Blogging the Bracket: FanPosts

Doing Some Advance Bracket Scouting

2010-03-12T22:34:12Z

Who doesn't love hearing this?

Ahh, March Madness is finally here, and it's almost time for everyone to start filling out their brackets! Everyone has their own way of doing it, and most of the time it doesn't work too well, but usually picking the Final Four correctly, and definitely picking the champion correctly will get you close to the money in a lot of bracket pools.

So, what gives? The NCAA tournament has been going on for 25 years in the 64-team (or 64+1 team) format. Some stat geek had to have crunched the numbers and given us something to work with!

It turns out, that is the case. One such man is Pete Tiernan who cranks out tons of articles every year around this time jam packed with information. He does offer one huge caveat though:

Of course, every March Madness forecasting strategy should come with a gigantic disclaimer: Past performance does not guarantee future results. Each tournament manages to violate rules that were once considered ironclad.

But enough of that, let's jump into the stats!

Pete Tiernan's "Crown Your Tourney Champion"

The last 21 champions in a row, and 23/25 champions have possessed the following attributes:

Seeded 1, 2, 3, or 4 (obviously we won't know this for a few days)
Score at least 76 ppg
Win on average by at least 10 points

The teams who currently possess such attributes? Well, ignoring the seeding requirements, those teams are (through games of 3/11): New Mexico, Sam Houston State, Gonzaga, Kansas State, Texas, Xavier, Missouri, Marshall, Maryland, Baylor, St. Mary's (CA), Kentucky, Syracuse, Murray State, Duke, Kansas, and BYU. I've also crossed out the teams that basically have no chance of scoring a top seed.

This leaves us with 13 teams. Not exactly narrowing it down, is it? Well, keep that group in mind, because on average 2.83 of those teams per tournament will be making it to the Final Four. Obviously, take out any one of them that don't get the top seeds, but that's a pretty solid group to start with.

Additionally, the vast majority of the champions had gone to the tournament the previous year. This qualification eliminates New Mexico, Kansas State, Baylor, and Kentucky. That whittles us down to 10 teams.

You can whittle it down even more by upping the scoring and scoring margin requirements and adding a few more. 17 of the past 19, and 18 of 25 champions overall have had the following requirements:

Score at least 77 ppg
Outscore opponents on average by at least 11 points
Come from the ACC, Big East, Big 12, Big 10, SEC, or Pac 10.
Have a coach who has been to the tourney at least 5 times.

This will eliminate Gonzaga, Xavier, BYU, and Missouri and leave you with 6 legit contenders this season that based on overall tournament history have about a 72% chance of winning the tournament (and based on recent trends about a 89% chance). Those teams are: Texas, Maryland, Syracuse, Kentucky, Duke and Kansas. However, I will make a caveat that based on Texas' recent collapse (and thus likely not getting a top 4 seed) you could probably eliminate them. Maryland will be close to a 4 seed and it will depend on their ACC tournament performance probably.

Pete Tiernan adds a few more juicy stats in another article, saying that all but one tourney champ has never lost 2 or more games in a row, and all but two have gone into the tournament winning at least 7 of their last 10 games.

This eliminates Syracuse and Maryland, and leaves us with a trio of solid picks - Kentucky, Duke and Kansas. Of course this doesn't mean that the champion will definitively be one of those three teams, but there is a high statistical likelihood that it will be, at least if the past is any indication.

Other Encouraging Signs

Another quote from Pete Tiernan before we jump into something else:

The 111 teams with a pre-tourney scoring margin above 15 points per game won nearly 48 games more than seed projections. That works out to a weighty +.429 PASE-about half a game per tourney better than expectations. Perhaps even more impressively, 41 of these 111 squads (37 percent) have reached the Final Four and 12 (11 percent) have won the tourney. Both of these percentages are the highest for any single attribute we examined.

That only begins to explain the importance of victory margin in foretelling tourney overachievement. Consider this: of the top eight attributes I studied, four of them related to scoring margin. Teams that beat opponents by more than 14, 13 and 12 points all had impressive PASE values that would have landed them in the chart above. However, I elected not to repeat similar attributes.

The only two teams of the "contending five" that I isolated that have a scoring margin greater than 15 ppg were Kansas and Duke, for what it's worth. Also, considering that performance above seed expectation (PASE) is somewhat important in forecasting other games correctly, consider that the only other two teams with a >15 ppg scoring margin are BYU and Murray State. Take note of them as possible spoilers.

