yup... but this will just piss them off. I wouldn't want to face a normal Gonzaga, let alone a pissed off Gonzaga.
Easy to see how Maryland got a #1 seed...the head of the committee is the AD for NC State, an ACC school and the team that beat Maryland in the conference tournament.
Oh my god!!! OU got a #2 seed! What the hell do we have to do?? We won the Big 12 tournament, we beat Kansas, the #1 team in the country. Hell, we've beaten the top two teams in the country! We were ranked 4 in the country before today and now that we beat Kansas they want us to believe we're actually no better than 5?! You know what? **** the ncaa selection commitee. They can all go to hell. Man, and the **** they did to Gonzaga?! The team goes 27-3 and gets a #6 seed? They were ranked frickin' number 8 in the whole damn nation. Gonzaga got the same f*ckin seed as Texas, who wasn't even in the top 25! This is such bullsh*t! (Yeah I know I just copied and pasted from the other thread. But that's how pissed off I am )
exactly. I guess it doesnt really matter if we're 1 or 2, Cincy will lose in the first 2 rounds anyway..... Also, we beat a #2 seed(UConn), 2 #1s(KU, MU) UT, Mizzou, OSU, TTU, Michigan State..... I can't even say how mad I am right now I will be sending some emails to the selection committee if i can get their email addys......
the west is BRUTAL. OU and the ZAGS were screwed. but can you imagine an Arizona-Gonzaga 2nd round matchup? Wow....don't know what else to say. Also kinda funny how lower seeds got huge home court advantages over higher seeds. (See #6 Texas, if they advance, and #11 S. Illinois vs. Texas Tech in round 1.)
ROTFLMFAO!! No offense, duke, I know that you are an OU homer, but I highly doubt that Cincy is going to lose to BU or UCLA/Ole Miss. Ohio State if they can get to the Sweet 16 should be a good game, but I like the Bearcats' chances despite their past struggles in the Tournament. Why get upset over this?? If you feel that OU is better than Cincy, then why does it matter that they are seeded #1 and OU is seeded #2?? Both teams are in the same f*cking region!! It's not like that Cincy gets an automatic 10 points added to their score when they play OU (if it plays out that way). Now, Maryland getting a #1 seed may be a different story.
IF OU wins the 1st 2 rounds, they have to play Arizona. Can someone give me one good reason Cincy should be higher than OU??...
IF OU wins the 1st 2 rounds, they have to play Arizona. Can someone give me one good reason Cincy should be higher than OU??... Or if you're lucky, Arizona loses early and you get to play Gonzaga. Seriously, OU not only deserved the #1 seed (in my opinion), they ended up getting the most difficult of the #2 seeds. Big 12, Big 10, Pac-10, and Conf-USA tourney champs are all in that bracket, not to mention the WCC champs.
ACtually, they didn't play as tough a schedule as I thought. A 6th is still low, but they didn't beat anyone with a top four seed. Maybe a 4th or 5th would have been fine. BTW, Georgia is a bit high.
Yea, I can...they won both their regular season and their conference tournament. Also, their RPI must have been higher than OU. However, it is probably more due to the fact that the selection committee is in love with the ACC over the Big 12. But if OU is as good as you say they are, which I think that they are a pretty damn good team, why are you scared about Arizona or Gonzaga??? Don't you want to play strong teams?? They don't give the NCAA championship to teams that don't play anybody in the tournament.
I think Gonzaga did about as it should. While RPI has its limitations, I think it's the best tool to seed teams. One takes a team's win-loss record... then their opponents' win-loss record, and ranks all the teams according to that. I think that one more regress should be added: the opponents of the opponents... to provide for more accuracy, but it seems like a fair system to me. After all, how can one really know Gonzaga is that good? Sure, they've beaten a lot of teams. But those teams have crappy records, for the most part. One can assess talent... but then, sometimes talent just doesn't perform. And sometimes talent looks better than it really is against inferior competition. All in all, I'd say that unless a mid-major goes nearly undefeated, a 22-9 major is really a more proven team, provided they beat some quality opponents, than the Gonzagas of the world. And yes, Gonzaga has beaten good teams. But fewer. And they don't have to play with the stress of playing quality competition, game after game. It's easier to "get up" for a quality opponent when you have so few. Gonzaga's seeding is based on what they've proven, not how good one speculates they might be, based on previous tournament success and a gaudy record enhanced by playing in a bad conference.
My question is how Georgia got a #3 seed: * They tied with Florida at 10-6 in the SEC East. Florida had a better record and better RPI and got a #5 seed. * They closed the season 5-6 * They were ranked at #19 (Florida at #12) * They had an RPI of 18 (Florida at 15) * They lost to a bad LSU team in the Quarterfinals of their conference tournament (Florida lost to eventual champ MSU) Kentucky was basically the same way -- better in every respect -- and had a #4 seed.
