Friday, February 26, 2010

Men's seed race 2/26/2010

Scores from 2/25/2009:


Wright State 76 Youngstown State 73
UIC 78 Green Bay 71
Milwaukee 63 Loyola 61
Detroit 65 Cleveland State 54

Seed Team Conf 1st round matchup
---- ---------- ---- -----------------
#1 Butler 17-0 Has clinched #1 seed and double-bye
#2 Wright State 12-5 Has clinched #2 seed and double-bye
#3 Green Bay 10-7 Would host #10 Youngstown State
#4 Valparaiso 10-7 Would host #9 UIC
#5 Milwaukee 9-8 Would host #8 Loyola
#6 Cleveland State 9-8 Would host #7 Detroit
#7 Detroit 8-9
#8 Loyola 5-12
#9 UIC 3-14
#10 Youngstown State 2-15

With a win tonight, Wright State clinched the #2 seed. They don't even need a tiebreaker because Green Bay inexplicably lost at UIC.

Loyola had already clinched the 8 seed, but now they can't even tie Detroit, so there's no longer any scenarios where Detroit/Loyola is looked at as a common opponent.

UIC clinched the 9 seed because even if they lose to Milwaukee and YSU beats Detroit, UIC's victory over Green Bay breaks the tie (YSU was swept by the Phoenix).

There remains now 5 teams jockeying for seeds 3 through 7. Again, they aren't all fighting for all 5 spots of course.

All scenarios needing the RPI tiebreaker have now been eliminated. As a matter of fact, this analysis as usual gets a lot simpler. We just reduced the number of scenarios from 512 to 32.

Green Bay: can clinch 3 seed with a win and a VU loss. Otherwise they will get the 4 seed. They have clinched a first round home game.

Valparaiso: can clinch the 3 seed with a win over Butler, because they split with Green Bay (the only other team that can reach 11-7), and Butler swept Green Bay. With a 10-8 record, they can still get the 4 seed if both CSU and Milwaukee lose on Saturday. If either CSU or Milwaukee wins and the other loses, Valpo gets the 5 seed. If they both win, Valpo slips all the way to the 6 seed. Again, Valpo loses each of these tiebreakers because they were swept by WSU while the others split with them. They have clinched a home game in the first round.

Cleveland State: can clinch the 4 seed with a win if Milwaukee and VU both lose. They can clinch the 5 seed with a win and either a Milwaukee loss or a VU loss. If both Milwaukee and VU win, CSU clinches the 6 seed with a win. If CSU loses to finish 9-9, they need Detroit to lose and either a Milwaukee loss or a VU loss as well to clinch the 6 seed. If Detroit wins, CSU gets the 7 seed because they lose the tiebreaker, having been swept by Detroit.

Milwaukee: can clinch the 4 seed if they win and Valpo loses (Green Bay keeps them from the 3 seed because they swept Detroit, but they trump Valpo by splitting with WSU) and CSU (by splitting with Detroit) in a tie for 4th. They can still clinch the 5 seed with a win if Valpo wins. If they lose, they can still get the 5 seed if both CSU and Detroit lose. Otherwise, Milwaukee ends up with the 6 seed. They have clinched a home game in the first round.

Detroit: can clinch the 5 seed if they win, CSU loses, and Milwaukee loses. In a 3-way tie with CSU and Milwaukee, Detroit's sweep of CSU paired with Milwaukee's splitting with each team immediately establishes the heirarchy Detroit, Milwaukee, CSU. They can still clinch the 6 seed if they win, CSU loses, and Milwaukee wins. They win the tiebreaker with CSU by sweeping them, but they lose a tiebreaker with Milwaukee because they were swept by WSU. So, CSU wins, even at 9-9, Detroit is the 7 seed. Of course, if they lose, they have the 7 seed outright.

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