. ......you gotta figure hopkins was gonna get some love with those 2 big wins vs maryland. and the ot thriller vs psu, even with their lousy, stinkn record. rutgers a couple of years ago got major screwed and looked a whole lot better. but you can't go wrong with picking hopkins to play.....they should just expand the gd field if you ask me to 24. save everyone the dam headache.

[Seahawk]

Expand to 20, then have bottom 8 play on Wed 13v20, etc, then winners play top four seeds based on seeding, 1vlowest seeded winner. Only problem is that last four in may be usual suspects ie name programs not a High Point or second or third place team in a smaller conference.

[HooDat]

Contract to conference champions ONLY.

If the ACC wants in, they better find a 6th team pronto. You want to not shoot yourself in the head - give the ACC 3 years to find a 6th.

A tournament that includes ONLY conference champions and NO at large bids - is the purest form of post season tournament. It will be quite humorous to see how quickly conferences get rid of their tournaments, or at least make their regular season champion the one who gets the AQ.

The NC$$ won't go there because there's no money in those games, at least not in their minds. To the committee you MUST have Cuse and JHU in post season play. They also have a very strong preference for UMD, Duke and ND to be there. Everyone else is pretty expendable....

[Catbird]

Ha! I had forgotten that one. Wgdsr put it the same way---they're making it up as they go.

And again: Coach's bonuses and six figure jobs are on the line. I have no clue why they all accept this nonsense.

But it's even worse than that. While undeserving Hopkins teams get invited year after year, almost without regard to how terrible their record is, teams like Rutgers in 2016 (who had a significantly better record than Hopkins and beat them twice) are left out. Kids who work their asses off and do everything they need to do to get an at-large berth are denied year after year as the criteria shift and slide to ensure Hopkins and their ilk get in.

Yes Rutgers had a magnificent season in 2016 with their 5 losses (compared to Hop's 6), including to Stony Brook, a bad Princeton team, and a sub-500 OSU team. Indeed they beat Hopkins twice, once with the Jays head coach in the Hospital, and couldn't get more than 2 Top 20 RPI wins thanks to the non-conference schedule they set up. Indeed they had it all in front of them if they just wouldn't have crapped the bed at home on senior day against OSU. I guess winning even 1 of those 3 bad losses wasn't on the list they made of things they needed to do to get into the tournament, an unfortunate oversight. A season for the ages they had.

[reLAX]

Ha! I had forgotten that one. Wgdsr put it the same way---they're making it up as they go.

And again: Coach's bonuses and six figure jobs are on the line. I have no clue why they all accept this nonsense.

But it's even worse than that. While undeserving Hopkins teams get invited year after year, almost without regard to how terrible their record is, teams like Rutgers in 2016 (who had a significantly better record than Hopkins and beat them twice) are left out. Kids who work their asses off and do everything they need to do to get an at-large berth are denied year after year as the criteria shift and slide to ensure Hopkins and their ilk get in.

you never go really wrong picking hopkins to go vs, say, rutgers on any given year. ......you gotta figure hopkins was gonna get some love with those 2 big wins vs maryland. and the ot thriller vs psu, even with their lousy, stinkn record. rutgers a couple of years ago got major screwed and looked a whole lot better. but you can't go wrong with picking hopkins to play.....they should just expand the gd field if you ask me to 24. save everyone the dam headache.

.


Or maybe just have Hopkins have to abide by the same selection criteria as everyone else.... just a thought. I guess I can’t wrap my head around the fact that their losses are seen as more valuable than other people’s wins. Regardless of the momentum they seem to have found at the end of the season. If indeed all the wins are, in my naive understanding, equally weighted. I suppose it was in their favor to the end their season on that high note. The Early season wins of others Seem like a faint distant memory. I understand this is driven by ticket sales in part, this drama certainly will spark more Interest for the tourney. I just wish everyone’s comments re teams that may not have had strong finishes wouod not be so disparaging. Competition is great, cocky arrogance, not so much. I wish all the teams the best going forward. Certainly I have my wishes who makes the final four, but good sportsmanship going forward.

[Catbird]

Hop missed the NCAAs in 2013 at 9-5 with a better team (probably the last time the team had a consistently "good" defense) than they had in 2016 or 2017 or 2019 when they made it with 6+ losses against a tougher schedule. Even beat #1 Maryland but no other wins were worth anything. That team didn't have the quality wins or SOS thanks to alot of "standard" teams on the schedule having a down year.

Would seem to disagree with your assertion.

