NCAA Tournament Day One Open Thread
by Pete Rossman on Mar 18, 2010 10:00 AM CDT
in Basketball
36 comments
After what seems like years of waiting, one of the best days of basketball of the year is finally here. The good folks at CBS Sports have been kind enough to partner with SB Nation to provide us with links to watch the games online. Here it is:
Just click on the game you want to see, and if CBS isn't showing it in your area, you'll be able to watch it. Here's the link if you want a larger version of the player in another window: Launch Player
This is our first time using live video, so either comment in the thread or shoot me an e-mail at pete.rossman@gmail.com if you're having problems with the site.
Enough tech talk. LET THE GAMES...BEGIN!
36 comments | 0 recs |
T-shirts are waaaay better than books
by KJ@theonlycolors on Mar 18, 2010 9:59 AM CDT
in Basketball
2 comments
Slight change in plans: The prize for the nontraditional bracket contest will be one (1) free MSU-related t-shirt from Underground Printing. You may have noticed the new ads UGP is running on the site. Head over to their website to check out what looks like some high-quality Spartan gear.
There's just one hour left to get your contest entry in.
UPDATE: UGP will be providing prizes for both TOC bracket contests. And you'll get more than just one t-shirt: $50 gift certificate to each winner.
2 comments | 0 recs |
This just in: Blair White is RIPPED.
Now back to your regularly-scheduled programming.
Tournament Eve Thoughts
by KJ@theonlycolors on Mar 17, 2010 8:42 PM CDT
in Basketball
11 comments
I have to confess that I'm struggling with what to say about this team going into NCAA Tournament action. I think Friday's night loss has left an analytical fog hanging over me. But that was just one game--and one game that, despite the major issues with the playing rotation, Michigan State would have won with just a 60% free throw shooting performance.
Bigger picture, it still doesn't feel like MSU has put together many (if any) games this season in which it's played 40 minutes of high-quality basketball. Still, this season hasn't exactly been a complete disappointment, with another Big Ten championship banner now hanging from the Breslin Center rafters. This, despite the injury and other personnel issues that have cropped over the course of the season.
(Notice how every sentence in that paragraph has a direction-shifting word like "still" in it? I think that's a clear symptom of blogger ambivalence.)
Since the beginning of Big Ten play, MSU has a record of 14-2 in games in which the full contingent of major contributors has been available and (mostly) healthy. (Exclusions: Loss at Illinois without Lucas, loss to Purdue with a gimpy Lucas, loss to Minnesota in BTT without Allen.)
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Bracket Breakdown, Bradley-Terry Style
by SpartanDan on Mar 17, 2010 7:39 AM CDT
4 comments
[Bumped. Another tool for anyone who, like me, hasn't filled out their bracket yet. Dan, can you provide a little more technical information on how you calculate these ratings? Looks like a ton of work. -KJ]
(Alternate title: This Is Your Bracket on KRACH.)
Undoubtedly you have seen the log5 breakdowns of the bracket over at Basketball Prospectus, based on Ken Pomeroy's rankings. (If you haven't, what's stopping you? The link is to the Midwest preview, but the others are available as well.) You may also recall that back in December, I posted a short article on the Bradley-Terry ranking method (familiar to college hockey fans as KRACH) and applying it to college basketball as a potential RPI substitute. The main point in its favor is that exceptionally strong or weak opponents cannot have such a significant effect on strength of schedule that a loss raises your rating or a win lowers it; this is a significant flaw in the RPI (and some other record-only rating systems; it can happen in points-based rankings like Pomeroy's but that's because you won by less than his model predicted, so it's not really a flaw there). In fact, if you were to play the world's most awful team, a team that would never beat anyone, your rating would remain exactly unchanged (assuming you won). Likewise if you lost to a theoretically perfect team who had an infinite rating.
Another useful point about the Bradley-Terry method is that it, like Pomeroy's rankings, provides an easy method to calculate the odds of one team beating another: simply divide Team A's rating by the sum of (Team A's rating) and (Team B's rating), and you have Team A's probability of defeating Team B. (The formula for Pomeroy's rankings is only slightly more complex.) So I decided to do a similar bracket breakdown, giving odds of each and every team reaching each round.
Odds table after the jump.
