Last Modified: 2020 February 1
Joe Schlobotnik / joe@amurgsval.org
URL for this frameset: http://www.elynah.com/tbrw/tbrw.cgi?2000/pairwise.000313.shtml
Game results taken from US College Hockey Online's Division I composite schedule
This analysis is based on the pairwise comparisons at the time it was written. You can also go through this process interactively with the up-to-date results using the "You Are The Committee" script, or you can fill in hypothetical results for the remaining games using the conference tournament bracket or non-table hypothetical interface, and use the resulting pairwise comparisons. You can also use the self-service hypothetical interface to add, remove, or change any results you like from this season and go from there.
College Hockey America has held its conference tournament, and the remaining five Division I conferences hold theirs this weekend, after which the NCAA tournament will be seeded, just six days from now. Wisconsin, Michigan, St. Lawrence and Boston University are all already guaranteed bids for winning the regular season titles in the four established conferences. Up to four more teams can receive auto bids by winning major conference tournaments. The remainder of the field of twelve will be filled out with at-large bids based on the NCAA's system of pairwise comparisons. Here are the current pairwise comparisons among the 26 teams with Division 1 records of .500 or better:
Due to a shortcoming in the criteria currently used by the NCAA, the strength of schedule of teams playing in weak conferences is overestimated. As was the case last season with Quinnpiac, the selection committee is expected to take overall conference strength into consideration when applying the results of the pairwise comparisons. Here is at a table of conferences' performance agaisnt one another and the average Ratings Percentage Index within each conference:
| Conference | Avg RPI | vs HE | vs WCHA | vs CCHA | vs CHA | vs ECAC | vs MAAC | Leader | Opp RPI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hockey East (H) | .5332 | 13-6 | 10-7 | 3-2-1 | 26-15-3 | 5-0 | Me | .5249 | |
| WCHA (W) | .5147 | 6-13 | 15-12-1 | 3-1 | 10-2-1 | 0-0 | Wi | .5040 | |
| CCHA (C) | .4906 | 7-10 | 12-15-1 | 1-2-1 | 11-10-2 | 0-0 | Mi | .4829 | |
| CHA (A) | .4900 | 2-3-1 | 1-3 | 2-1-1 | 5-8-1 | 15-5-2 | Ni | .4485 | |
| ECAC (E) | .4896 | 15-26-3 | 2-10-1 | 10-11-2 | 8-5-1 | 4-0 | SL | .4813 | |
| MAAC (M) | .4531 | 0-5 | 0-0 | 0-0 | 5-15-2 | 0-4 | Qn | .4358 |
The MAAC is clearly still a step below the other conferences, so Quinnipiac will almost certainly be left out again this year. Niagara is a tougher case. Their schedule includes a number of respectable opponents, but is still heavily influenced by seven games against CHA opponents Air Force and Army, as well as three more against MAAC opponents (out of a total of 27 Division I games). The average Ratings Percentage Index of the CHA is comparible to that of the ECAC and WCHA, but one-third of that is Niagara's own RPI, not to mention that Air Force is somewhat weaker than their RPI would indicate. The committee will probably take Niagara's pairwise comparison wins with a small grain of salt, and it's hard to tell if that would be enough to pass them over in favor of the next 3 or 4 teams. A more robust statistical measure like KRACH shows them as a top-20 but not top-15 team (18th out of 54 Division I programs; in comparison, Quinnipiac is #42).
If we make the decision to exclude Niagara as well as the MAAC teams, filling out the remaining bids becomes easy, as Maine, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Colgate, Boston College, Michigan State, St. Cloud and Minnesota State-Mankato all win their comparisons with all the rest of the teams under consideration. That gives us the following field of 12:
| West | East | |||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wisconsin (W) | 5 | .611 | ND | Mi | MS | SC | Mk | 1 | Maine (H) | 5 | .600 | SL | Cg | BU | NH | BC |
| North Dakota (W) | 4 | .590 | Mi | MS | SC | Mk | 2 | St Lawrence (E) | 3 | .581 | Cg | BU | BC | |||
| Michigan (C) | 3 | .575 | MS | SC | Mk | 3 | Colgate (E) | 3 | .572 | BU | NH | BC | ||||
| Mich State (C) | 2 | .558 | SC | Mk | 4 | Boston Univ (H) | 2 | .588 | NH | BC | ||||||
| St Cloud (W) | 1 | .545 | Mk | 5 | New Hampshire (H) | 2 | .598 | SL | BC | |||||||
| MSU-Mankato (W) | 0 | .532 | 6 | Boston Coll (H) | 0 | .583 | ||||||||||
The next step is to give byes to the top two teams in each region according to the pairwise comparisons. Wisconsin, North Dakota, and Maine clearly qualify; the final bye in the East would go to St. Lawrence given the current comparisons, since they and Colgate each win three comparisons against other Eastern teams, but SLU wins the individual comparison with Colgate.
Next, two Eastern teams are switched to the West regional, and vice-versa; based on the pairwise comparisons, that would be UNH and BC for St. Cloud and Mankato. This will also turn out to be desirable to avoid intraconference games in the regionals, so the only reason not to do it would be an attendance argument. The two WCHA teams to be swapped are from Minnesota, and the regional is in Minneapolis, but Big Ten schools Wisconsin, Michigan and Michigan State, as well as rival North Dakota, would presumably generate enough interest in Minnesota. Working with these regions, we get:
| West | East | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wisconsin (W) | 1 | .611 | ND | 1 | Maine (H) | 1 | .600 | SL | ||||
| North Dakota (W) | 0 | .590 | 2 | St Lawrence (E) | 0 | .581 | ||||||
| New Hampshire (H) | 3 | .598 | BC | Mi | MS | 3 | Colgate (E) | 3 | .572 | BU | SC | Mk |
| Boston Coll (H) | 2 | .583 | Mi | MS | 4 | Boston Univ (H) | 2 | .588 | SC | Mk | ||
| Michigan (C) | 1 | .575 | MS | 5 | St Cloud (W) | 1 | .545 | Mk | ||||
| Mich State (C) | 0 | .558 | 6 | MSU-Mankato (W) | 0 | .532 | ||||||
With the natural seedings, we would have potential second-round intraconference games between Maine and BU and SLU and Colgate. The remedy is to switch the seeds of BU and Colgate (simultaneously exchanging SCSU and Mankato to preserve the first-round pairings). This produces the following tournament brackets:
5W Michigan (C) 6E St Cloud (W)
4W Boston Coll (H) 3E Boston Univ (H)
1W Wisconsin (W) --+--2E St Lawrence (E)
|
2W North Dakota (W) --+--1E Maine (H)
3W New Hampshire (H) 4E Colgate (E)
6W Mich State (C) 5E MSU-Mankato (W)
If you want to have a look at why each pairwise comparison turned out the way it did, you can click on the individual comparisons in the table at the top of this article for a breakdown of criteria.