1/24 Bracketology

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#129      

Illini2010-11

Sugar Grove
And yet we’re still projected to provide the most teams to the dance. Weird
The B1G lacks the number of top tier teams, but the depth of the league is super strong.

We will still get 8-10 teams in the tourney. A true down year for the B1G as a whole was 2017-2018 where the conference only had 4 bids to the NCAA tourney (Michigan lost in champ game). That season was very top heavy for the league.

This year may lack a B1G making final four, but there could easily be five to six teams being capable of making S16.
 
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#131      
Can some explain to me how Net rankings are calculated. O$U is ahead of us and doesn’t really have a great win on their resume. Meanwhile you have Wisky who is 69th and they at least beat Marquette. When people talk about who in the Big Ten is a tournament team Wisky is above O$U yet the Net rankings are 40 places apart. I think Wisky is about where they should be being a low seed
 
#132      

danielb927

Orange Krush Class of 2013
Rochester, MN
Can some explain to me how Net rankings are calculated. O$U is ahead of us and doesn’t really have a great win on their resume. Meanwhile you have Wisky who is 69th and they at least beat Marquette. When people talk about who in the Big Ten is a tournament team Wisky is above O$U yet the Net rankings are 40 places apart. I think Wisky is about where they should be being a low seed

OSU's losses are all close and their wins are big. Margin of victory is a factor in NET.
 
#133      
Can some explain to me how Net rankings are calculated. O$U is ahead of us and doesn’t really have a great win on their resume. Meanwhile you have Wisky who is 69th and they at least beat Marquette. When people talk about who in the Big Ten is a tournament team Wisky is above O$U yet the Net rankings are 40 places apart. I think Wisky is about where they should be being a low seed

Serious answer: doubtful. It's got a number of components with analytics in it. I think all the folks who use it know it's crude, but is a decent starting point for the committee. When it comes time for seeding, they'll look at teams in detail. The bracketmatrix is probably the only tool you need --it's very reliable, updated frequently, and only a couple experts beat it each year. They currently have the following BIG (seeds), which aligns more with what you're saying. (Today's win over Wiscy not included)

1 Purdue
5 Rutgers
6 Indiana
7 Illinois
7 MSU
9 Iowa
10 Northwestern
10 Wiscy
11 Maryland
Bubble teams:
tOSU
Penn State
 
#135      
WRT regular season vs tourney..

Do you want to be the best player in your neighborhood or the best player in your town?

The best player at your school or the best in your county?

The best in your county or the best in your state?

The best in your state or the best in your country?

The best in your country or the best in your world?

The best in your world or.... nevermind.


The whole, "The tournament is random luck" narrative was invented by people who struggle to hold themselves (or their team) accountable.

We'll get a Natty one day. No reason to down play its importance just because we don't have one... yet.
 
#137      
Serious answer: doubtful. It's got a number of components with analytics in it. I think all the folks who use it know it's crude, but is a decent starting point for the committee. When it comes time for seeding, they'll look at teams in detail. The bracketmatrix is probably the only tool you need --it's very reliable, updated frequently, and only a couple experts beat it each year. They currently have the following BIG (seeds), which aligns more with what you're saying. (Today's win over Wiscy not included)

1 Purdue
5 Rutgers
6 Indiana
7 Illinois
7 MSU
9 Iowa
10 Northwestern
10 Wiscy
11 Maryland
Bubble teams:
tOSU
Penn State
I think O$U is an interesting outlier to assess if it a useful tool. The NET is what determines quad wins. They don’t have a great win, lost a lot recently, have a bad lost against Minnesota. Their NET ranking makes sense based on margin of victories/loses. I also understand NET is not meant to seed teams but it determines what a good win is

I think it is a better tool than the old RPI which has is 68 O$U is 100

 
#138      
I think O$U is an interesting outlier to assess if it a useful tool. The NET is what determines quad wins. They don’t have a great win, lost a lot recently, have a bad lost against Minnesota. Their NET ranking makes sense based on margin of victories/loses. I also understand NET is not meant to seed teams but it determines what a good win is

I think it is a better tool than the old RPI which has is 68 O$U is 100

star wars GIF
 
#139      

Illini2010-11

Sugar Grove
The B1G lacks the number of top tier teams, but the depth of the league is super strong.

