Regional Hosting Predictions Redux

In past years, one of the more popular (and fun articles to write) were my NCAA Tournament projections. We now have the NCAA Power Index (NPI) giving you weekly projections and Ned and the Latvians given you almost daily projections. That basically makes me obsolete. Of course, it’s also fun to write about NPI and I think there are a number of articles in the future that will be written about the unintended consequences of the formula. (I’ll just let that sit there.) Another popular article from the past that is still relevant is predicting the hosting sites and composition of the regionals. Thankfully, this is something Ricky loves to do and he has shared with me his latest best guess. I guess Ricky is making me obsolete, too.

Let me start this off by giving Ricky a “get out of jail free” card. What you are about to see are general ideas and concepts. There are some repeat matchups that the NCAA will try to avoid. More work is needed to flesh this out but it’s too early for that kind of work. Oh, and this projection was done through the Sunday matches and we had a change to the Top 8 since then. It doesn’t affect things as you’ll see below. I will say that it will be very interesting to see what Ricky comes up with on Selection Eve and how that compares with what the Selection Committee comes up with.

Looking at Ricky’s work, he is protecting the Top 8, letting them all host (now that Oshkosh has moved past Salisbury), keeping flights to a minimum and (I think) trying to even protect the Top 16! He really is a master at this and probably should be a paid consultant to the Selection Committee. (It probably doesn’t help that his buddy releases the information for free on his website.) Dang! I just noticed that he also does a good job of getting the Top 32 in a top 4 seed in each regional. Only two teams outside of the Top 32 get a top 4 seed! His consulting fee has just skyrocketed!

Starting off with the Juniata Regional:

1 Juniata 17 Ithaca 22 Gettysburg 35 Ohio Northern32 Eastern 41 Gallaudet 68 Allegheny 258 Marymount

In this bracket, we have Juniata facing off against Marymount out of the Atlantic East. This is truly the top team in the country playing the lowest ranked team in the country. The #2 seed is Ithaca who will draw Allegheny in the first round. (It should be pointed out that this is one regional without two Top 16 teams but 17 is pretty close.) The number 3 seed in this bracket is Gettysburg who will play Gallaudet. The number 4 seed is Ohio Northern who will play Eastern in a fascinating match. I think both the 3/6 and 4/5 matches should be close affairs.

Here is the MIT Regional:

2 MIT 15 Franklin & Marshall 21 William Smith 30 NYU36 Endicott 60 Lasell 140 Hunter 208 Alfred State

I always worry about these New England Regional and giving these teams a free pass because there are so many teams in a drivable distance. In this projection, we have MIT hosting Alfred State. The #2 seed F&M playing Hunter. The #3 seed William Smith playing Lasell and the #4 seed NYU playing Endicott. That 4/5 match would be a great one. I don’t think the other three will be that competitive. I might have complained a bit about this regional in the past, but I just think MIT is really good.

Here is the Johns Hopkins Regional:

3 Johns Hopkins 14 Case 20 Trinity (TX) 26 Babson39 Middlebury 50 William Paterson 83 Hartwick 153 Manhattanville

We have our first bolded team. I’m supposed to be meaner to Trinity according to a recent comment so a team in bold means they are guaranteed to lose in the first round. (It actually means that a bolded team needs a flight.) In this bracket we have the hosts playing Manhattanville with the 2 seed, Case Western Reserve, drawing Hartwick. Neither should be troubled. This is another bracket with a protected 16. I like the 3/6 and 4/5 matches with Trinity taking on William Paterson and Babson taking on Middlebury. Since Babson has played Middlebury this season, my guess would be that Trinity would play them instead and Babson would get William Paterson.

Here is the Emory Regional:

4 Emory 10 Washington and Lee 23 Whitworth 27 La Verne31 Centre 45 Transylvania 66 Methodist 94 Asbury Giving Emory a hosting gig is no small feat but is made much easier when the west doesn’t get to host, as is the case here in this projection. This is the first regional where I think things have gotten a little tougher but not for the first two seeds. Emory will draw Asbury while Washington & Lee will get Methodist. The fun begins with the 4/6 and 4/5 matches as Whitworth plays Transylvania and La Verne plays Centre. La Verne has already played Centre this year so we would probably see Transy and Centre switch seeding. Great matches, both. What allows Emory to host is being able to fly in two Region X teams. You’ll notice a 31 seed is not protected but really there is no difference in a 4 and 5 seed. You just have to wear a different colored jersey.

Here is the Hope Regional:

5 Hope 11 Whitewater 24 Platteville 29 Eau Claire37 Carnegie Mellon 43 Illinois Wesleyan 51 Coe 70 Edgewood

So far, this is the bracket of death. All 4 matches are tough ones here and no Marymount’s exist in this regional. Hope draws WIAC killer, Edgewood while UWW gets Coe. Both of these matches would be tough and competitive. The 3 seed is UW-Platteville and they would draw IWU. UW-Eau Claire is the 4 seed and they get a battle tested Carnegie Mellon. What a fun regional, as long as you are not in it!