Jumping to Adjusted Scoring Margin

Here is an excerpt for something I wrote for the blog I write for (Crimson and Cream Machine) last year:

Another interesting metric for tournament performance, and for performance overall is adjusted scoring margin (ASM) that ESPN's Joe Lunardi uses in his bracketology segments. Adjusted scoring margin is a part of their insider content, so I won't give away the rankings, but I'm sure some of you are wondering what ASM is. It is the sum of two components:

The number of ppg a team scores above/below the average ppg allowed by all of it's opponents combined. Basically, if a team doesn't score many points per game, but they play in a conference with great defense, it will take that into account.

Basically the opposite of the above concept to take into account a team's defensive prowess.

Therefore this tends to be a little bit better than simply looking at scoring margin. I'm not sure how it's been in recent years, but it has a history of success. The Florida Gators of 2000 had the 2nd highest ASM in the nation, but were a 5-seed. They got to the Final Four.

The top 5 in ASM right now, in order, are: Kansas, Duke, Syracuse, BYU, and Kentucky. Do the teams sound familiar? The fact that both of these proven tournament metrics are turning up the same teams consistently is definitely something to take note of!

Looking for cinderellas? The same philosophy can apply. BYU keeps turning up and they are projected to be a 5 seed in Chris' latest bracket. Murray State is an interesting team as they are in the top 4 nationally in scoring margin and they are projected to be a 13 seed, so there's a potential lead on a big upset. Maryland also has a lot of good attributes and they are projected to be a 5 seed like BYU. They are #7 nationally in ASM, so nothing to sneeze at.

Does ASM identify any other potential sleepers? Here they are with ASM rank followed by seed projection by Chris in parentheses: Wisconsin (8, 4-seed), Utah State (10, 10-seed), Baylor (11, 5-seed), Missouri (11, 10-seed).

So, in summary, if you're looking for a tournament champion, I'd zero in on Kansas or Duke. At least that's what the statistics are telling us.

early march madness picks

2009-12-27T02:35:14Z

based on games so far would the following teams be in the tourney. (if your team is not in here and you would like me to add it then leave a comment to me. Also if you want say if in your opinion the team would be in our Out.

First Up

Cal 6-4

Wins- Murray St Detroit Jacksonville Princeton Iowa St Pacific

Losses- #6Syracuse #18Ohio St #12 New Mexico #1 Kanas

UCLA

4-7

Wins Cal St bakersfeild Pepperdine Colarado St New Mexico St

Losses Cal St Fullerton Portland Butler Long Beach St Kanas Missisipi st Notre Dame

OUT

Portland 7-4

Wins Eastern Washington Seattle Oregon UCLA Minasota Denver Idaho

Losses West Virgina Portland St Idaho

OUT

Oklahoma St 10-1

Wins Seattle Southern North Texas Prairie View A&M Bradley Utah UTSA Arkansas Pine Bluff Stanford La Salle

Losses Tulsa

Some Teams I'm Keeping An Eye On

2009-12-21T05:53:02Z

Now that we're about a third of the way through the College Basketball season, I'm starting to focus more on the season and the NCAA Tournament. Up to now, the coverage is still dominated by preseason expectations for the most part, and a lot of coverage is being given to the bowl games.

Below is a list of teams that I'm curious to see where they end up. It's still early and there's still the conference play to go, so anything can still happen at this point. Just some teams that have caught my eye and am curious to see where they go:

