Bracketbuster

[agibson]

Hey wh, help me out. What's your source?  My recollection (mostly from following the annual VCU discussion) was that the RPI was a pretty good indicator of who was in, and who was out.  And had something to do with match-ups.  But that it was far from definitive.

I don't see anything at all on the Bracketbusters website about how the pairings are made.

Last year, details below, it looks about like I said.  RPI had something to do with it, but was hardly definitive.  (They went as far down as the 17th home and 17th away teams for 13 TV games.  Necessarily skipping over teams, including the #10 home team by RPI and the #11 away team.)

For last year's details:
Here are the RPI's from Jan 30, 2012, the day ESPN announced the TV games

http://www.vcuramnation.com/forums/threads/bracket-buster-2012-final-01-30-12-do-not-post-here.7481/

here are the TV pairings

http://www.cleveland.com/sports/college/index.ssf/2012/01/cleveland_state_akron_earn_tv.html

The number one away team, St. Mary's, was paired against the number two home team, Murray State.  Which pushed Creighton, the number one RPI home team, all the way down to the number three away team, Long Beach State (maybe skipping over conference rival Wichita State).

All together, it looks like the match-ups went:

H2-A1 (ESPN or ESPNU)
H1-A3 (conference reasons, otherwise best remaining teams) (ESPN2)
H7-A2 (Davidson name appeal?) (ESPN or ESPN2)
H3-A5 (ESPN or ESPN2)
H11-A4   (VCU name appeal?) (ESPN2)
H4-A6 (best remaining teams) (ESPN or ESN2)
H5-A7 (best remaining teams) (ESPNU)
H6-A9 (ESPNU)
H8-A13 (RPI 71 vs RPI 127!) (Ohio vs. UNC Asheville) (EPSN3)
H12-A8 (ESPNU)
H9-A15 (Missouri State vs. Old Dominion) (ESPNU)
H17-A10 (RPI 108 vs 112) (Loyola Marymount vs. us) (ESPNU)
H13-A17   (RPI 91, RPI 136) (Weber State vs. UT Arlington) (ESPN3)

For 13 games they went as far down as the 17th home and 17th away teams by RPI.
Skipping over H10 (RPI 83 Loyola, MD), A11 (RPI 113 Indiana State), etc.

It seems the match-ups were _sometimes_ "highest remaining RPI vs. highest remaining RPI, avoiding conference foes".  Maybe three of 13.  Otherwise other factors must have come into play.

[agibson]

Looking at the numbers today (no different than what talksalot posted, really) we can _maybe_ tolerate losing one of the two remaining games before the pairings are announced (Wright State, Green Bay).  But, it might push us down into the dangerous zone where a team lower than #13 might skip up over us.  Perhaps our name recognition, the ARC, the Drews, etc. might be enough to let us get a game even if we were down in the e.g. #15 range (losing two games?) - but who knows?

[truth219]

We won't lose....at least I don't see it happening

[vuweathernerd]

We won't lose....at least I don't see it happening

glad to see you've changed your tune from the early season frustration and panic

[truth219]

Well we finally have pulled it together. We finally started to win consistantly on the road against solid opponents. I hope its a good turn out tonight for the boys. I know ill be there with pops

[StlVUFan]

Plus we generally provide them (ESPN) with entertaining games and they love braodcasting from the ARC -- Miami (OH) and Detroit as examples.

[/b]

Don't forget about the beating we put on Missouri State with Dicky V in the house!

Just remembered the triple overtime win against Bowling Green at the ARC, which was also a BRacket Buster game as I recall.

Our bracketbuster game with Bowling Green was at their place, and we lost 87-70 in regulation.

[historyman]

OK... I had forgotten about Rob and Laura... but That Girl's parents were from New Rochelle; and as I recall, had many episodes with her and Donald going up there.... anyway... now you're gonna make me watch MeToo reruns to verify that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/That_Girl

According to wikipedia, Ann Marie was from Brewster, NY, which is across the state line from Danbury, CT. You could say that New Rochelle, which is in Westchester County on I-95, is on the way from Brewster to Manhattan.  I'm not saying your incorrect about New Rochelle but I could find no mention of it. The writers for That Girl were the same writers who wrote the Dick Van Dyke Show so it would make sense that they would use New Rochelle, probably a place they knew, in both shows.

[agibson]

After the Wright State win we're up to RPI 84 (before the game went final we had fallen back to 95 or so).  With some other teams dropping, we're currently the 6th best home RPI.  But it's close, #4 Akron is at 69, then 70, 84, 91, 92, 93, 95.

[wh]

Hey wh, help me out. What's your source?  My recollection (mostly from following the annual VCU discussion) was that the RPI was a pretty good indicator of who was in, and who was out.  And had something to do with match-ups.  But that it was far from definitive.

I don't see anything at all on the Bracketbusters website about how the pairings are made.

Last year, details below, it looks about like I said.  RPI had something to do with it, but was hardly definitive.  (They went as far down as the 17th home and 17th away teams for 13 TV games.  Necessarily skipping over teams, including the #10 home team by RPI and the #11 away team.)

If I recall correctly, every participating conference was guaranteed at least one TV game.  If a conference's top team RPI was below the cutoff, they replaced a higher team from a conference with more than 1 TV game.  I think that's why Indiana State didn't get a TV game.  They were the 6th and last MVC team in the top 13 RPI group, so they were lopped off in favor of someone from a conf. that didn't have a team in the top 13.

