{"id":1238,"date":"2013-01-16T14:00:05","date_gmt":"2013-01-16T20:00:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.uscho.com\/bracketology\/?p=1238"},"modified":"2013-01-16T14:00:05","modified_gmt":"2013-01-16T20:00:05","slug":"nine-weeks-out-and-some-teams-cant-get-closer-to-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.uscho.com\/2013\/01\/16\/nine-weeks-out-and-some-teams-cant-get-closer-to-home\/","title":{"rendered":"Nine weeks out, and some teams can’t get closer to home"},"content":{"rendered":"
We’re at that time of the year where one thing is on everyone’s minds.<\/p>\n
Will my team make the NCAA tournament?<\/p>\n
Those of you that are veterans of the college hockey scene know that it is all about the PairWise Rankings. This is USCHO’s numerical approach that simulates the way the NCAA Division I men’s ice hockey committee chooses the at-large teams that make the NCAA tournament.<\/p>\n
The criteria are set by the committee. It is set in stone, so there is no objectivity in the selections of which schools are selected to play in the tournament.<\/p>\n
The only objectivity comes when deciding the brackets and where each team will play.<\/p>\n
For more on this please check out our FAQ<\/a>.<\/p>\n Since USCHO has begun the PairWise Rankings, we have correctly identified all of the teams that have been selected to the NCAA tournament.<\/p>\n For the past two years, I have correctly predicted the exact brackets for the NCAA tournament, meaning that I have predicted how the NCAA committee thought when putting together the brackets.<\/p>\n With that in mind, it’s time once again to do what we like to call Bracketology — college hockey style. It’s our weekly look at how I believe the NCAA tournament will wind up come selection time.<\/p>\n It’s a look into what are the possible thought processes behind selecting and seeding the NCAA tournament teams.<\/p>\n We’ll keep bringing you a new one every week until we make our final picks before the field is announced.<\/p>\n If you want to skip the inner workings and get to the results of the analysis, then click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n Here are the facts:<\/p>\n • Sixteen teams are selected to participate in the national tournament.<\/p>\n • There are four regional sites (East — Providence, R.I.; Northeast — Manchester, N.H.; Midwest — Toledo, Ohio; West — Grand Rapids, Mich.).<\/p>\n • A host institution which is invited to the tournament plays in the regional for which it is the host and cannot be moved. There are four host institutions this year: Brown in Providence, New Hampshire in Manchester, Bowling Green in Toledo and Michigan in Grand Rapids.<\/p>\n • Seedings will not be switched, as opposed to years past. To avoid undesirable first-round matchups, including intra-conference games (see below), teams will be moved among regionals, not reseeded.<\/p>\n Here are the NCAA’s guidelines on the matter, per a meeting of the championship committee:<\/p>\n In setting up the tournament, the committee begins with a list of priorities to ensure a successful tournament on all fronts including competitive equity, financial success and likelihood of playoff-type atmosphere at each regional site. For the model, the following is a basic set of priorities:<\/p>\n • The top four teams as ranked by the committee are the four No. 1 seeds and will be placed in the bracket so that if all four teams advance to the Men’s Frozen Four, the No. 1 seed will play the No. 4 seed and the No. 2 seed will play the No. 3 seed in the semifinals.<\/p>\n • Host institutions that qualify will be placed at home.<\/p>\n • No. 1 seeds are placed as close to home as possible in order of their ranking 1-4.<\/p>\n • Conference matchups in first round are avoided, unless five or more teams from one conference are selected, then the integrity of the bracket will be preserved.<\/p>\n • Once the five automatic qualifiers and 11 at-large teams are selected, the next step is to develop four groups from the committee’s ranking of 1-16. The top four teams are the No. 1 seeds. The next four are targeted as No. 2 seeds. The next four are No. 3 seeds and the last four are No. 4 seeds. These groupings will be referred to as “bands.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Given these facts, here is the top 16 of the current PairWise Rankings (PWR)<\/a>, and the conference leaders (through all games of Jan. 15, 2013):<\/p>\n 1t New Hampshire Here are the current conference leaders based on winning percentage:<\/p>\n Atlantic Hockey:<\/strong> Niagara
\n1t Boston College
\n1t Quinnipiac
\n4 Minnesota
\n5t Boston University
\n5t Notre Dame
\n7 North Dakota
\n8 Denver
\n9 Yale
\n10t Miami
\n10t Western Michigan
\n12 Dartmouth
\n13 Massachusetts-Lowell
\n14 Niagara
\n15t Minnesota State
\n15t Colgate<\/p>\n
\nCCHA:<\/strong> Notre Dame
\nECAC Hockey:<\/strong> Quinnipiac
\nHockey East:<\/strong> Boston College
\nWCHA:<\/strong> Denver (by virtue of 1-0-1 head-to-head record versus Nebraska-Omaha)<\/p>\nNotes<\/h4>\n