College Hockey:

Bracketology: March 13, 2007

It’s time once again to do what we like to call Bracketology — College Hockey Style. It’s our weekly look at how the NCAA tournament would wind up if the season ended today, and how it might end up after future results.

It’s a look into the possible thought processes behind selecting and seeding the NCAA tournament, and we’ll be bringing you a new one every week until we make our final picks before the field is announced.

Let’s dispense with the particulars, since we’ve beaten them into everyone’s heads. If you want to review them, just read the beginning of the Feb. 28 Bracketology to get your fix.

Here, then, are the top 16 of the current PairWise Rankings (PWR), with the bonus, as well as all conference tournament champions and number-one seeds in conference tournaments that are not in the Top 16 (through all games of March 13, 2007):

1 Minnesota
2 Notre Dame
3 St. Cloud
4 New Hampshire
5 Clarkson
6 Boston College
7 Boston University
8t North Dakota
8t Michigan
8t Michigan State
11 Massachusetts
12t St. Lawrence
12t Maine
14 Miami
15 Michigan Tech
16t Dartmouth
16t Denver
– Sacred Heart
– Alabama-Huntsville

Current number-one conference seeds and champions:

Atlantic Hockey: Sacred Heart
CHA: Alabama-Huntsville
CCHA: Notre Dame
ECACHL : St. Lawrence
Hockey East : New Hampshire
WCHA: Minnesota

Notes

Bracketology assumes that the season has ended and there are no more games to be played; i.e., the NCAA Tournament starts tomorrow.

The number-one seed in each tournament is the assumed champion of the tournament; therefore, that team gets an autobid to the NCAAs.

Step One

From the committee’s report, choose the 16 teams in the tournament.

We break ties in the PWR by looking at the individual comparisons among the tied teams, and add in Alabama-Huntsville and Sacred Heart.

From there, we can start looking at the bubble in a more detailed fashion.

The bubbles consist of North Dakota, Michigan and Michigan State at 8 and St. Lawrence and Maine at 12. The bubble at 16 is moot because Alabama-Huntsville has claimed a spot in the tournament.

Looking at the individual comparisons, North Dakota wins comparisons against both Michigan and Michigan State and Michigan wins the comparison with Michigan State.

At 12, SLU defeats Maine in the comparison.

Therefore the 16 teams in the tournament, in rank order, are:

1 Minnesota
2 Notre Dame
3 St. Cloud
4 New Hampshire
5 Clarkson
6 Boston College
7 Boston University
8 North Dakota
9 Michigan
10 Michigan State
11 Massachusetts
12 St. Lawrence
13 Maine
14 Miami
15 Sacred Heart
16 Alabama-Huntsville

Step Two

Now it’s time to assign the seeds.

No. 1 Seeds – Minnesota, Notre Dame, St. Cloud, New Hampshire
No. 2 Seeds – Clarkson, Boston College, Boston University, North Dakota
No. 3 Seeds – Michigan, Michigan State, Massachusetts, St. Lawrence
No. 4 Seeds – Maine, Miami, Sacred Heart, Alabama-Huntsville

Step Three

Place the No. 1 seeds in regionals. Because New Hampshire is hosting a regional, the Wildcats are placed first. Following the guidelines, we now place the other No. 1 seeds based on proximity to the regional sites

No. 4 New Hampshire is placed in the Northeast Regional in Manchester.
No. 1 Minnesota is placed in the Midwest Regional in Grand Rapids.
No. 2 Notre Dame is placed in the East Regional in Rochester.
No. 3 St. Cloud is placed in the West Regional in Denver.

Step Four

Now we place the other 12 teams so as to avoid intraconference matchups if possible.

Begin by filling in each bracket by banding groups. Remember that teams are not assigned to the regional closest to their campus sites by ranking order within the banding (unless you are a host school, in which case you must be assigned to your home regional).

If this is the case, as it was last year, then the committee should seed so that the quarterfinals are seeded such that the four regional championships are played by No. 1 v. No. 8, No. 2 v. No. 7, No. 3 v. No. 6 and No. 4 v. No. 5.

