Week of 1/6 Bracketology

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#4      
Illwinsagain
#6      
Bigtex
Illwinsagain said:
Pardon my ignorance, what does WAB stand for in the categories? I am sure if I took a while, I could figure it out, but thought that it would be easier to ask.
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Had to look it up

The NET Rankings have a new metric this season called WAB — Wins Above Bubble. It's used to evaluate how many more wins a team has compared to what an NCAA Tournament "bubble" team would be expected to have against the same schedule, using the NET Rankings as the basis for opponent strength.
 
#8      
Illwinsagain
Bigtex said:
Had to look it up

The NET Rankings have a new metric this season called WAB — Wins Above Bubble. It's used to evaluate how many more wins a team has compared to what an NCAA Tournament "bubble" team would be expected to have against the same schedule, using the NET Rankings as the basis for opponent strength.
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Thank you, seems a bit overkill, but OK.
 
#11      
Illini2010-11
I know that Washington is currently a Quad 2 win, but if the Washington team that played last week shows up the rest of the season, it is not inconceivable to see that win sneak in as a low Quad 1 win.

Nevertheless, it is still crazy to see half of the games show up in the Quad 1 bucket at this point in the season. The Illini are in really good shape right now, and that is ridiculously impressive given the roster turnover from the Elite 8 squad.
 
#12      
SkyysNotFalling
Massive week for us for positioning.
A week from now our resume could look like this:
Quad 1: 4-3
Quad 2: 2-0
Quad 3: 1-0
Quad 4: 5-0

Quad 1 wins are great, but these quad 2 games are the difference between playing for a 1 seed, or getting a 4/5 game. Let’s take care of business fellas.

& 5-1 in the league where with our road wins solidifies us as a favorite.
 
#14      
the juiceman cometh
Illini 993 said:
Duh, yeah I know that. Merely expressing my frustration with their formula. But, thanx anyway.
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Why though? That was a horribly inefficient performance, both offensively and defensively, against a weak opponent (#91 NET, #88 Kenpom). For the same reasons we benefitted bigly from blowing out Oregon, we suffer from a lackluster win against a weaker opponent. Efficiency metrics giveth, and efficiency metrics taketh away.
 
#15      
Piotyr
the juiceman cometh said:
Why though? That was a horribly inefficient performance, both offensively and defensively, against a weak opponent (#91 NET, #88 Kenpom). For the same reasons we benefitted bigly from blowing out Oregon, we suffer from a lackluster win against a weaker opponent. Efficiency metrics giveth, and efficiency metrics taketh away.
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Also, they didn't really drop, other teams passed them with good performances (Houston, Iowa St. Gonzaga) while Florida dropped with their loss.
 
#16      
Piotyr
KenPom facts:

- Typically, if a team has a 30 or higher adjusted efficiency margin, they're good enough to be the #1 team overall. As of right now, 5 teams are above that threshold, which is nutty.
- Illinois' current adjusted efficiency margin is 25.66, which is the 3rd best for any Illinois team in the KP era ('05 was 32.68, '21 was 29.06), and they're higher than last year's team finished up.
 
#17      
Fighter of the Nightman
Illwinsagain said:
A lot of 5, 6 and 7's from prior to Oregon win on that list.
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Yep, I was going to guess that there is simply a lag factor. Nobody looks at our resume right now and is thinking anything below a #3 seed without some serious bias. Even our AP ranking (which would hypothetically correspond to the best #4 seed) is arguably just on a lag factor to those who had us very clearly under-ranked compared to our actual resume from a NET perspective.

Speaking of NET rankings, Wisconsin moved back into the top 30, giving us another Quad 1 win. Mizzou also actually moved up to #44, making our Braggin' Rights victory a bit less shaky as Quad 1 (for a neutral court, that means a top 50 opponent). Rutgers remains the most frustrating to me at #84 ... I would really like them to sneak into the top 75 by the end of the year so our trip to the RAC vs. a very talented but young Scarlet Knights team is Quad 1.
 
#19      
Fighter of the Nightman
the juiceman cometh said:
Why though? That was a horribly inefficient performance, both offensively and defensively, against a weak opponent (#91 NET, #88 Kenpom). For the same reasons we benefitted bigly from blowing out Oregon, we suffer from a lackluster win against a weaker opponent. Efficiency metrics giveth, and efficiency metrics taketh away.
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I get what you are saying, but I also understand where he is coming from. If the formula is too weighted toward efficiency metrics at the expense of wins and losses (and I am not saying it is, BTW), I think we risk missing the forest for the trees. It is very difficult to gauge teams that seem to "know how to win" on their off days, and yet that is worth QUITE a lot when March Madness rolls around. Given that the NET Rankings are used to guide the NCAAT seeding process, I can see a pretty good argument that ideally shouldn't drop a team any spots for a Quad 2 road win. Obviously there are other factors like what other teams around us did and just how far the formula drops Washington for the home loss (which then affects us in a somewhat circular way, lol), but I am mostly just playing devil's advocate here.

