Wednesday, March 05, 2008

Seems as if the new rule never existed.

EDIT: Yesterday College Hockey news was tipped off by their reporters Brett Gobe and Ron Ayers, about the handbook containing the following new line: "To be considered during the at-large selection process, a team must have an overall won-lost record of .500 or better a team with a sub .500 record would not qualify for the NCAA tourney unless they won their conference tourney." Seems that was untrue and happened to be a miss-print. Hum, that does seem odd that this new wording would appear in the hand book and then be deemed a misprint.

Seems the complaining about which teams are going to get into the NCAA tourney is starting even before the selection committee meets. If I am not mistaken the selection committee will on or about the 23rd of March after all of the conference tournaments have been decided.

There are a number of college hockey fans that are upset with the high number of WCHA teams with less than stellar records sitting above the likes of Notre Dame, Princeton, Harvard in the PairWise Rankings. Also, there is a good chance that there will be teams with winning records that will not make the NCAA tourney. There is also a slight possibility that teams with a losing record might qualify for the NCAA tourney despite having a sub 500 record, this is based on their strong strength of schedule. While highly unlikely that is the reality of the NCAA tourney selection based on the PairWise Rankings.

The likelihood of that happening really isn't as good as it appears. Currently 8 teams in the WCHA are in the running for an NCAA bid with three weeks left in the season. The key word is currently, a lot will change between now and March 23rd. UND, C.C., DU, SCSU and Minnesota State University are looking like they have a good chance of dancing when the NCAA selection committee makes it's selections for the NCAA tourney. Minnesota, Wisconsin, UMD are going to need some serious help. That is why I believe some are getting way too excited about nothing. I do think eventually you will see a rule that states that a team needs to have a record above .500 to be considered for an at large bid, unless you qualify by winning your conference tourney.

Not so fast folks the rule never existed.

If you look at the PairWise Rankings you will see that there are 4 WCHA teams sitting in the 11-13 spots that could get into the NCAA tourney if the selection committee met today. In reality this is not going to happen because there is going to be a massive fratacide that is going to take place during the WCHA playoffs. In reality there are only going to be 5-6 teams that make the NCAA tourney. More than likely their will be 5 WCHA teams that make the NCAA tourney. These five teams will be participants from the Final Five.

11 Minnesota State 17-13-4 .5588 (10th)
12 Minnesota 14-13-9 .5139 (8th)
13 Wisconsin 15-14-7 .5139 (3rd)
13 Minnesota-Duluth 12-14-6 (2nd)
15 Providence 14-13-5 4688 (17th)
16t Notre Dame 22-12-4 .6316 (27th)
16t Princeton 17-12-0 .5862 (34th)
18 Boston University 15-15-4 .5000 (12th)
19 Harvard 14-11-4 .5517 (33rd)

Strenght of Schedule (ranking)





5 comments:

  1. Whoa, Goon ... correction ... College Hockey News never printed a story that said a sub-.500 team wouldn't make the NCAAs. That was published by others. We heard this rumor and chased it down with the NCAA on Tuesday, and they told us that it was a misprint. So that's the story we ran. Our story was the correct one. -- Adam W. (CHN)

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  2. Isn't anybody skeptical that this was a 'misprint'?

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  3. Why? Why should anyone be skeptical? What reason would anyone in the NCAA have to put the line in, and then take it out? I realize everyone likes a good conspiracy theory, but it just doesn't make sense. ... From having spoken to the NCAA people and Minnesota's AD myself, I can tell you flat out that they were surprised it was even in there. It was just an honest mistake that was overlooked. This is not very hard to believe. Many other sports have that rule, so the people doing up the handbooks copied and pasted parts, and didn't take that out of the hockey book. They were thanking us for pointing it out to them before it got too late. -- Adam W. (CHN)

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  4. I can see the rule being enacted after all of the discussion of there being 8 WCHA teams in the mix this far into the season.

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  5. As someone, I believe on a U.Michigan blog, said does a team that is around .500 REALLY deserve a chance to win a National Title?

    I personally don't think a .500 teams deserves a title shot, reguardless of league, strenght of schedule, or any of that.

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