Bracketology: 3 Seed/East
After this weekend, ESPN has pushed Michigan up to a 3 in their latest version:
http://www.espn.com/mens-college-basketball/bracketology
Bracket Matrix has Michigan at a 4; however, I believe it is not updated to show what happened yesterday.
MSU is at 3, Ohio State has fallen to a 5.
IMO it is down to M vs. MSU for Detroit. I think Purdue gets Detroit and Xavier/Cincy get Nashville & Pittsburgh in order to put one of the Michigan teams in Detroit.
Cincinatti to Detroit (~263 miles)
Cincinatti to Nashville (~274 miles)
Cincinatti to Pittsburgh (~288 miles)
Apparently Penn State fell to Q2, but 6 Q1 wins is still double MSU's
Incorrect Reply has been Deleted
PSU fell to number 76. Immediately in front of them: Utah Valley, UNCG (whatever that is), and Charleston. We are rooting against them.
MSU is basically St. Marys
Except that Michigan would need to be a 2 seed to get Detroit. There are no 3 or 4 seeds in Detroit.
That's not how it works. The assignments between seeds and sites aren't set in advance. If you look at 5 different bracket projections, you'll see 5 different combinations of who plays where.
They start with the #1 overall seed and find the most convenient place for them, and then they work their way down from there. Michigan got Detroit in 2013 because two teams higher than them on the S-Curve, Indiana and Ohio State, got sent to Dayton. Since there's no other first-round site that close, Michigan is competing with far more teams for the Detroit site this year.
Thank you for clearing that up. I was under the impression that those were set. So really, the second grouping beyond the 1 seed can be any of the others - 2, 3, or 4?
I'm not sure I understand the question.
The way that it works is that the first round is divided into 16 "pods," two at each of the eight first-round sites. Each pod consists of a top 4-seed plus the teams that they would conceivably play that weekend. So, you get four 1-16-8-9 pods, four 2-15-7-10 pods, four 3-14-6-11 pods, and four 4-12-5-13 pods. Then, they start at the top of the S curve and find the best first-round location for each team. If Virginia is the #1 overall seed, they'll get placed first -- probably in Pittsburgh. Then, if Villanova is the #2 overall seed, they'll get placed next; probably also in Pittsburgh (although they're actually not that much further from Boston than they are from Pittsburgh). At that point, Pittsburgh is full. Now, suppose Ohio State were the third #1 seed (they're obviously not). At this point, Pittsburgh is their preferred location, but it's full, so they'd be sent to Detroit. It continues from there.
Those pods are structured into the regions in the usual way, so that each region will get a 1, 2, 3, and 4 pod. But the first-round sites may have no correlation to the region. For example, the West region is in Los Angeles. There aren't any top teams out west this year, so the fourth #1 seed -- let's say, Kansas -- will probably get slotted into LA. Then, it -- more or less -- follows the S curve; the fourth #1 seed gets the top #2 seed, the fourth #3 seed, and the top #4 seed. All of those go to Los Angeles, even though they may have started in for example, Wichita (Kansas), Charlotte (Duke), Nashville (Michigan), and Boise (Wichita State).
Hope this helps. :)
will host two teams that are "protected" i.e. 1-4.
They will try to get those 1-4 seeds as close to home as possible with the higher seeds getting favorable treatment in the event they can't get everyone close to home. That's it.
Since there are so many more Midwest and East coast teams projected to be protected seeds than there are spots in Pittsburgh, Charlotte, Detroit and Nashville, some of them are going to have to play far from home. But they're still "protected" in the sense that they're supposed to be closer than the other teams in their four team "pod".
For example, a possible scenario would have Michigan a 3 seed playing #14 College of Charleston in a "pod" with Miami as the 6 seed playing #11 Providence in San Diego. Since San Diego is closer to Michigan than any of those other schools, we'd be "protected."
Purdue should not get Detroit. Nashville is the same distance for them (it's marginally farther from campus, but it's closer to Indy where most PU alums are).
That's more detail than you can reasonably expect the committee to go into. Besides, this pod system is allegedly about the teams and the students more than the alumni.
The difference between Detroit and Nasvhille is about 70 miles or so according to Google Maps. That's an extra hour's drive in each direction and I don't believe the committee will consider it to be marginal.
There's a better chance they'd move Xavier or Cincinnati, since it's only about 10 miles further from Cincinnati to Nashville than it is to Detroit -- but that may depend upon who's already in the Nashville region too.
Maybe, but they do make exceptions for close distances. MSU and Michigan would sell far more Detroit tickets than Purdue would.
The other thing is that his regions make no sense. MSU is a 3 with UNC as their 2 (played regular season) and Michigan has UCLA as an 11 option. I think at this point it's too early for his regions to be trusted.
Don't they try to avoid regular season rematches until the Elite Eight?
They never tried to avoid rematches until the Elite 8. They'll tell you that they don't project out who's going to win, anyway.
They'll avoid first-round rematches. For conference opponents, they'll allow a second-round rematch for teams that have only played once (e.g, MSU and Purdue, if they were to decide MSU is a 7 seed... :), a Sweet 16 rematch for teams that only played twice (so Michigan could actually be the 3 seed in a region where MSU is a 2 seed), and an Elite 8 rematch for teams that played thrice (Michigan cannot be the 3 seed in a region where Purdue is a 2 seed).