We should also all remember that the NET Rankings are a guide, but a committee of human beings is still creating the NCAAT bracket ... and I think the committee still, to the extent possible, does try to reward teams for wins away from home. After all, that is where the Tournament will be played. This is why I love that we get Braggin' Rights each year and why I am such a proponent of getting the United Center game back on the schedule (which we are thankfully doing starting next year). It gives our guys a minimum of two high-profile games in NCAA Tournament-like arenas, while also getting to play in front of friendly crowds (rather than, say, a random neutral site game in the Bay Area in front of 5,000 fans).
 
#20      
Illini2010-11
Fighter of the Nightman said:
I get what you are saying, but I also understand where he is coming from. If the formula is too weighted toward efficiency metrics at the expense of wins and losses (and I am not saying it is, BTW), I think we risk missing the forest for the trees. It is very difficult to gauge teams that seem to "know how to win" on their off days, and yet that is worth QUITE a lot when March Madness rolls around. Given that the NET Rankings are used to guide the NCAAT seeding process, I can see a pretty good argument that ideally shouldn't drop a team any spots for a Quad 2 road win. Obviously there are other factors like what other teams around us did and just how far the formula drops Washington for the home loss (which then affects us in a somewhat circular way, lol), but I am mostly just playing devil's advocate here.

We should also all remember that the NET Rankings are a guide, but a committee of human beings is still creating the NCAAT bracket ... and I think the committee still, to the extent possible, does try to reward teams for wins away from home. After all, that is where the Tournament will be played. This is why I love that we get Braggin' Rights each year and why I am such a proponent of getting the United Center game back on the schedule (which we are thankfully doing starting next year). It gives our guys a minimum of two high-profile games in NCAA Tournament-like arenas, while also getting to play in front of friendly crowds (rather than, say, a random neutral site game in the Bay Area in front of 5,000 fans).
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The committee spends a good deal of time focusing on quad records. For that reason, road and neutral site games are generally valued more (road games vs top 75 NET are quad 1, neutral games vs top top 50 are quad 1, and home games vs top 30 are quad 1). However, who you play also matters greatly. I would take a scheduled home and home vs the likes of Tennessee any day of the week over the neutral site "home and home" like we have scheduled with Alabama. If you are scheduling home and homes with teams like Tennessee or Alabama regularly, regardless of where the game is played, it will likely be quad 1. I personally like the idea of rewarding season ticket holders with marquis non-conference games, as opposed to making them shell out more money for a game at the United Center (but that is just me).
 
#21      
Fighter of the Nightman
Illini2010-11 said:
The committee spends a good deal of time focusing on quad records. For that reason, road and neutral site games are generally valued more (road games vs top 75 NET are quad 1, neutral games vs top top 50 are quad 1, and home games vs top 30 are quad 1). However, who you play also matters greatly. I would take a scheduled home and home vs the likes of Tennessee any day of the week over the neutral site "home and home" like we have scheduled with Alabama. If you are scheduling home and homes with teams like Tennessee or Alabama regularly, regardless of where the game is played, it will likely be quad 1. I personally like the idea of rewarding season ticket holders with marquis non-conference games, as opposed to making them shell out more money for a game at the United Center (but that is just me).
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I mean, we clearly saw value in the United Center game for literal decades before we got our first tiny crowds ever there in the Groce years. I think it's obviously beneficial to our program to play regularly in Chicago, and it's even more of a no-brainer over Christmas Break with students gone. Now that we would draw well there once again (our average all-time attendance in our UC games is higher than the capacity of SFC), I think it's obvious why we are bringing it back. As you will see, the vast majority of major programs are playing games in their main media markets and recruiting hotbeds. It's at LEAST as important for us as most programs.

This is obviously a matter of opinion, but I don't think we should act like it would be some unique attack on our season ticket holders that programs everywhere are not doing. We have over a quarter of a million alumni in the Chicago MSA and many more non-alumn fans; playing a home game there around Christmas isn't too much to ask.
 
#22      
Fighter of the Nightman
^ On the neutral court note, I'll just limit this to the Big Ten and SEC ("Power Two") to save time, but the following teams have all moved home games to the following locations in the last couple of seasons. I'm not counting tournaments or events that a school was "invited" to (e.g., Maryland playing Syracuse in Brooklyn was very clearly Syracuse just finding an opponent for that game). Whether it is to try to play in a recruiting hotbed, to try to reward a fan base by playing in their backyard or to try to court potential fans in an "expansion" market of sorts like South Dakota below, clearly programs think this is important. And I agree with them.