William & Mary (7-2) - currently have an RPI of 16. Wins against Richmond, @ Wake Forest, and against VCU have caught my eye. They also played close to a suprisingly good Harvard, and also had a respectible showing @ UConn. One of only a handful of teams in their history to never go dancing, but that makes watching this team that much more fun. Old Dominion looks to be the team to beat in the CAA, but having 3 contenders makes for an interesting conference tournament.
Southern Mississippi (7-1) - Is Larry Eustachy finally back? Hard to say. The RPI of 11 stands out, but it's too early.They haven't played much in terms of quality opponents yet, but they did only lose by 2 @ Ole Miss, a team that is likely going dancing this year. They should be right up there in the CUSA with Tulsa and Memphis. If that's the case, they're going dancing.
Missouri State (10-0) - Where did these guys come from? I live in Central Iowa, a place close to a lot of The Valley teams, and I hadn't heard anything about these guys. Just talk about UNI and Creighton. They could sneak in there at the top. I'm curious to see how they play against UNI and Wichita State this year. If they can split with both teams, they could very well get that top seed in The Valley Tournament.
Harvard (7-2) - I'm not going to sit here and pretend that I follow Ivy League basketball closely, because I don't. The Ivy League is unique in that they get an automatic bid, but have no conference tournament. Cornell is the favorite to win the league, but checking Ken Pomeroy's most recent basketball projections show Harvard has a good chance to be right in the mix to win the Ivy League and make their first NCAA Tournament Apperance since 1946.
Rhode Island (9-1) - The A10 is going to be tough yet again this year. Hard to really think of them as a "mid-major" when it comes to basketball. They are off to a good start, and playing teams like Xavier, Charlotte, Temple, Dayton, Richmond, and George Washington is a two-edged sword. It's the kind of league where you can pick up a bunch of quality wins, but you can also bury yourself.
Minnesota (8-3) - After going through a rough patch at the end of November/beginning of December, losing to Portland, Texas A&M, and Miami (FL), lots of people were getting down on the team. I think the Gophers are poised enough to bounce back. When Big 10 play starts in about a week or so, I think they will start to separate themselves.
Xavier (6-4) - At first glance, you might say to yourself "wow, Xavier isn't themselves this year". I know I did. But then you look at the schedule and see that they lost to Marquette and Baylor on neutral sites, and @ K-State, those are legit losses. Plus their 4th loss was kind of flukey as I think they got a screwed a little @ Butler. They have plenty of time to enchance their resume though. They've got a road game at Wake Forest on the schedule coming up soon, and they're playing in a tough A10.
Northwestern (9-1) - After losing Coble and Ryan, the sexy pick to make the NCAA Tournament seemed to be done. But then, stuff happened. Now the Wildcats have jumped to a 9-1 start, losing only to Butler, and collecting decent wins against Notre Dame, Iowa State, and Stanford. Ken Pomeroy currently has the Wildcats winning 21 games, including going 9-9 in the Big 10. Last year, Michigan and Minnesota both got in with 9-9 records and 20+ wins, so could this finally be their year? Either way, they are much better than I thought they would be and have a great coach in Bill Carmody
Oklahoma (8-3) - To start the year, many were excited about this team, and they have been disappointing, losing to VCU, San Diego, and Houston. Now, all three of those teams are actually pretty solid, but they weren't that close of games. Ken Pomeroy currently has the Sooners going 14-16 overall with a 4-12 league record. I don't know if they will be that bad, but it's an interesting story. I would think with guys like Tiny Gallon and Willie Warren, this team would find their way to the middle of the pack in the Big 12, but with the Big 12 looking so deep, maybe not? That's why I'm watching them!
Texas Tech (9-1) - I had these guys picked for last in the Big 12, and they have suprised me with their start. They did get a nice home win against Washington, but just lost @ Wichita St. Those are the only two teams they have played with a pulse, and I think the Red Raiders are a little bit of paper tigers still at this point. Over the next few weeks, their games @ New Mexico, UTEP, and @Oklahoma State will tell me a more about this team.
Iowa State (8-3) - Last and hopefully not least. My team. I watch this team closely regardless as I'm a season ticket holder, but I had expectations for this team prior to the season. Losses to Northwestern, UNI, and Cal have been tough, but the team has the potential to come around. Part of me thinks that a team of Craig Brackins and Marquis Gilstrap is too talented to not go dancing, but the other part of me realizes that ISU doesn't have a marquee game and is playing in the buzzsaw of the Big 12. With games against Houston, Duke, Texas, Texas Tech, and Kansas over the next month or so, January is going to be make-or-break for the Cyclones.

A question from a naive newcomer.

2009-07-30T12:37:54Z

So in searching through the blogs on SB Nation, I came across "Blogging the Bracket", a blog devoted to College Basketball. Once I saw this, I thought to myself, " I need to be a part of this." And here we are. I really appreciate the coverage this blog gives to all teams with a chance to make it to the field of 64.

But enough brown nosing, it's time to get to the point. This topic has probably bean beaten to death, and I haven't looked through the site enough, but I have a question. Are "The Calipari Years" in Kentucky going to be as dominant as I suspect? I mean, he's turning in one of the best recruiting classes in the nation in the span of about a month or two. When he has a couple tourney appearances under his belt there, can they be stopped?... Maybe I'm just clueless, but this seems somewhat interesting to me. Thank you for your time.

What games are on TV?