[DALaxDad]

Why not have a 64 team tournament that starts the first weekend in May. The first three rounds are played at the site of the higher seed (seeding based solely on RPI of top 10 games with no team included in top 10 more than once). The first three rounds are played Saturday, Wednesday and Saturday (or Sunday, Thursday, Sunday). Then a week off for the quarterfinals played at designated sites as they are now. Then, Memorial Day weekend games as they are now.

[admin]

D1 MEN: The D1 Men National Championship Tournament starts tonight at 7 PM EST when UMBC faces Marist. You can follow the game live and join the discussion within the Live Game Reports forum.

[calourie]

[quote=Fanlax999

you never go really wrong picking hopkins to go vs, say, rutgers on any given year. ......you gotta figure hopkins was gonna get some love with those 2 big wins vs maryland. and the ot thriller vs psu, even with their lousy, stinkn record. rutgers a couple of years ago got major screwed and looked a whole lot better. but you can't go wrong with picking hopkins to play.....they should just expand the gd field if you ask me to 24. save everyone the dam headache.
[/quote]

I agree with CU77 that we need an agreed upon numbers' crunching system such as hockey's pairwise that would determine the 17 participants in the D! lacrosse tourney as well as their seeding. Such a system needs to obviously be fair while being blind to conference affiliation and legacy. Until then we will be left litigating the grievances of whoever the first two or three bubble out teams are as well as moaning about the various seeding choices ad infinitum which for me ends up being as nauseum, and as we can see in this thread obviously distracts from discussing directly the tournament's upcoming games and possibilities. Interestingly enough unless or until such a system gets instituted CU77 says he is favors a 10 team tournament including only conference champions as opposed to the 24 team proposal being made above. I myself think a 16 team system, even with a playoff game or two, provided the playoff participants are also fairly determined, is the proper size for the current number of D1 teams.

[QuakerSouth]

I'd like to see 2 things.

1) Implement a hard-and-fast formula for bids. Its beyond me to know what that formula is, so I'll leave that to the more well informed. But there needs to be a set of selection criteria THAT EVERYONE KNOWS going into the season, that can be distilled down to a mathematical formula. Tweak it over time as needed, but within 10yrs we'd have something that would pretty accurately identify and select the "best" teams that most would agree with.

2) Get rid of the AQs. Period. I know its all nice and feel good for the small conference winners to "be a part of it." But why? With all due respect, do we all really think UMBC, Marist, etc have a real shot to win a national championship? What right do they have to "be a part of it" if they are not worthy of being part of it?

And perhaps that should be addressed as well. Its called a national championship, but thats clearly NOT what it is. Its a politically correct invitational, with the winner being called the national champion. With 70-odd teams, we don't really need any more teams in the tourney. Just the best ones. There was a great deal of discussion this year about the last couple ALs. Always is. But without the AQs, the "deserving" teams get their shot. Does anybody really believe that Cornell wouldn't have a reasonable shot at making a run over some of the AQs that made the cut?

"Inclusion" is a ruse. Lets include the best teams that have a legitimate shot. The players on Marist and UMBC, et al, can say they made the tourney...and its at the expense of players who have a legitimate shot. How "fair" is that? If those teams are really any good, the mathematical formula would include them. We have potential T winners and AAs sitting on the sidelines watching this thing. And its not because they "didn't get it done" during the regular season. They certainly got it done. There just isn't room right now because of a broken selection system.

There are 16 teams out there that have a legitimate shot to win this thing. Those are easy to identify. Unfortunately, the political correctness won't allow a real national championship to take place.

And the argument about the inability to schedule the "big boys" to be recognized as legitimate is a smokescreen. Every team has to start somewhere. You build relationships, schedules, rivalries over time. How did High Point get those top teams on their schedule?

In a 16-17 team field, there is no way you can get the "best" teams in with all the AQs. Half a dozen well-informed guys on this forum could sit around a table and come up with a better format than the NCAA has...in a Saturday afternoon.

[laxreference]

I used the same simulator that I built for the Bracketology stuff to run through 10,000 simulations of the NCAA tournament. I'll keep this page updated as the games start to happen, but the idea is to show the chances that each team advances to the various rounds and ultimately wins the title.

Interesting factoid: UMBC won the title exactly 1 time in 10,000 simulations.

[Wheels]

I'd like to see 2 things.