BIG TEN
Indiana: Indianapolis, IN
Iowa: Moline, IL and Sioux Falls, SD
Maryland: N/A
Michigan: Detroit, MI
Michigan State: Detroit, MI
Nebraska: Sioux Falls, SD
Northwestern: N/A
Ohio State: Cleveland, OH
Oregon: Portland, OR
Penn State: Philadelphia, PA
Purdue: Indianapolis, IN
Rutgers: New York, NY and Newark, NJ
UCLA: Inglewood, CA
USC: San Diego, CA
Washington: Seattle, WA (downtown and not on campus)
Wisconsin: N/A

SEC
Alabama: Birmingham, AL
Arkansas: Little Rock, AR
Auburn: Birmingham, AL and Atlanta, GA
Florida: Jacksonville, FL and Sunrise, FL (Miami suburbs)
Georgia: Atlanta, GA
Kentucky: N/A
LSU: N/A
Mississippi State: Jackson, MS, Tupelo, MS and Southaven, MS (Memphis suburbs)
Missouri: Kansas City, MO
Oklahoma: Oklahoma City, OK and Tulsa, OK
Ole Miss: Biloxi, MS and Southaven, MS (Memphis suburbs)
South Carolina:
Tennessee: Nashville, TN
Texas: Dallas, TX and Houston, TX
Texas A&M: Houston, TX
Vanderbilt: N/A

Some others I came across while looking these teams up was Arizona hosting UCLA in Phoenix, Syracuse hosting Maryland in Brooklyn, Wake Forest hosting Michigan in Greensboro, North Carolina hosting Michigan in Charlotte, Stanford hosting Oregon in San Jose, and Baylor hosting Arkansas in Dallas.

So again, I TOTALLY understand the argument in favor of the season ticket holders, but the fact is programs are doing this. And I think that is because they think it is important/beneficial, and I agree with them. Hell, Illinois is likely even more reliant on our major metros than many of these other schools. On that list of 34 Power Two teams, we are actually only 1 of 4 that has not done this in the last couple years ... and we are fixing that next year, so the ratio will now be 31 out of 34 or over 91%.

TL;DR

I think it is very important for us to get the United Center game back on the schedule over Christmas Break. Season ticket holders got by for two decades with this arrangement, and I think it will be fine once again; they should get a discounted ticket or something like that. Let's remember that once upon a time the irreplaceable atmosphere of Braggin' Rights was "giving up a home game" every other year. I also don't think this means we have to give up key home games with the way Brad is scheduling!
 
#23      
Illini2010-11
Fighter of the Nightman said:
I mean, we clearly saw value in the United Center game for literal decades before we got our first tiny crowds ever there in the Groce years. I think it's obviously beneficial to our program to play regularly in Chicago, and it's even more of a no-brainer over Christmas Break with students gone. Now that we would draw well there once again (our average all-time attendance in our UC games is higher than the capacity of SFC), I think it's obvious why we are bringing it back. As you will see, the vast majority of major programs are playing games in their main media markets and recruiting hotbeds. It's at LEAST as important for us as most programs.

This is obviously a matter of opinion, but I don't think we should act like it would be some unique attack on our season ticket holders that programs everywhere are not doing. We have over a quarter of a million alumni in the Chicago MSA and many more non-alumn fans; playing a home game there around Christmas isn't too much to ask.
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I want to be clear, I have absolutely no problem with the United Center game (I actually like it being a Chicago area alumn). The problem is that the game has not always been played over the student break schedule over the years. There were a substantial number of years where the game took place in early December while class was still in session. I am going to venture that the Alabama game next year will also be while class is in session (there is really only room for one non-conference game outside of Mizzou during winter break and it is hard to schedule the UC with Hawks and Bulls involved). My primary point was that the top tier non-conference "home" games (call it tier 1 A games) should be held at SFC with a raucous student section involved (which will still be a quad 1 opportunity). That is why I like the arrangement with Tennessee much more than Bama. We can easily fill a different team in the UC slot that is not a top tier game but still has a great opportunity at being a quad 1 game (or quad 2 at worst).

As a note, the Illini are actually only playing 17 true home games this year, down from the traditional 18-19 home games (plus exhibition). This is due to the increased number of neutral court games scheduled (Bama, Arkansas, Mizzou, Duke). Without the Tennessee game on the schedule, the non-conference home schedule is very meh. There really is the need to keep at least one home power non-conference game on the schedule, especially if the team is going to sacrifice the number of home games played for more neutral court games. That is why I loved the arrangement with Tennessee so much (it was a great opportunity for the team in both years and we got a true home game against the #1 team in the country).
 