2009-03-17T18:54:42Z

I realize that CBS cuts in and out of games all the time to show others from around the country, but I was just wondering if anyone knew if there was a guide to which games were going to be the prominently featured matchups (the ones that were going to get most of the air time)? A website/TV guide type deal would be great...Thanks in advance, and Go Marquette!

Also, I assume there isn't a way to watch any game live on the internet for free, but if someone could prove me wrong that'd be awesome

NCAA conference tournaments seem unneeded.

2009-03-16T18:52:34Z

From watching the past NCAA tournaments I have frequently had the thought enter my head about the relevancy of the conference tournaments. I understand that winning conference tournaments grants an automatic bid to the ncaa tournament. But, I believe that the automatic bid should be given to the regular season champion and that the conference tournaments should be eliminated. I also understand that these conference tournaments bring in money for the conferences, so they will most likely be here to stay until something else could possibly replace this profit.

One of the main reasons that I don't like these conference tournaments is that they seem like they are very physically and mentally draining on the teams that advance far into the conference tournament. Then, when the ncaa tournament comes around, these teams and players can under perform. Also, teams have different interest levels in the conference tournaments. Some teams have to play at 100%, while some have already locked up ncaa tournament automatic bids and have less intensity.

Mid Majors Automatic Bids

2009-03-14T15:03:32Z

An Automatic Bid means you've made it. You've made it to the Big Dance (NCAA Tournament). Every year there's at least 1 Mid Major upsetting Major. Last year Davidson made a run. Who will it be this year?

23-10, 19-15 and 21-11. These are the three records of the Mid Major Automatic Bids: East Tennessee State, Morehead State and Radford. All of these played hard and long to win there non-respected Confrences. East Tennessee State completely demolished their opponent, Morehead State won on a last few points and Radford won it pretty easily. Now my question to you was who can make a run in the tourney. East Tennessee State has a pretty balanced team. But Morehead State and Radford are fuled by one person (still a team effort). For Morehead Sate it's Kenneth Faried, a 6'8" 215 pound sophomore who wears his hair long and his heart on his sleeve. For Radford it's Artsiom Parakhouski, a 6'11" 260 pound junior who knows how the weather is up there. All three teams look awful good. But how will they match up against the nation's elite? Only fate will decide.

Poll

Which of these teams has the best chance to make it to the elite eight?

East Tennessee State

0 votes

Morehead State

1 votes

American

1 votes

Siena

9 votes

11 votes | Poll has closed

After Further Review...Refs Got It Wrong

2009-03-13T20:34:39Z

Devendorf releases a shot at the end of regulation time of the marathon game between UConn and Syracuse last night. It is too close to call. The ref at the scene of the crime rules the basket counts. Even after the reviewing the replay, which the whole country saw ad nauseum, it still appeared to close to call. So, when it doubt, the ref should have left the call as it was. I saw nothing on the replay to completely convince me that the basket should have been disallowed.

Poll

The Referees at the UConn-Syracuse game were :

Correct..the shot came after time expired

13 votes

Wrong..there was no conclusive video evidence to disallow the shot

5 votes

18 votes | Poll has closed

Five Things To Consider When Filling Out Your Bracket

2009-03-13T00:25:21Z

It’s almost bracket picking time, and everyone has a system or a theory to help them out. Regardless of your system, consider these historical trends while you’re picking your winners.

Keep in mind that these trends say what is likely to happen, not what will happen. Everything here is based off of the era of 64-team tournaments, which means we’ve only got 24 past tournaments to go off of.

One last thing: I do not classify an eight-seed losing to a nine-seed as an upset. That is all; let’s do this.

Kansas, UCLA, Memphis, and North Carolina will all win their first round games, but at least one will probably lose its second round game.

In the last ten years, nearly every Final Four team has won its first round game the next year (provided it made the tournament). The three that have not were all Big Ten teams and six-seeds or below. No Big Ten squads made the Final Four and it’s looking like all of last year’s participants will be at least four-seeds, so those teams should be safe.

For all of the tournaments though, never have all Final Four teams from one year made the Sweet 16 the next.

The champion will almost certainly be a one, two, or three-seed.

Only three teams lower than a 3-seed have won it all: 8-seed Villanova in 1985, 6-seed Kansas in 1988, and 4-seed Arizona in 1997. Keep in mind that in the ‘80s when the six and eight-seeds won, we didn’t have nearly the coverage of the sport we do now. The committee has gotten better with more time and more film, and a team at the top will take home the title.

In case you’re wondering, one-seeds have won just over half of the championships and seven of the last ten. Three-seeds aren’t even that great a bet, as only three of those have ever won the whole thing (though two were this decade).