1) Implement a hard-and-fast formula for bids. Its beyond me to know what that formula is, so I'll leave that to the more well informed. But there needs to be a set of selection criteria THAT EVERYONE KNOWS going into the season, that can be distilled down to a mathematical formula. Tweak it over time as needed, but within 10yrs we'd have something that would pretty accurately identify and select the "best" teams that most would agree with.

2) Get rid of the AQs. Period. I know its all nice and feel good for the small conference winners to "be a part of it." But why? With all due respect, do we all really think UMBC, Marist, etc have a real shot to win a national championship? What right do they have to "be a part of it" if they are not worthy of being part of it?

And perhaps that should be addressed as well. Its called a national championship, but thats clearly NOT what it is. Its a politically correct invitational, with the winner being called the national champion. With 70-odd teams, we don't really need any more teams in the tourney. Just the best ones. There was a great deal of discussion this year about the last couple ALs. Always is. But without the AQs, the "deserving" teams get their shot. Does anybody really believe that Cornell wouldn't have a reasonable shot at making a run over some of the AQs that made the cut?

"Inclusion" is a ruse. Lets include the best teams that have a legitimate shot. The players on Marist and UMBC, et al, can say they made the tourney...and its at the expense of players who have a legitimate shot. How "fair" is that? If those teams are really any good, the mathematical formula would include them. We have potential T winners and AAs sitting on the sidelines watching this thing. And its not because they "didn't get it done" during the regular season. They certainly got it done. There just isn't room right now because of a broken selection system.

There are 16 teams out there that have a legitimate shot to win this thing. Those are easy to identify. Unfortunately, the political correctness won't allow a real national championship to take place.

And the argument about the inability to schedule the "big boys" to be recognized as legitimate is a smokescreen. Every team has to start somewhere. You build relationships, schedules, rivalries over time. How did High Point get those top teams on their schedule?

In a 16-17 team field, there is no way you can get the "best" teams in with all the AQs. Half a dozen well-informed guys on this forum could sit around a table and come up with a better format than the NCAA has...in a Saturday afternoon.

For as much as I love a good "PC" debate, might you consider a different perspective?

The NCAA isn't some amorphous organization. The NCAA represents its member institutions. Not the athletic departments but the academic institutions. Who runs those institutions? College/university presidents. Why would college presidents be happy with the AQ/AL system at 17 teams right now? Certainly it isn't because that system maximizes $$. As many have pointed out, the tournament would make more money (via more eyeballs, more butts in seats) if the 16 best teams made the tournament. And remember, (most of) that money goes back to the member institutions. So in some ways, the member institutions knowingly accept less money for more access ("participation trophies" as you call it). Why would they do this? I'm sure there's a perfect Game Theory application to answer this question, but I'd answer the "why" like this: each institution operates in a different environment, and athletics is one of the many things that helps a specific university meet its goals. In a sport like lacrosse with only 12.6 scholarships, lacrosse is actually part of an enrollment management strategy for many schools, which is why the sport is growing at college level. 45-50 kids on fractional scholarships means that lacrosse makes money not for the athletic department but for the academic institution via tuition, room & board, and fees. Think of the demographic that lacrosse disproportionately serves right now. Lots of families that can afford college and don't need full scholarships to do so.

The AQ system isn't a reward to Little Johnny for all of the work he's done. It's an indicator to the institution that their investment has paid off and will continue to pay off in the future (i.e., recruiting students for enrollment not players for lacrosse). Drop the AQ system and how many new programs will be added? If the sport contracts at the college level, what happens to the value of the TV rights? Perhaps the college presidents see that growing the sport to gain exposure and increase the value of TV contracts in the long run means that the system might disadvantage a blue-blood program from time to time in the short run, which, at a place like Denver, Villanova or Loyola (big state schools or well endowed privates aren't as enrollment sensitive), still means that they get the enrollment/tuition stabilizer.

From that perspective, maybe college presidents having their cake and eating it, too, no?

[CU77]

Why not have a 64 team tournament that starts the first weekend in May.

How about a 72 team tournament that starts in February with (like the World Cup) round-robin group play? We could call the groups "conferences". Conference winners and an equal number of other teams, selected by mathematical formula (because who would trust a committee of individuals associated with particular teams to make the selection?), advance to the knock-out stage.

[Chousnake]

Ha! I had forgotten that one. Wgdsr put it the same way---they're making it up as they go.

And again: Coach's bonuses and six figure jobs are on the line. I have no clue why they all accept this nonsense.

