2013-2014 Bracketology thread

[Play Angry]

When exactly do you think I got mad? Was it when I posted about your "condescending scorn," "vigor of a coke fiend," complained about your "walls of text," called you dishonest, or called you "one of those" ?

Please pick out one point in any of my posts there that could be construed as being mad at you. You've taken five shots at me in your last two posts. I've taken none at you.

I'm not arguing with you. Arguing requires an emotional reaction to the other person ... you are arguing with me. I absolutely enjoy debate, but I generally do it happily and refrain from taking petty pot shots until others do so first. Such as you've done here. Repeatedly.

I stopped "arguing" with you because I saw it was going to become something more than a friendly debate with you very fast, which is how I intended it. Your further meltdown is showing that I was right to disengage.

This is some impressive sensitivity and revisionism.

Really, it's shame on me for engaging the argument guy. I concede. Back to basketball.

[rlh04d]

This is some impressive sensitivity and revisionism.

Really, it's shame on me for engaging the argument guy. I concede. Back to basketball.

Cute. Sensitivity like having a meltdown because someone disagreed with you?

Any time you want to have a debate, let me know. Any time you want to descend into childish name calling because the generic strategy of "people like you" is to go on the attack to hide the weaknesses of your argument, I'll pass.

Now make another personal shot so you can get the last word in while passive aggressively pretending you don't actually care.

[Play Angry]

M. Night Shyamalan twist: guy screaming about everyone else having meltdowns is the one melting down.

Take it to PM if you want to continue your rant.

[SHOXMVC]

M. Night Shyamalan twist: guy screaming about everyone else having meltdowns is the one melting down.

Take it to PM if you want to continue your rant.

You guys sound like the recent rant me and ABC recently had on SN (I guess ABC was the one ranting though).

[TheAsianSensation]

I've lost the plot of this thread.

Meanwhile, in other news, Syracuse is about to render every argument involving itself and the 1 line moot. What the hell?

[rlh04d]

M. Night Shyamalan twist: guy screaming about everyone else having meltdowns is the one melting down.

Take it to PM if you want to continue your rant.

Now make another personal shot so you can get the last word in while passive aggressively pretending you don't actually care.

[rlh04d]

Meanwhile, in other news, Syracuse is about to render every argument involving itself and the 1 line moot. What the hell?

Down by 12 to Georgia Tech at home? Wow. They're lucky they don't play VT again.

[TheAsianSensation]

Update: If Wichita wins out, who can still finish ahead of them on the S-Curve? This assumes everyone wins out.

Definitely: Florida, Arizona (Florida might even be able to survive a loss to Kentucky, and Arizona at Oregon)

I say definitely, others may disagree: Kansas

Maybe: Wisconsin, Duke, Michigan, Villanova

Probably not, but not impossible: Michigan St, Virginia

Off the board for insubordination: Syracuse

The one dagger scenario is still in play where Florida/Arizona/Kansas/Wisky win out. I moved Wisky down a tier because Michigan now has the solo B1G title, but man, Wisky's profile is rock-solid. Wisky, not Duke, is the threat.

Public sentiment is starting to form in Wichita's favor, and everyone is low-rating San Diego St, so they're off the board. Iowa St and Creighton off the board for obvious reasons as well.

[Wufan]

34-0 with an RPI of 5 trumps anything that anyone else can do. Winning St Louis locks it in for the Shockers.

[CBB_Fan]

It also helps that Wichita State has been moving up the other statistical rankings. They are up to #6 in KenPom, #1 in Nolan's Power Index, #1 in Sagarin's Elo Ratings, and of course #2 in the polls.

Sagarin ELO is based heavily on winning. i.e. the team with the most wins will be #1, and that is Wichita. I doubt anyone seriously looks at ELO as a guage for comparing two teams, its at least as bad and probably worse than RPI.

It was used mostly as an example of a high rating rather than as an argument in and of itself. Alternatively, these are the rankings where Wichita State is ranked #1 or #2 (currently #5 in the Massey Composite, which combines 60 different rankings):

#2 Massey (separate from composite)
#2 Team Rankings
#1 Baker-Bradley Terry
#1 Donchess Inference
#1 Wolfe
#1 Krache
#2 Rothman
#2 Wilson
#2 Sports Ratings
#2 RT Power
#1 Sagarin Elo
#1 Snapper's World
#1 Marchpool
#1 Nolan
#2 Tulsa World
#2 D1A Sports
#2 AP Poll
#2 Coaches

Our mean was 6.67, but our SD was huge at 5.56 (most of the Top 10 had a SD of 3 or less). The Massey Composite seems to rank teams based solely on their mean from wide variety of rankings with different criteria instead of relying on one statistical measure or subjective rating. However, the SD puts us nearly with 1 SD of the 1.00, which is only true for Wichita State and Arizona.

What this means is that criteria heavily favor us as a #1 or even the #1 overall, while others barely put us in the top 25 (lowest score was 21). The Elo rating is a perfect example of the former. Whereas rankings that put heavy emphasis on margin of victory and strength of schedule (like the BVL least squares or SRS) are an example of the latter. By those standards, Wichita State's average opponent was almost a perfectly average team and they would have needed to win by around 25 PPG to have the top spot (Arizona at 24.76 SRS).

As the year goes by, the objective measures that rely on efficiency and simple win rate and the subject measures that rely on human analysis have begun to rate us fairly consistently as a top-seed level program. That was the point I was trying to make in my previous post. If only one type of rating or analysis favored us we would have an even higher SD and a lower mean.