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Linking Laconically is killing time until Thursday
by KJ@theonlycolors on Mar 16, 2010 10:43 PM CDT
in News Roundup
1 comment
- The State News : Blogs - Allen talks about suspension
"It was tough. Seeing plays if I was in I could have done something, it was just hurtful. I was just hurting so that humbled me a lot." Yeah. Us, too. - Tom Izzo defends his discipline of MSU players this season | detnews.com | The Detroit News
Allen practicing well according to Izzo. - Minnesota-Michigan State is top-rated basketball game in Big Ten Network's history | - MLive.com
Half a million people were watching. No wonder the team missed so many free throws. All that pressure. - Michigan State's Raymar Morgan, Kalin Lucas and Draymond Green selected as team MVPs | - MLive.com
Lucas and Morgan picked by players, Green by the media. I'd lean slightly toward Green, but they're all in the same ballpark. Morgan wins if you weight late-season performance more heavily. - Trash talk galore! | DETNEWS | Weblogs | Big Ten Blog
New Mexico State's leading scorer has never heard of Kalin Lucas. - Can Maryland Slow Down Houston's Aubrey Coleman? - Testudo Times
The game on the other side of the pod looks potentially entertaining. - Don't fall for 'em: The five most overrated teams - The Dagger - NCAAB Blog - Yahoo! Sports
I hope they're right about Maryland. - Basketball Prospectus | Articles | Tournament Preview: Midwest Musings
Only a 3.6% chance of making the Final Four under the KenPom log5 methodology. - Tom Izzo, Steve Mariucci set record straight on relationship | detnews.com | The Detroit News
TMI. - Pershing downs Southeastern in overtime | detnews.com | The Detroit News
29 and 7 for Keith Appling. Late-game steal made up for missed free throw. - Jefferson runs past Lehman for D-IV district title
Adreian Payne back in action after the dislocated shoulder: 14 points, 11 rebounds. - Where does Trey Zeigler fit best? - ESPN
Options are UCLA/U-M/MSU/CMU/Duke. MSU still doesn't have scholarship spot officially open. - Scouting & Video: Trey Zeigler vs. Flint NW | UM Hoops.com
Dylan with the first-hand scouting report; free throw shooting an issue. - Iowa outlines hoops job in ad | Hawkmania
Hey, I have a master's degree! - Playing the name game | Hawkmania
Brian Gregory a potential candidate to replace Todd Lickliter? Not sure I want two former Izzo assistants in the Big Ten. - Broadcaster Bill Raftery prepares for his 28th NCAA tournament - The Bonus - SI.com
Good read. - Big Ten Prospectus - What Is Your Team Really Worth to the Conference? - The Rivalry, Esq.
Interesting: Blind formulating puts MSU at #4, behind UM/OSU/PSU. - WhatIfSports.com: Big Ten Network Bracket of Classics, College Basketball Tournament
Apparently, NCAA sanctions prevent the Fab Five teams from even participating in hypothetical tournaments. 79, 00, and 09 teams in for MSU. - Michigan's only known wolverine is dead | - MLive.com
Autopsy showed it died of a broken heart. Hardy, har, har.
1 comment | 0 recs |
Smarter Than the Average NCAA Tournament Bracket Contest, Boo Boo
by KJ@theonlycolors on Mar 16, 2010 5:55 PM CDT
in Basketball
41 comments
Other contests:
- The BTT Bracket contest ended in a tie between KarkoviceIsHawt, spartyboy40, and SpartanDan. All three entrants had Ohio State winning the tournament, Illinois and Purdue in the semifinals, and 2 of the 3 first-day winners correct. And they were each one possession off on the tie-breaker. That means we go to a random draw for the prize. The accounting firm of My Five-Year Old Son Rolling a Die conducted the draw. The winner of one copy of When March Went Mad is [drumroll] spartyboy40. Send me me your name and mailing address, sir (or madam), and we'll get the book right out to you. Kudos to all three first-place finishers.
- Pete's more traditional NCAA Tournament contest is here. (He's so old-fashioned. But his version does have automated scoring.)
The Smarter-than-Average Contest
Any schmuck can fill out a bracket by picking the higher seed in almost every game. This blog’s readers deserve a more intellectually-demanding competition. Hence the contest I've run the last three years (and by "run," I mean "post the rules for and hope that SpartanDan graciously takes care of actually keeping tracks of the scores again").
Here are the rules (same as last year):
- Each entrant picks a list of 16 teams from the 65-team NCAA bracket.
- For each game a team on your list wins, you receive points equal to the team’s seed. Example: If you pick an 8 seed and they win 2 games before losing in the third round, you get 16 points. This creates an incentive to look for lower-seeded teams likely to pull upsets.
- There are bonuses of (a) 1 point for making the Final Four, (b) 3 points for making the championship game, and (c) 5 points for winning the national championship. So picking a 1 seed who wins the national championship would be worth 15 points (6 points for their 6 wins plus 9 points for the three bonuses). This keeps the top seeds in play as potential picks.
Entries must be posted in the comments section of this blog post by noon on Thursday. Just list your 16 teams in any order. The tie-breaker is the number of possessions in the championship game (as determined by StatSheet).
Here’s the official bracket. Get those mental gears turning. Winner gets a book (the same one).
41 comments | 0 recs |
TOC Traditional Bracket Challenge
KJ will have his bracket challenge he ran at the ol' Spartans Weblog up sometime tonight or tomorrow. If you want to do a more traditional bracket, here's the information to join The Only Colors group on ESPN:
Group Name: The Only Colors
Group Password: Green5
Winner gets a random book I have lying around my apartment. It could be God Bless You Mr. Rosewater, or it could be The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, if you're lucky.
Because I want everyone to do their best, here's a tip - totally pick New Mexico and Purdue to make the Final Four. I'll be picking them too *stifles laugh*.
2 days ago
Pete Rossman
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