2021 NCAA Tournament

[AreaLax]

Patrick Stevens interview Towson athletic director Tim Leonard, the chair of the NCAA men’s lacrosse committee


EVERYTHING IS FLEXIBLE AT THIS POINT' WHEN IT COMES TO THE NCAA TOURNAMENT

[jrn19]

“It’s going to be really hard to use the same tools that we always use because people aren’t going to be playing as many games,” Leonard said. “A lot of teams aren’t going to play the schedule they would normally play, so are we going to have good evaluative data at our fingertips? How much of the eye test is going to come into play? This year, I would say probably more than most. But we’ll see. We know those are going to be things that we’re really going to have to discuss.”

Very interesting. If eye test is going to come into play and be a factor; will be fascinating to see how they weigh that compared to RPI and SOS as usual

[wgdsr]

surprised a towson guy would go there, especially this early. maybe he's trying to move up in gigs.
a shame.

[jrn19]

surprised a towson guy would go there, especially this early. maybe he's trying to move up in gigs.
a shame.

?

A sitting AD is always the head of the tournament committee.

[bearlaxfan]

Eyeball test??!! How many games can the individual committee members commit to seeing given their other duties? What sources; full tv/streaming games? Highlight vids? Other sources? The rpi/sos- based decisions are pretty plug-and-play up to the margins, assuming they have been honest in the past about minimal 'eyeball' judgements. Think the choices will still be overwhelmingly rpi/sos, just based on the mechanics of giving every potential tourney team sufficient views.

[wgdsr]

surprised a towson guy would go there, especially this early. maybe he's trying to move up in gigs.
a shame.

?

A sitting AD is always the head of the tournament committee.

by go there, i meant he would publicly declare that they're likely to throw out all past ways of selecting teams for the tournament. and then just say we're going to select based on who looks good.

[wgdsr]

Eyeball test??!! How many games can the individual committee members commit to seeing given their other duties? What sources; full tv/streaming games? Highlight vids? Other sources? The rpi/sos- based decisions are pretty plug-and-play up to the margins, assuming they have been honest in the past about minimal 'eyeball' judgements. Think the choices will still be overwhelmingly rpi/sos, just based on the mechanics of giving every potential tourney team sufficient views.

it's ridiculous. your last point runs counter to what he just said. goodbye, mid-majors.

[wgdsr]

https://www.ncaa.com/news/lacrosse-men/ ... ected-mens

several juicy quotes.
"we are not allowed to have an eye test. that's the only way that we can keep it from becoming subjective".

those days seem so long ago.

[jhu08]

Eyeball test??!! How many games can the individual committee members commit to seeing given their other duties? What sources; full tv/streaming games? Highlight vids? Other sources? The rpi/sos- based decisions are pretty plug-and-play up to the margins, assuming they have been honest in the past about minimal 'eyeball' judgements. Think the choices will still be overwhelmingly rpi/sos, just based on the mechanics of giving every potential tourney team sufficient views.

it's ridiculous. your last point runs counter to what he just said. goodbye, mid-majors.

If the 3rd place Big Ten team gets in at 6-5 (give or take), the NCAA Lacrosse Committee has made their intentions crystal clear: It's all about money and name brands and the number of eyeballs on the product. Actual on the field results be damned, we're gonna put in who we want anyway. Anyone defending them is either deluded or pushing an agenda. You could argue that it's always been this way, but never so blatant as what Mr Towson is suggesting in the article.

There's absolutely no metric that they can use to justify that choice given how SOS and RPI are going to sort themselves out this year.

[xxxxxxx]

Eyeball test??!! How many games can the individual committee members commit to seeing given their other duties? What sources; full tv/streaming games? Highlight vids? Other sources? The rpi/sos- based decisions are pretty plug-and-play up to the margins, assuming they have been honest in the past about minimal 'eyeball' judgements. Think the choices will still be overwhelmingly rpi/sos, just based on the mechanics of giving every potential tourney team sufficient views.

it's ridiculous. your last point runs counter to what he just said. goodbye, mid-majors.

If the 3rd place Big Ten team gets in at 6-5 (give or take), the NCAA Lacrosse Committee has made their intentions crystal clear: It's all about money and name brands and the number of eyeballs on the product. Actual on the field results be damned, we're gonna put in who we want anyway. Anyone defending them is either deluded or pushing an agenda. You could argue that it's always been this way, but never so blatant as what Mr Towson is suggesting in the article.

There's absolutely no metric that they can use to justify that choice given how SOS and RPI are going to sort themselves out this year.