So therefore:

No. 2 Seeds

No. 5 Clarkson is placed in No. 4 New Hampshire’s Regional, the Northeast Regional.
No. 6 Boston College is placed in No. 3 St. Cloud’s Regional, the West Regional.
No. 7 Boston University is placed in No. 2 Notre Dame’s Regional, the East Regional.
No. 8 North Dakota is placed in No. 1 Minnesota’s Regional, the Midwest Regional.

No. 3 Seeds

Our bracketing system has one Regional containing seeds 1, 8, 9, and 16, another with 2, 7, 10, 15, another with 3, 6, 11, 14 and another with 4, 5, 12 and 13.

Therefore:

No. 9 Michigan is placed in No. 8 North Dakota’s Regional, the Midwest Regional.
No. 10 Michigan State is placed in No. 7 Boston University’s Regional, the East Regional.
No. 11 Massachusetts is placed in No. 6 Boston College’s Regional, the West Regional.
No. 12 St. Lawrence is placed in No. 5 Clarkson’s Regional, the Northeast Regional.

No. 4 Seeds

One more time, taking No. 16 v. No. 1, No. 15 v. No. 2, etc.

No. 16 Alabama-Huntsville is sent to Minnesota’s Regional, the Midwest Regional.
No. 15 Sacred Heart is sent to Notre Dame’s Regional, the East Regional.
No. 14 Miami is sent to St. Cloud’s Regional, the West Regional.
No. 13 Maine is sent to New Hampshire’s Regional, the Northeast Regional.

The brackets as we have set them up:

West Regional:

Miami vs. St. Cloud
Massachusetts vs. Boston College

Midwest Regional:

Alabama-Huntsville vs. Minnesota
Michigan vs. North Dakota

East Regional:

Sacred Heart vs. Notre Dame
Michigan State vs. Boston University

Northeast Regional:

Maine vs. New Hampshire
St. Lawrence vs. Clarkson

Our first concern is avoiding intraconference matchups. We have three of them.

We have to move Maine out of the Northeast, so we swap the Black Bears with Miami.

Now we have to move St. Lawrence and Massachusetts. We just swap the two.

So the tournament is now fixed.

West Regional:

Maine vs. St. Cloud
St. Lawrence vs. Boston College

Midwest Regional:

Alabama-Huntsville vs. Minnesota
Michigan vs. North Dakota

East Regional:

Sacred Heart vs. Notre Dame
Michigan State vs. Boston University

Northeast Regional:

Miami vs. New Hampshire
Massachusetts vs. Clarkson

Bracketing the Frozen Four, if all four number-one seeds advance, then the top overall seed plays the No. 4 overall, and No. 2 plays No. 3. Therefore, the winners of the Midwest and Northeast Regionals face each other in one semifinal (Minnesota and New Hampshire’s brackets), while the winners of the West and East Regionals (St. Cloud and Notre Dame’s brackets) play the other semifinal.

What Do We Know So Far?

Well, let’s take a look at the PairWise and we can draw some conclusions using both logic and running scenarios through our PairWise Predictor.

Teams That Can Look Forward To The Dance

A total of nine teams have punched their tickets, according to my calculations.

Those teams are Minnesota, Notre Dame, St. Cloud, New Hampshire, Clarkson, Boston College, Boston University, Michigan and Alabama-Huntsville.

Teams That Are, Or Can Be, TUCs That Must Wait Until Next Year

These teams, while they are now or can be TUCs, are done with their seasons: Colorado College, Vermont, Cornell, Nebraska-Omaha and RIT.

Teams That Must Win Their Conference Tournaments To Get In

These teams need to skate away with their conference trophies this weekend in order to get in: Wisconsin, Quinnipiac, Lake Superior, Sacred Heart, Army, Connecticut and Air Force.

Which Brings Us To The Bubble

You’ve got it, we’re now at the bubble, the place you really don’t want to be because anything can happen. It’s even worse when you can’t do a thing about your position by your own volition.

The teams on the bubble are North Dakota, Michigan State, Massachuset