#24      
skyIdub
Fighter of the Nightman said:
BIG TEN

Iowa: Moline, IL and Sioux Falls, SD
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#25      
Fighter of the Nightman
Illini2010-11 said:
I want to be clear, I have absolutely no problem with the United Center game (I actually like it being a Chicago area alumn). The problem is that the game has not always been played over the student break schedule over the years. There were a substantial number of years where the game took place in early December while class was still in session. I am going to venture that the Alabama game next year will also be while class is in session (there is really only room for one non-conference game outside of Mizzou during winter break and it is hard to schedule the UC with Hawks and Bulls involved). My primary point was that the top tier non-conference "home" games (call it tier 1 A games) should be held at SFC with a raucous student section involved (which will still be a quad 1 opportunity)...
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I think this is all entirely fair, and I think we might run into a headache with scheduling on "off years" or whatever. However, using next year's return Alabama game as a potential example but using this year's dates/template, it could look something like below. I tried to highlight any changes to the setup, and I have to wonder if Duke in February should have "normally" been before the New Year? That will be our 11th non-conference game, and it looks every other Big Ten school had 11 non-conference games before January 1st.

Monday 11/4 - vs. Eastern Illinois
Friday 11/8 - vs. SIU Edwardsville
Wednesday 11/13 - vs. Oakland
Wednesday 11/20 - at Florida in Gainesville. This is a replacement for Alabama in Birmingham, and the return game next year would be our "marquee home game" that Tennessee was this year. I just picked a good SEC program.
Saturday 11/23 -vs. Maryland Eastern Shore
Monday 11/25 - vs. Little Rock
Thursday 11/28 - vs. Kentucky in Indianapolis. ANY big-name opponent at ANY location works here, but the exposure we got on Thanksgiving for the Arkansas game was invaluable ... most watched regular season game since 2008!! I also think this could be the backup weekend/day for the United Center game if scheduling over New Year's is too difficult.
---> Tuesday 12/3 - vs. Arizona in Champaign. This is effectively the Duke game at MSG moved into the normal non-conference schedule in our biggest gap. The opponent doesn't matter, but the idea is that this would then be our return away game in the following season when we get Florida in Champaign. Thus, we always have a marquee home game.
Friday 12/6 - [Early Big Ten game]
Tuesday 10/10 - [Early Big Ten game]
Saturday 12/14 - vs. Chicago State. Some cupcake, basically. This was the Tennessee weekend this year, but Chicago State was on 12/29.
Sunday 12/22 - vs. Missouri in St. Louis
Sunday 12/29 - vs. Alabama at United Center. The Bulls played at home on Saturday 12/28 this year, so if they had a Sunday game, we'd play on the Saturday (ideally) instead.

I agree that there should always ideally be the following:

1. Marquee home game vs. Power Five opponent.
2. At least 7 of the 11 non-conference games at home.
3. Games in our most important markets - Chicago (the UC game) and St. Louis (Braggin' Rights).
4. This one is more of a "wish list" item than a requirement, but ideally a marquee Thanksgiving Day matchup. That exposure was just soooooo great.

1. I think #1 is very achievable by staggering home-and-home series. We are a desirable name program once again, and we will be a "big draw" for any program to host that will excite their fans in the return year (see Tennessee last year).
2. The second one is more difficult, but we will at least always have 6 and maybe some years where we have 8+. I'll leave that to the scheduling experts!
3. Braggin' Rights (thankfully) is ironclad for a while, and the UC game is coming back next year. I think by FAR the biggest challenge with these (and I readily admit this) is balancing a big name opponent in Champaign and having an opponent at the UC that is a "draw." It will definitely take some smart scheduling to stagger the return games for the UC with other series to ensure that we get it to work each year. Worst case, you make the UC an every-other-year thing.
4. I am not sure how much we control this, but we should move heaven and earth to be in this event any time we can! As said above, it would be AWESOME to have a big-time Thanksgiving Day game at the United Center in years where the Bears aren't playing the Lions.

skyIdub said:
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Haha, it is definitely funny from a "size of market" perspective. However, I think it is a cool idea for a state flagship school to play games in every corner of the state. I am not that knowledgeable about all of the old school arenas around the state of Illinois, but I think it would be really cool for the Illini to either play one cupcake game or even an early season exhibition game in a cool and SMALL arena (so we would sell it out) in an era of the state where our fan support isn't as strong as in Central Illinois in an effort to shore up those areas. Maybe Rockford, extreme Southern Illinois, the Quad Cities, etc. This would not have to be an every year thing, but doing something like that every 3-4 years might be a cool way to "give up" a not very desirable home game and serve as both a gesture to Illini fans in those areas and an effort to get kids in those areas to grow up accustomed to the Illini as "their team."
 
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