We will still get 8-10 teams in the tourney. A true down year for the B1G as a whole was 2017-2018 where the conference only had 4 bids to the NCAA tourney (Michigan lost in champ game). That season was very top heavy for the league.

This year may lack a B1G making final four, but there could easily be five to six teams being capable of making S16.
Looking at how the B1G performed in non-conference this year (before beating up on each other), the conference did fairly well, which helps explain how the conference is still considered top 2/3 in nation. There were a few bad losses for sure, but a number of notable wins (I may have missed a few):

Illini - UCLA, TX
IU - Xavier, NC (when they were still ranked)
Iowa - Iowa St -> Also had laughably bad loss to EIU
MD - Miami
MSU - KY (#4 at time)
Mich - BAD -> CMU loss among others that are fitting for that program
MN - BAD
Neb - Creighton (ranked 7 at time)
NW - Soft schedule (won all but 2 games) -> lost by 1 to Auburn, blown out vs Pitt
OSU - TX Tech (did not age well though)
PSU - Soft schedule -> Lost close games to VA Tech and 2OT to Clemson
PUR - Gonzaga, Duke, Marquette
RUT - Lost all top tier non-conf games -> doing damage during B1G schedule
WISC - USC, Marquette -> Lost by 1 to Kansas in OT

We can talk about how the conference lacks top punch compared to prior years (outside of Purdue), but the league is fairly deep (even Nebraska has a big non-conference win). I think the parity of the conference this year is making the league look real down, when in actuality it is just deeper than typical. I remember many years the last decade where we would circle about 5-6 teams in the B1G season where a loss would look bad for the resume. This year, only MN and Neb stand out in that category. That speaks volumes to the current depth of the conference.

Ultimately, performance in the tourney in March will tell a lot about the true strength of B1G. I see at least 5 teams that are a serious threat to make the S16:

Illini, IU, MSU, Purdue, and Rutgers; a couple others could make it to S16 based on bracket, etc.
 
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#141      
This just isn't true, and I'm not sure why you're being resistant when presented with real data. Metrically, the conference is top 2 or 3. Purdue is a top team and the depth of the conference is fantastic. This is all a result of how the conference performed, as a whole, in non-conference play. KenPom, NET, Bartovik all paint the same picture. The Big 12 is running away with "best conference" metrics, then the SEC and Big Ten are right there with each other with the Big Ten slightly edging it out. The ACC and Pac-12 are both "power" conferences, why wouldn't they be compared with them? You're just using a deep conference as opposed to a more top heavy one to automatically mean bad. That's just silly and flawed. No offense, but I think you're drinking the opposite of koolaid.
You're completely wrong. All the conferences like the Big East and WCC are stepping it up. We are stepping backwards. The metrics prove me right. our conference is far behind what we have been. if you call the Pac 12 a power 5 for basketball then that shows your understanding. the ACC as well. The Big 10 is terrible compared to recent years. That is just a flat out truth. Anybody that can't see that is blind or hasn't watched our conference in recent years. We have always had depth and ranked teams. Now we have one ranked team and a bunch of bubble teams. Its clear as day, no point in me debating with people that are in outer space.
 
#142      
You're completely wrong. All the conferences like the Big East and WCC are stepping it up. We are stepping backwards. The metrics prove me right. our conference is far behind what we have been. if you call the Pac 12 a power 5 for basketball then that shows your understanding. the ACC as well. The Big 10 is terrible compared to recent years. That is just a flat out truth. Anybody that can't see that is blind or hasn't watched our conference in recent years. We have always had depth and ranked teams. Now we have one ranked team and a bunch of bubble teams. Its clear as day, no point in me debating with people that are in outer space.
Big East? They haven’t played well against the BIG this year…. Look at the results.

Xavier is in 1st place. Lost to their only BIG opponent

Marquette 2nd in Big East. Lost both games they played against BIG opponents.

Providence is 3rd. No BIG match ups.

Creighton 4th place lost their only game against a BIG team… Nebraska!!!??

Seton Hall 5th place. Lost to IOWA and won a squeaker against Rutgers.

Are you telling me that the BE is better than the BIG? Evidence doesn’t bear this out.

I’m not even going to justify your WCC comment with a response. 😂
 
#144      
The WCC?

KenPom wise, St. Mary's is 7th in KenPom, Gonzaga is 17th. Those are legit teams.