I agree 100% they are basically saying we will put in who we feel is best for our agneda, translation "we will go with marquee names and big schools" It looks like the ACC will deserve to have all their teams invited and should. Big Ten will be a different story someone will get in with a 500 record or slightly better. If you are in the Big East you better win it unless you are Denver or Georgetown, who looks deserving regardless. The rest of the conferences you will need to win, except maybe Partiot which could send two teams.

[jrn19]

surprised a towson guy would go there, especially this early. maybe he's trying to move up in gigs.
a shame.

?

A sitting AD is always the head of the tournament committee.

by go there, i meant he would publicly declare that they're likely to throw out all past ways of selecting teams for the tournament. and then just say we're going to select based on who looks good.

I mean, the preseason favorite in his conference is going to play a conference only schedule. The Big East is going to play largely a conference only schedule. Same with Big Ten. MAAC I think as well; some AE teams are 90% conference only.

When the metrics and data you usually use are rendered less useful and relevant because of the conditions of the season; you have to include and look at other data points.

[jhu08]

I mean, the preseason favorite in his conference is going to play a conference only schedule. The Big East is going to play largely a conference only schedule. Same with Big Ten. MAAC I think as well; some AE teams are 90% conference only.

When the metrics and data you usually use are rendered less useful and relevant because of the conditions of the season; you have to include and look at other data points.

UMass still has one non-conference game (Albany) on the schedule as of right now. Not much, but it's something. Some of the other CAA teams have enough non-conference games to draw some point of comparison with the other conferences at least.

Those other data points being? Sure, I agree that RPI and SOS are going to be less meaningful than what they normally are, but I struggle to see an objective alternative. ("This team looks good" is not a data point)

[jrn19]

Eyeball test??!! How many games can the individual committee members commit to seeing given their other duties? What sources; full tv/streaming games? Highlight vids? Other sources? The rpi/sos- based decisions are pretty plug-and-play up to the margins, assuming they have been honest in the past about minimal 'eyeball' judgements. Think the choices will still be overwhelmingly rpi/sos, just based on the mechanics of giving every potential tourney team sufficient views.

it's ridiculous. your last point runs counter to what he just said. goodbye, mid-majors.

The CAA has one team in UMass playing essentially a conference only schedule. One team in Drexel playing 1 non con game against Lafayette. Fairfield is playing 8 conf games to 3 non con

The MAAC is playing a conference only schedule

The America East has Hartford playing a conference only schedule. Binghamton playing a conference only schedule. UMBC playing only one non con game.

VMI in the SoCon if they ever play will be playing conference only

These are all mid majors who have utterly no shot with RPI or SOS because they’re only playing teams in their own conference or 80-90% of their schedule is conference only. They will have zero chance to get in as an at large on those grounds. So how are we saying goodbye mid majors by giving these teams another way of evaluating?

[jrn19]

I mean, the preseason favorite in his conference is going to play a conference only schedule. The Big East is going to play largely a conference only schedule. Same with Big Ten. MAAC I think as well; some AE teams are 90% conference only.

When the metrics and data you usually use are rendered less useful and relevant because of the conditions of the season; you have to include and look at other data points.

UMass still has one non-conference game (Albany) on the schedule as of right now. Not much, but it's something. Some of the other CAA teams have enough non-conference games to draw some point of comparison with the other conferences at least.

Those other data points being? Sure, I agree that RPI and SOS are going to be less meaningful than what they normally are, but I struggle to see an objective alternative. ("This team looks good" is not a data point)

RPI and SOS aren’t data points either. RPI is literally freaking just taking your win percentage and an opponents win percentage and throwing it together with SOS thrown in there too. It tells you quite literally nothing about the quality of a team. SOS doesn’t tell you about the quality of a team either; just who you played. You can lose to all those teams and still have a high SOS

RPI and SOS are not anywhere close to actual ways to evaluate teams and are no better than the eye test. The committee has just used them for a long time so people have Stockholm syndrome with them like they actually tell you anything

[wgdsr]

I mean, the preseason favorite in his conference is going to play a conference only schedule. The Big East is going to play largely a conference only schedule. Same with Big Ten. MAAC I think as well; some AE teams are 90% conference only.

When the metrics and data you usually use are rendered less useful and relevant because of the conditions of the season; you have to include and look at other data points.

UMass still has one non-conference game (Albany) on the schedule as of right now. Not much, but it's something. Some of the other CAA teams have enough non-conference games to draw some point of comparison with the other conferences at least.