But it's even worse than that. While undeserving Hopkins teams get invited year after year, almost without regard to how terrible their record is, teams like Rutgers in 2016 (who had a significantly better record than Hopkins and beat them twice) are left out. Kids who work their asses off and do everything they need to do to get an at-large berth are denied year after year as the criteria shift and slide to ensure Hopkins and their ilk get in.

Yes Rutgers had a magnificent season in 2016 with their 5 losses (compared to Hop's 6), including to Stony Brook, a bad Princeton team, and a sub-500 OSU team. Indeed they beat Hopkins twice, once with the Jays head coach in the Hospital, and couldn't get more than 2 Top 20 RPI wins thanks to the non-conference schedule they set up. Indeed they had it all in front of them if they just wouldn't have crapped the bed at home on senior day against OSU. I guess winning even 1 of those 3 bad losses wasn't on the list they made of things they needed to do to get into the tournament, an unfortunate oversight. A season for the ages they had.

Do you realize how absurd that argument is? Does anything tell more about comparing one team to another than what happens on the field in an actual lacrosse game? Games are played for a reason! Why play this tournament? Let's just use some formula to decide who is the better of the teams in all match ups and declare a winner based on RPI and SOS!

Rutgers beating JHU twice provides rock solid indisputable evidence that they were the better team. What Rutgers did against OSU means diddly compared to beating JHU twice. Head to head should be the first criteria used for deciding bids among and between relatively equal teams. Any other measure is BS statistics. The selection system is both flawed and rigged to give bids to the ACC/B10 teams.

I asked this earlier. When did Hopkins ever not receive a bid unfairly or when were they ever underseeded? I believe the answer is never. Prove me wrong. Hopkins finishes above .500, they get a bid (and in recent years, get blown out). Hopkins goes 10-4 and they get a good seed and a favorable draw. I can count 5-6 times Cornell has been screwed over the years and the Ivies get the short straw virtually every year. Hopkins and the ACC teams receive bids for losing games to highly ranked teams.
Refute this argument with facts if you disagree.

[Catbird]

Hop missed the NCAAs in 2013 at 9-5 with a better team (probably the last time the team had a consistently "good" defense) than they had in 2016 or 2017 or 2019 when they made it with 6+ losses against a tougher schedule. Even beat #1 Maryland but no other wins were worth anything. That team didn't have the quality wins or SOS thanks to alot of "standard" teams on the schedule having a down year.

Would seem to disagree with your assertion.

For the record I was have a very good memory of laxpower having posted there for years under a different name and there was next to no crying from Jays fans when we were left to go golfing that season.

[Catbird]

Do you realize how absurd that argument is? Does anything tell more about comparing one team to another than what happens on the field in an actual lacrosse game? Games are played for a reason! Why play this tournament? Let's just use some formula to decide who is the better of the teams in all match ups and declare a winner based on RPI and SOS!

So what you're really saying is Stony Brook should have gotten in. Or maybe Marist. Or Hartford.

Rutgers beating JHU twice provides rock solid indisputable evidence that they were the better team. What Rutgers did against OSU means diddly compared to beating JHU twice. Head to head should be the first criteria used for deciding bids among and between relatively equal teams. Any other measure is BS statistics. The selection system is both flawed and rigged to give bids to the ACC/B10 teams.

So why aren't you complaining about the Terps?

I asked this earlier. When did Hopkins ever not receive a bid unfairly or when were they ever underseeded? I believe the answer is never. Prove me wrong. Hopkins finishes above .500, they get a bid (and in recent years, get blown out). Hopkins goes 10-4 and they get a good seed and a favorable draw. I can count 5-6 times Cornell has been screwed over the years and the Ivies get the short straw virtually every year. Hopkins and the ACC teams receive bids for losing games to highly ranked teams.
Refute this argument with facts if you disagree.

Provided above.

A 4 loss Hopkins team last made the tournament as an at large in 2014 as an unseeded team that had to travel to UVA in the first round and then play Duke (the Myles Jones Jordan Wolff version) in the quarterfinals. Quite the overseeding. 2018 version won the Big 10, got a home game against one of the better AQ teams (Gtown) and by the numbers were underseed and had to play Duke again.

2015, 2018 they played their own way in by winning the conference. Before that you are talking about the first decade of the 2000s where the bubble teams were not nearly as contentious.

[HopFan16]

Does anything tell more about comparing one team to another than what happens on the field in an actual lacrosse game? Games are played for a reason!

Rutgers beating JHU twice provides rock solid indisputable evidence that they were the better team.

If you believe this is true then why are you complaining about Hopkins getting in and not Maryland?