Sunday, March 14, 2010

Ga Tech vs Va Tech, Illinois vs Minnesota

Now that Georgia Tech has lost in the ACC title game, they'll be one of the four or five teams fighting for the last couple of at-large bids. And it's always difficult to break down these last few teams because the resumes can be so disparate between Big East and WAC teams. But the easiest match-ups are the intra-conference match-ups, and it seems to me that the first thing we should do before throwing up the resume of the 7th ACC team and fifth Big Ten team versus Utah State and Mississippi State is to figure out: Who is that 7th ACC team? Who is that 5th Big Ten team?

Let's break it down:

ACC:

Total records:
Georgia Tech: 22-12, 7-9 in ACC (12-10 including the tournament), 8-10 in road/neutral
Virginia Tech: 23-8, 10-6 in ACC (10-7 including the tournament), 8-7 in road/neutral
Edge: Virginia Tech

RPI records:
Georgia Tech: 2-3 vs Top 25, 5-7 vs Top 50, 11-10 vs Top 100, 16-12 vs Top 200
Virginia Tech: 0-3 vs Top 25, 3-4 vs Top 50, 8-7 vs Top 100, 14-8 vs Top 200
Edge: Georgia Tech

Important Wins/Losses:
Georgia Tech: Wins vs Duke, Maryland (neutral court) and Siena. Losses at Miami, at Georgia, at Virginia
Virginia Tech: Wins vs Clemson and Wake Forest, and at Georgia Tech. Losses at Boston College, at Miami (twice)
Edge: Georgia Tech

Computer ratings (Sagarin & Pomeroy ratings are my estimation of where they'll be tomorrow):
Georgia Tech: RPI = 33, ELO_CHESS = 40, PREDICTOR = 27, Pomeroy = 28
Virginia Tech: RPI = 58, ELO_CHESS = 36, PREDICTOR = 39, Pomeroy = 31
Edge: Georgia Tech

Final verdict: This ACC match-up will be the test of whether the Selection Committee will behave as they say they will. Under old-fashioned standards you give the edge to Virginia Tech, because they have the better record, the clearly better ACC record, and the better ELO_CHESS (the best objective gauge of a team's resume, and the best objective predictor of the seeds that teams earn). It's been very rare in the past for a team finishing four games over .500 in one of the best conferences to end up out of the field (although Virginia Tech would basically be the poster boy of what you have to do to be an exception to that rule). But the Selection Committee claims that they care more about big wins than a lot of decent wins, and that they want to emphasize "the eye test" this year. The eye test says that Georgia Tech is the better team, and they've played more good teams and beaten more good teams. So I'm going to give the Selection Committee the benefit of the doubt, and I'm going to lean towards Georgia Tech.


Big Ten:
(All stats assume a Minnesota loss to Ohio State since this analysis is meaningless if they win)

Total records:

Illinois: 19-14, 10-8 in Big Ten (11-9 including the tournament), 7-9 in road/neutral
Minnesota: 21-13, 9-9 in ACC (12-10 including the tournament), 8-8 in road/neutral
Edge: Minnesota

RPI records:
Illinois: 3-6 vs Top 25, 5-9 vs Top 50, 6-10 vs Top 100, 11-14 vs Top 200
Minnesota: 4-5 vs Top 25, 5-7 vs Top 50, 6-9 vs Top 100, 14-12 vs Top 200
Edge: Minnesota

Important Wins/Losses:
Illinois: Wins at home vs Vanderbilt and Michigan State, on neutral court vs Missouri and Wisconsin, on road at Clemson, Wisconsin. Losses at Northwestern and Georgia, on neutral court vs Utah and Bradley.
Minnesota: Wins at home vs Ohio State and Wisconsin, on neutral court vs Michigan State, Purdue and Butler. Losses at home vs Michigan, and on road at Miami (Fl), Indiana, Northwestern and Michigan.
Edge: Slight edge to Minnesota because Selection Committee weights big wins more than bad losses

Computer ratings (Sagarin & Pomeroy ratings are my estimation of where they'll be tomorrow):
Illinois: RPI = 75, ELO_CHESS = 63, PREDICTOR = 54, Pomeroy = 53
Minnesota: RPI = 61, ELO_CHESS = 57, PREDICTOR = 21, Pomeroy = 18
Edge: Minnesota

Final verdict: This Big Ten match-up won't happen if Minnesota wins today. But with so little time between the end of that game and the final announcement, I've got to do what the Selection Committee does which is to break this stuff down while the game is still going on. That said, I don't think there's really much debate here. Illinois finished one game better during the Big Ten regular season, but that's more than made up for by Minnesota's better Big Ten tournament performance. And while Illinois does have fewer bad losses, the Selection Committee has shown that they don't really care about those, and Minnesota's better set of wins carries the day. And the computers are all overwhelming in saying that Minnesota is the better team with the better resume. So I don't see any question here: Minnesota gets in over Illinois.

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