Those other data points being? Sure, I agree that RPI and SOS are going to be less meaningful than what they normally are, but I struggle to see an objective alternative. ("This team looks good" is not a data point)

RPI and SOS aren’t data points either. RPI is literally freaking just taking your win percentage and an opponents win percentage and throwing it together with SOS thrown in there too. It tells you quite literally nothing about the quality of a team. SOS doesn’t tell you about the quality of a team either; just who you played. You can lose to all those teams and still have a high SOS

RPI and SOS are not anywhere close to actual ways to evaluate teams and are no better than the eye test. The committee has just used them for a long time so people have Stockholm syndrome with them like they actually tell you anything

they are the epitome of data points. sos hasn't been used for years. it's baked into rpi, but the at larges have been chosen on straight rpi for the last 2 or 3 tournaments. the actual criteria actually used wins and losses against that rpi as well as sos and other criteria. but that got tossed out the window.

that worked all fine and dandy for the p5 when it fit the agenda. now... not so much.

getting cake and eating it, too. must be nice.

[jhu08]

RPI and SOS aren’t data points either. RPI is literally freaking just taking your win percentage and an opponents win percentage and throwing it together with SOS thrown in there too. It tells you quite literally nothing about the quality of a team. SOS doesn’t tell you about the quality of a team either; just who you played. You can lose to all those teams and still have a high SOS

RPI and SOS are not anywhere close to actual ways to evaluate teams and are no better than the eye test. The committee has just used them for a long time so people have Stockholm syndrome with them like they actually tell you anything

What in the world. RPI and SOS are literally derived from the simplest data points there are - 1s (wins) and 0s (losses). Your argument is the equivalent that they aren't is they equivalent of saying that speed can't be used as a data point because it's derived from distance over time. Next thing I know, you're going to be arguing that LEOs should use the eye test when writing speeding tickets because they have no other valuable data points to go on.

If the committee is primarily using RPI to choose at larges, I might not like what they come up with - not at all sometimes - but at least if I so choose, I can pull out my pencil, paper, and calculator and reproduce and verify the numbers they are getting and see why they made the choices that they did. How is "we think 6-5 OSU/PSU/JHU/(pick your team of choice) deserves to be in, trust us " an improvement?

[jrn19]

RPI and SOS aren’t data points either. RPI is literally freaking just taking your win percentage and an opponents win percentage and throwing it together with SOS thrown in there too. It tells you quite literally nothing about the quality of a team. SOS doesn’t tell you about the quality of a team either; just who you played. You can lose to all those teams and still have a high SOS

RPI and SOS are not anywhere close to actual ways to evaluate teams and are no better than the eye test. The committee has just used them for a long time so people have Stockholm syndrome with them like they actually tell you anything

What in the world. RPI and SOS are literally derived from the simplest data points there are - 1s (wins) and 0s (losses). Your argument is the equivalent that they aren't is they equivalent of saying that speed can't be used as a data point because it's derived from distance over time. Next thing I know, you're going to be arguing that LEOs should use the eye test when writing speeding tickets because they have no other valuable data points to go on.

If the committee is primarily using RPI to choose at larges, I might not like what they come up with - not at all sometimes - but at least if I so choose, I can pull out my pencil, paper, and calculator and reproduce and verify the numbers they are getting and see why they made the choices that they did. How is "we think 6-5 OSU/PSU/JHU/(pick your team of choice) deserves to be in, trust us " an improvement?

I never said it’s an improvement; I said it’s an additional tool to use considering the tools they usually use are not going to be nearly as effective this year; for not just Big Ten teams like everyone on here seems to be mad about but ALSO for mid-majors as well. 4-5 conferences are playing schedules that render RPI irrelevant

[DU-fan]

Current RPI and SOS ranking on laxbytes:
http://www.laxbytes.com/OUTPUT/SERVER/men/rating01.php

It is too early for RPI and I doubt it will ever be very helpful this year.

Current RPI: http://www.laxbytes.com/OUTPUT/SERVER/men/rpi01.php
Maryland is currently ranked 29th because Michigan and PSU are both 0-2.

[Boxster54]

I could see the old ACC as the final four this year: Duke, UVA, UNC and MD. Much would depend on the seeding but it would make an awesome final four in Hartford this May. Ratings extravaganza!

[Henpecked]

Current RPI and SOS ranking on laxbytes:
http://www.laxbytes.com/OUTPUT/SERVER/men/rating01.php

It is too early for RPI and I doubt it will ever be very helpful this year.

Current RPI: http://www.laxbytes.com/OUTPUT/SERVER/men/rpi01.php
Maryland is currently ranked 29th because Michigan and PSU are both 0-2.

RPI is garbage.