[agibson]

The America East and MEAC must have been upset.

[LaPorteAveApostle]

The America East and MEAC must have been upset.

When they lose, it's NEVER an upset.

[wh]

The America East and MEAC must have been upset.

Only 2 teams from America East and 3 from MEAC participated, thus they didn't get a TV guarantee.  Any other questions, or can we put this to bed now?

[EddieCabot]

The America East and MEAC must have been upset.

Only 2 teams from America East and 3 from MEAC participated, thus they didn't get a TV guarantee.  Any other questions, or can we put this to bed now?

It would appear that wh knows his stuff here ... keep challenging him if you'd like, but I'll assume he's correct until someone proves him wrong.

[valpocleveland]

1/21 Predictions with current RPI's and records against Div 1 Opponents:
Wichita State (15,17-2) vs. ND State (53,14-4)
Belmont (24,13-4) vs. Creighton (22,17-2)
Indiana St (47,11-6) vs. SD State (60,12-6)
St Mary's (62,14-4) vs. SF Austin (69,12-1)
Akron (68,12-4) vs Eastern Kentucky (71,14-4)
Valpo (83,14-5) vs. Loyola Md (108,13-6)

At this point I think the Belmont/Creighton matchup is a lock. Unfortunately for Wichita St there is not another top 25 rpi away team for them to play (one of the reasons BB is over after this year, too many top mid-majors dropping out). SD State hosts ND State on Saturday so this could move things around. SF Austin and Utah St are two teams with great records but their weak SOS bring them down. Would like to see Valpo play someone with a higher RPI than them but they might be the odd team out at this point. RPI wise they are matched with Detroit but this cannot happen. The next team would be Evansville but they are 10-8 so I went down to Loyola Md at 13-6.

Here is a good site that projects RPI's for 1/28. Be sure to read thorugh the details as they do not update projections daily.
http://www.rpiforecast.com/bb.html     

[oklahomamick]

I would like to get matched up with ORU.  I know its not the RPI team we want but its an old rival. 

[valpocleveland]

Can't happen, we are both hosting BB games.

[agibson]

It would appear that wh knows his stuff here ... keep challenging him if you'd like, but I'll assume he's correct until someone proves him wrong.

I'm still hoping for a cite.  Only because I've never seen ESPN explain their methodology at all.

[talksalot]

Hey, wh, is there anything in the "rules" that would allow us to say "NO THANK YOU" to the match-up?  I'm thinking that we would have said no, if not for the TV game, at LU-MMT....

[talksalot]

Just went to the original ESPN announcement ... "The 13 BracketBusters matchups will be announced Monday, Jan. 28 with dates, times and networks."... so we only have one more game to impress the judges... Wednesday night we really need a great crowd, great atmosphere... and a win!...

[valpocleveland]

We did our job now time for ESPN to do theirs. I know most of us are dreaming of drawing Creighton and some thought odds increased last night when they lost to Drake but I think what we need is the teams above us in RPI to lose before Monday (Belmont, St Mary's, and Akron). All 3 of these teams have stronger SOS and similar records to us.   

[valpo84]

Espn mid-major power rankings are out and we're in at 14. Should solidify a TV game for bracketbuster. If Ohio is an away team, that may be a good matchup or an old Summit v new Summit match with mid-major stars.

http://m.espn.go.com/general/blogs/blogpost?blogname=collegebasketballnation&id=73820

[agibson]

We've done what we can since Loyola, certainly, but it's hard to see us moving up from our current spot at #6 on the RPI list of home teams. A freak loss from Akron _might_ do it, two losses from St. Mary's might well do it - but I'm not sure one loss would.

Unfortunately, it's easier to imagine that we might move _down_.  St. Mary's is at 64, Akron 68, we're 84 (not changed much on the Green Bay win), and then it's knotted pretty tight (85, 88, 89, 91, 92, 94, 103, then the other two Horizon League squads at 114 and 117).

It's easy to imagine that the actions of others will impact our RPI enough to bump us down a couple of spots, or push others above us.

It does seem almost certain that we'll stay in the top 13.  We'd have to get awfully unlucky to fall that far (currently #13 is RPI 103 western michigan).

[vu72]

Just looking at the Sagarin's, we are currently 77th.  We want to play someone ranked higher and there are two teams very close to us and away teams with Ohio being ranked 75 and Denver 70.  If we want to play a team ranked higher than those two it would next be ND State at 57 and SF Austen at 54.  I don't think we get either and am currently thinking it will be Ohio.

There are 9 ESPN2 and ESPNU games in total with 5 on ESPN2.  We have a shot at ESPN2 but for sure will get a national tv game on the U.

[agibson]

My away spreadsheet's pretty out of date- I may be missing some teams that have risen.  But, just updating the numbers for the teams that were high a couple of weeks ago.

It looks like the home teams are running ~10 points ahead of the away.  We could be looking at a Loyola (Md), RPI 99, an Evansville, RPI 102, or, yes, an Ohio, RPI 111.  If we get promoted a bit for whatever reason, it could be the likes of SD State or Stephen Austin.  But, things being out of our hands now, we could well fall down the RPI ranks to an Iona, Denver, or whoever.

[LaPorteAveApostle]

This would be a good juncture to remind ESPN that since they invented a spiffy new stat (BPI), maybe they should use their own stat to plan the BracketBuster. 

We can only hope they do:  we're 72 on BPI and 86 in RPI (as calculated by ESPN)!

http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/bpi