These rules were tweaked a few years back in response to the growth of superconferences, because they were constantly having to move teams off of their true seed lines in order to honor the bracketing principles (it used to be, no conference teams could meet until the Elite 8 unless there were more than 8 teams from the same conference).
Most of the "experts" are now predicting a #3 seed for UM. As UM fans, what we really want are the first and second round games in Detroit.
UM is a bigger draw than MSU, will put more asses in the seats than Sparty, and has already proven it is a better team than Sparty. UM has earned its first and second round games in Detroit.
Were you at the game because that's not what I heard.
That is ABSOLUTELY false.
I was at the semifinals on Saturday. Yes, MSU did show up well, but they did not have more than us. I'd say it was 60/40 M, maybe 55-45. At worst, it was even. But the loudest moments were pro-Michigan ones. You also have to remember MSU fans, who were expecting to win the Big Ten all year/preseason, were more likely to plan trips in advance from outside NYC.
MSU expecting to win the BTT is a good point. However, M probably still outnumbers most fan bases in NYC (other than Rutgers, PSU and maybe Maryland).
LCA early this year was in favor of MSU fans by a wide margin (70/30 probably). They had the better game (oakland) and played later in the afternoon, but still.
Again, back then MSU fans were expecting a national championship season and we were a bubble team. Also they were against teams nobody cares about. Not a good litmus test.
In the 2013 tournament when we both played in Detroit, it was an even split for the first rounds of the NCAAs (was there).
Michigan has by far the most alumni in every East and West coast city compared to the traditional Big Ten schools.
Fair point, but I still expected more M fans to attend the game. Tickets were not expensive and it was a chance to check out the new arena. The game was also on a non-football Saturday before the holidays.
attends games in larger force within the state of Michigan. They are a basketball school and that's what they care most about.
I too was disappointed at the showing earlier at LCA, but as others have pointed out, we weren't the same team and didn't have the level of excitement we have now (and that's what's disappointing; we really only get strong support when we're playing really well), and it was the earlier game.
If we're both playing at LCA in two weeks, I expect the crowd to be fairly split down the middle (as it was in 2013, which I attended).
We would outdraw them in most other coastal cities (SF, LA, NYC, DC) thanks to having a larger number of alums in those cities.
If Michigan draws LCA and MSU is somewhere else, you'll see maybe 10-15% sparty fans.
I was also in the building on Saturday (and Sunday). I agree, about 60-40 M.
I was surprised, I expected 70-30 or even better. But I think you are right, they expected to at least get to the final game, so they likely planned in advance.
A friend of mine at the game also estimated 60-40 for Michigan.
I don't think it really matters anyway. The point of giving us Detroit is to reward us for our season performance. The NCAA knows that we'll fill up the place if we get the chance.
if either MSU or M is playing at LCA, they'll sell out. They won't need both teams to be there to fill the place (although the "other" Friday session might not sell out if it doesn't involve M or MSU, but that's only 1/3 of the games for the weekend).
They definitely made plans assuming they’d be playing Saturday and Sunday. Which was extremely satisfying.
Off topic, but all the sad looking fans in OSU gear was great too. They’d already made the trip so they just came to the game.
God, if we get a higher 3 seed than MSU, I will poop myself with happiness...
Pictures or it won't have happened
Careful what you wish for.
The love affair the media and selection crew has with Izzo makes me think they'll still have the higher seed.
I remember several years back, MSU got a 7th seed in the tourney despite 14 losses. Anyone else with that resume would have gone to the NIT. But it's Izzo....so whatever.
Wasn't that last year? Apparently, as a historian you have an extremely narrow focus... :-D
They also had 14 losses last year but no, they were a 9 seed.
They've gone to the tournment 3 times with 14 losses in recent memory. Decent seeding despite a crumby record but again....Izzo.
I agree. The one thing that gives me a tiny bit of hope is that the NCAA may want to hide MSU as much as possible this year because of all the vile things. Boise would be a good hiding spot.
But then I think wait, this is the NCAA, and I lose that tiny bit of hope.
Nothing worse for the NCAA than having MSU make the Final Four so the media can talk about...all that for a full week.
I don't think the committee is going to consider this, but NCAA has to be rooting for an early exit for them (as well as Louisville, Arizona, etc).
and as a Historian you should know better!
They've made the NCAA tournament twice with 14 losses. Ever. And it's probably sour grapes to complain about much their seeds in those seasons.
Last year they were 42nd in kenpom and got a 9. So fine, maybe a seed or two better than they should have been but they did win their first game easily. In 2011 they were also 42nd and got a 10 seed so just about right on there.
They never got a 7 seed with 14 losses.
Hollis no longer being there is going to manifest itself this year - no more msu seeding/home cooking bullshit. They're going to be sent to the region that's close to Kentucky and get knocked silly.
I remember Izzo and Sparty fans just complaining about their tough schedule that year. And then they got pounced by Nevada in the first round.
your khakis?
Sparty's going to be upset that we're seeded the same, they'll have flashbacks to the Outback Bowl selection process. Their schedule was weak, they only played 7 Quadrant 1 games and had a losing record. We won 6 of 11 such games.
forgot the 2 most important things - 82-72 and 75-64.
Only the most ignorant of Sparty fans (for details - see everyone on the RCMB) think Sparty deserves a higher seed after our two beatdowns of them on the road and neutral site...
and I think it make the most sense for them both to be 3 seeds but to give Michigan the spot in Detroit as the "higher" 3 seed.