I think Gonzaga did about as it should. While RPI has its limitations, I think it's the best tool to seed teams. One takes a team's win-loss record... then their opponents' win-loss record, and ranks all the teams according to that. Except RPI isn't the sole measure of seeding teams. For reference, here are the teams around Gonzaga in the RPIs: #17 Ohio State (4 seed) #18 Georgia (3 seed) #19 Okie State (7 seed) #20 Indiana (5 seed) #21 Gonzaga (6 seed) #22 Texas (6 seed) #23 Marquette (5 seed) #24 Wake Forest (7 seed) #25 Kent State (10 seed) #26 USC (4 seed) ... #34 Oregon (2 seed) Other things the committee looks at are actual record (28-3 for the Zags) rankings (Gonzaga is #6), conference championships (Zags won the WCC Regular Season & Tournament), how the team closed (Zags were 14-0), tournament history (whether it should be or not -- Zags are sweet 16 the last 3 years), etc. If it was just RPI, yeah, Zags should be #6. However, every single other factor that is considered is a huge plus for the zags. No way the Zags should be #6 after taking all of that into account.
Hehe... you give me two options. I can either disapprove of Gonzaga's ranking... or that of the other teams you list. I elect to disapprove of the latter, and maintain the Gonzaga got what it deserved. The factors that I think are most useful in seeding: 1. RPI (most important by far, in my mind) 2. Record versus tournament teams (useful for determining relative strength within the bracket) 3. How a team closed. 4. Wins over teams with an RPI above 25 or so (my measure of "elite" competition). I have strong objections to three things you list: 1. Polls - they suck. Voters are #1 not objective, #2 not well informed, and #3 tend to vote for the same old cadre, which the Zags are now part of (somewhat). 2. Conference championships - I really, really don't care who wins the Southland conference. Sorry, I think the worst team in any of the major conferences would beat McNeese St. more often than not. IMO, Gonzaga would be a slightly-above-average MC team. I could be wrong... but there isn't anything inherently wonderful about a conference championship, other than the automatic birth (which is stupid anyway, imo). 3. Prior tournament performance - NC made it to the final four two years ago. Last year, got bounced in the first round. Not much of a trend. Duke has made it to the sweet 16 for many consecutive years... chalk it up to tournament success? Nah, they're just good.
Hehe... you give me two options. I can either disapprove of Gonzaga's ranking... or that of the other teams you list. I elect to disapprove of the latter, and maintain the Gonzaga got what it deserved. The factors that I think are most useful in seeding: Fair enough. I'd believe more in the RPI if I thought it measured anything well (which I don't). As it stands, the RPI will credit Texas virtually the same for beating Oklahoma as it would for beating Butler. That right there is enough for me to question the RPI system. I also don't like that it doesn't account for winning margin, which I think is an important factor and does impact other measures like rankings. A team that goes 25-5 and wins by 40 pts a game is better than a 25-5 team that won by 1 pt a game, in my opinion. The RPI currently also rewards you more for losing to a great team than beating a mediocre team because your opponent's record is weighted more than your own record. That seems a bit odd to me. Other power-ranking systems seem to more consistently put Gonzaga higher (Sagarin has them at #10, I think). 1. Polls - they suck. Voters are #1 not objective, #2 not well informed, and #3 tend to vote for the same old cadre, which the Zags are now part of (somewhat). I agree to some extent (especially in football). However, I think they have to have *some* weight here. If Gonzaga was 31-0, they would be #1 in the nation, and I guarantee they would have gotten a #1 seed, even though their RPI wouldn't be much better. Also, keep in mind that the Zags weren't ranked earlier this season, I believe. That means that the Zags at least earned their ranking a bit. 2. Conference championships - I really, really don't care who wins the Southland conference. True. I don't think conf tourneys in small conferences are that important, but I do think the conference regular season is an added factor to consider. 3. Prior tournament performance Yeah, I don't think this should be considered, but I've heard that it is, at least when selecting whether to invite teams.
Except the formula is this: Beating Oklahoma is more valuable than beating Butler, because 25% of that equation involves who Butler beat. I do agree, however, that the regress should be extended further, for even greater accuracy. Incidentally, I do agree that a team that wins by an average of 40 is generally better than a team that wins by an average of 15. However, margin of victory is more important in an imaginary world than a real one. Are you familiar with the pythagorean method in baseball for calculating wins? Well, a slightly different one exists for college basketball that can be found at : http://www.morey.org/dmorey/modpyth.html This method works well. Hence, we know that a team that generally scores more points will generally tend to win more games than one that doesn't. As the point differential, either way, grows larger, this method becomes somewhat less reliable, as deviation in a single game becomes more important. Furthermore, if a team were to go undefeated or never won... yeah, margin of victory would be invaluable. However, that rarely happens. And thus, W-L record tends to take into account MoV in normal circumstances. I would agree that MoV makes a good tie break. (Note: I admit to being a bit disingenuous here... I'm a big advocate of keeping MoV in the BCS. I do, however, think it's less important in college basketball due to the greater # of games in which the odds of statistical deviance grows smaller).