Strictly speaking, based on history each one-seed has a 13.5 percent chance of winning it all, each two-seed has a 5.2 percent chance, each three-seed has a 3.1 percent chance, and everyone else from four-seeds to eight-seeds has a 0.4 percent chance.

One and three-seeds playing in their home state are money, but twos are not quite so reliable.

Only a single one-seed in 62 contests has lost a game in its home state, and that was in 2001 when three-seed Maryland beat Stanford in Anaheim. Only a single three-seed in 19 contests has lost a game in its home state, and that was in 2007 when Texas A&M lost to two-seed Memphis in San Antonio.

Two-seeds however are just 30-8 (.789) in their home states, essentially losing one of every five contests. When you take out games against one-seeds, they go to 27-7 (.794) which is basically the same performance. They have won ten in a row in their home state, but six of those came from UCLA’s 2006 and 2007 teams. Even then, two-seeds are just 16-4 (.800) in home state games since 2003.

When picking first round upsets, don’t bet on lucky seven.

The average number of first round upsets is 5.63. The most common number is five in a year, something that has happened seven times. The next most common number of first round upsets is eight (five times) and then six (four times).

What about seven you ask? We’ve seen seven first round upsets exactly once, and that was in 2002. I have no good explanation for this phenomenon other than that there have been a relatively small number of 64-team tournaments, but try not to bet against history with this one.

For what it’s worth, this decade has evenly split up the number of upsets: 2007 had two, 2004 had three, 2005 had four, 2003 had five, 2008 had six, 2002 had seven, 2006 had eight, and 2001 had nine. If you’re considering extending the pattern, be advised that we’ve never seen one or ten first round upsets in a year. Then again, we had never seen two or nine in a year until it happened this decade.

Having a team return to the Final Four is about a coin flip.

Having all Final Four teams shut out of the next year’s Final Four has happened 11 times in 23 possible chances. That means 12 times in 23 chances we’ve seen at least one come back.

The most that have ever returned is two, and each time that has happened one of the two Final Four repeat teams was on at least a three-year run of making it that far: Duke and UNLV both made it in 1990-91 during a four-year run for Duke, Kentucky and North Carolina both made it in 1997-98 during a three-year run for UK, and both UCLA and Florida made it in 2006-07 during a three-year run for the Bruins.

That would seem to indicate that if two teams were to make it back, UCLA would be one of them. It’s a trend, not a rule though, so nothing is set in stone.

Anyway, it’s no guarantee than any of last year’s bunch makes it back, much less two. Just pull out a quarter and let George tell you.

CONFERENCE TOURNAMENTS-YES OR NO

2009-03-11T19:02:05Z

For the longest time I have argued against conference tourneys on the grounds that each year you end up with two or three teams stealing NCAA bids that they probably don't deserve.

Case in point, Cleveland State winning the Horizon league title, beating Butler. No question Butler belongs at the big dance, but Cleveland State..I don't think so. Somewhere some bubble team..pick any one you like..is staying home now. The same thing may happen one or two more times before these conference tournaments are over. Completely ridiculous and unfair. If the NCAA needs money they should have a telethon before they resort to these tournaments.

Poll

Should there be conference tournaments?

Yes

12 votes

No

3 votes

Indifferent

0 votes

15 votes | Poll has closed

USC's Tourney Hopes?

2009-03-09T00:17:36Z

I was wondering whether USC had much of a chance to earn an NCAA tournament birth this season. They're 6th in the Pac-10 and I heard 6 teams from the Pac-10 had a chance to get in this year. At 18-12 (9-9), they're just two victories shy of the all-important 20 win mark. Are they on the bubble at all? Haven't heard much talk about the Trojans. What's the scoop?

Pitt Sweeps Series With UConn

2009-03-07T19:54:30Z

Pitt beat UConn for the second time this year today. Is there any doubt that Pitt is the best team in the country right now? You guys think UConn still gets a number one seed?

In my mind, Pitt showed they are the best team in the nation today. Blair got in foul trouble and Fields was hobbling around the court, but Sam Young and Brad Wanamaker stepped up and led Pitt to the victory. They were able to slow down Thabeet enough to get the win.

I think UConn still deserves a number one seed. They are still one of the top four teams in the country. I think the number one seeds should be Pitt, UNC, UConn, and Oklahoma (assuming UNC, OK, and either Pitt/ UConn wins their conferences tournies).