Here is the Marietta Regional:

6 Marietta 13 Millikin 18 Christopher Newport 25 Virginia Wesleyan38 Stevens 42 Calvin 99 Wittenberg 141 Greenville

Ah, yes, I remember the day when Calvin was still an at-large. Yes, the latest update has them out with Smith replacing them. I don’t want to poo-poo on Ricky’s Regionals but that probably means Smith heads to either Colby or, more likely, MIT. The easy thing about sending them the almost 500 miles north is that we can use one of the flights there and send them here (or do some other cool Ricky thing). More on the Colby Regional in a second. I’m sort of meh on this regional. Good teams and I certainly like Millikin in this spot because I think they’ve been a top 8 eyeball team this season. Marietta is the host and 1 seed, however, and they will get Greenville. Millikin gets Wittenberg but this isn’t your momma’s Wittenberg anymore. CNU gets Calvin (or whomever is here) in a pretty good match while Virgnia Wesleyan draws Stevens. VWU has played Stevens so some adjustment would be made here.

Here is the long talked about Colby Regional:

7 Colby 16 East Texas Baptist 19 CMS 33 Southwestern34 Cortland 56 Plymouth 195 Maine Maritime 247 Westfield

Who wants to go to Maine?!? I do! Please make this happen. First, I need SU in the tournament. Make that happen! Then send them to a place the (hot) wife has been begging to go! No offense intended, Oshkosh. (We’ve already been there, you see.) There are three teams flying into this one, which is why it may make sense to take one of the MIT teams and drive them up here if Smith makes an at-large. Do we think the selection committee would send CMS basically from the southwest part of the country (sorry, Hawaii) and fly them to the northeast part of the country? I honestly don’t think CMS would complain for one second. In fact, the only complaints I heard last year with them flying to MIT was, well, from MIT. Fascinating bit of work here from Ricky. As for the projections, I still see a pretty balanced regional although a little easier than most. Colby gets Westfield in what should be an easy win. ETBU surprised last year and are not a secret this year getting Maine Maritime in a match that should go smoothly for them. (The subtle side note here is that I’ll have both CMS and ETBU parents buying me meals and drinks all weekend.) CMS gets Plymouth State while my Pirates get a really tough Cortland team. Like the MIT Regional, we may only have one difficult match in this one in the first round.

A challenger for the bracket of death, I give you the Salisbury UW-Oshkosh Regional:

8 Salisbury 9 Oshkosh 12 Washington (MO) 28 Chicago40 Stevens Point 49 Northwestern 54 Gustavus 93 Cornell

Just swap Salisbury and Oshkosh. You’ll notice Salisbury will have to fly into this one, which gives us 7 total flights. I think that plays for the Selection Committee. This is the only regional with 3 Top 16 teams, which isn’t great but, just think, this was normal just a few years ago. Heck this was tame a few years ago! Oshkosh would get Cornell and Salisbury would get GAC. Neither would be an easy match. Remember that GAC played and beat Oshkosh earlier this year so maybe something that would be avoided regardless of the seeding. WashU would draw a healthy Northwestern team but a team they also lost to earlier in the year. Of course, they also played UW-Stevens Point so not sure what you would do here. As it stands UWP would play Chicago who they happen to be scheduled to play this weekend. There is simply too much incest in this regional so either the NCAA says it’s best or moves some teams around. (I fear Ricky will not want to be associated with me after that last line but I’m laughing so it stays in.) Yeah, either this one (as it stands) or Hope are your toughest brackets. I guess you could keep Whitewater here and get Salisbury to Hope (still a flight). I’m not sure that helps anything with the real problem being five WIAC teams in two regionals who were not afraid to play other tough teams this season.

I will list the complete bracket below. I think this does give you an idea of what the Selection Committee is facing. What is not maybe understood is that this type of work was normally done on Selection Eve (which is really Selection Day for the NCAA as they announce the following day). With NPI, the committee can be doing the work Ricky is doing here and get pretty close with only a few tweaks needing to be done. This is why a flawed NPI may never go away. It simply makes the work of the NCAA so much easier.

I hope you enjoyed Ricky’s work here. I know I did. I think he did a great job protecting teams and making the regionals as fair as possible. One question I had was whether it’s worth being a host out of the WIAC. (And make no mistake that regardless of the Top 8, a WIAC team will be hosting.) Would it be better to be shipped off somewhere else? I think the answer is no because you still have to drive, there really isn’t anywhere safe to go!

Thanks to Ricky for his hard work. As always, you can find his site here.

Complete Bracket:

1 Juniata 17 Ithaca 22 Gettysburg 35 Ohio Northern 32 Eastern 41 Gallaudet 68 Allegheny 258 Marymount

2 MIT 15 Franklin & Marshall 21 William Smith 30 NYU 36 Endicott 60 Lasell 140 Hunter 208 Alfred State

3 Johns Hopkins 14 Case 20 Trinity (TX) 26 Babson 39 Middlebury 50 William Paterson 83 Hartwick 153 Manhattanville

4 Emory 10 Washington and Lee 23 Whitworth 27 La Verne 31 Centre 45 Transylvania 66 Methodist 94 Asbury

5 Hope 11 Whitewater 24 Platteville 29 Eau Claire 37 Carnegie Mellon 43 Illinois Wesleyan 51 Coe 70 Edgewood

6 Marietta 13 Millikin 18 Christopher Newport 25 Virginia Wesleyan 38 Stevens 42 Calvin 99 Wittenberg 141 Greenville

7 Colby 16 East Texas Baptist 19 CMS 33 Southwestern 34 Cortland 56 Plymouth 195 Maine Maritime 247 Westfield

8 Salisbury 9 Oshkosh 12 Washington (MO) 28 Chicago 40 Stevens Point 49 Northwestern 54 Gustavus 93 Cornell