After that? BYU is 80th, Loyola Marymount is 86th, Santa Clara is 92nd, San Francisco is 104th. You really think these middle of the pack WCC teams would be able to hang in the Big Ten? 12/14 Big Ten teams are considerably higher than all those teams.

Not to mention the bottom of the league. Portland is 172nd, Pepperdine is 183rd, San Diego is 195th and Pacific is 209th. Even Nebraska is much better than all those teams. They'd get absolutely destroyed. With only Minnesota (KP #188) being around the level of those squads.

I'm sorry, but you're in a complete fantasy land if you think the WCC is up to par with the Big Ten.
 
#145      
The WCC?

KenPom wise, St. Mary's is 7th in KenPom, Gonzaga is 17th. Those are legit teams.

After that? BYU is 80th, Loyola Marymount is 86th, Santa Clara is 92nd, San Francisco is 104th. You really think these middle of the pack WCC teams would be able to hang in the Big Ten? 12/14 Big Ten teams are considerably higher than all those teams.

Not to mention the bottom of the league. Portland is 172nd, Pepperdine is 183rd, San Diego is 195th and Pacific is 209th. Even Nebraska is much better than all those teams. They'd get absolutely destroyed. With only Minnesota (KP #188) being around the level of those squads.

I'm sorry, but you're in a complete fantasy land if you think the WCC is up to par with the Big Ten.
All great points. Let’s be honest…Minnesota would be top 100 net and Ken Pom if they played in the WCC.
 
#146      
I think O$U is an interesting outlier to assess if it a useful tool. The NET is what determines quad wins. They don’t have a great win, lost a lot recently, have a bad lost against Minnesota. Their NET ranking makes sense based on margin of victories/loses. I also understand NET is not meant to seed teams but it determines what a good win is

I used to follow the selection/seeding really closely because I thought the committee had it's share of misses, and I could get pretty close myself. When I disagreed, I'd have an informed argument. But over the last 5 or so years, the amount of data the committee deals with makes it very difficult for the them to screw it up. There's way more consensus on the modeling that allows for comparisons of teams. It'll never be perfect, and there are some oddball cases of teams where they don't have a lot of good wins, and it matters a lot how good those wins are perceived to be. The committee used to try and weight late season performance, conference championships, and other things more heavily that have (rightly IMO) fallen out of favor. That said, I think the committee does a good job 99% of the time and the complaints are often unjustified. Bracketmatrix is such a good tool for viewing the consensus that I rarely find it interesting to generate my own seeding.
 
#147      
I used to follow the selection/seeding really closely because I thought the committee had it's share of misses, and I could get pretty close myself. When I disagreed, I'd have an informed argument. But over the last 5 or so years, the amount of data the committee deals with makes it very difficult for the them to screw it up. There's way more consensus on the modeling that allows for comparisons of teams. It'll never be perfect, and there are some oddball cases of teams where they don't have a lot of good wins, and it matters a lot how good those wins are perceived to be. The committee used to try and weight late season performance, conference championships, and other things more heavily that have (rightly IMO) fallen out of favor. That said, I think the committee does a good job 99% of the time and the complaints are often unjustified. Bracketmatrix is such a good tool for viewing the consensus that I rarely find it interesting to generate my own seeding.
There’s also so many seeding rules an average fan doesn’t follow that dictate the bracket and teams even slightly changing their seed. Two years ago was a perfect example of all the big ten top 4 seeds impacted the entire bracketing.
 
#149      

Illini2010-11

Sugar Grove
KenPom is based on net rating adjusted for strength of schedule so Minnesota's rating would not get a big bump by playing in the WCC since it already accounts for strength of schedule
I think State of Chicago's point is that Minnesota would likely be top 4 in the league if they played in the WCC vs 14th place in the B1G. If that is the case, then Minnesota would definitely be hovering around the 100 level or slightly better.

The WCC is by definition, what a top heavy league looks like (but at least it is two teams now compared to just Gonzaga at the top).
 
#150      
I think State of Chicago's point is that Minnesota would likely be top 4 in the league if they played in the WCC vs 14th place in the B1G. If that is the case, then Minnesota would definitely be hovering around the 100 level or slightly better.

The WCC is by definition, what a top heavy league looks like (but at least it is two teams now compared to just Gonzaga at the top).
Wins and losses do not factor into KenPom, so yes they would have more wins in the WCC and be higher in their conference standings but their strength of schedule adjusted net rating would not really change.
 
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