2020 NCAA Tournament

[Greek Tragedy]

While I'm on the topic, Platteville v St. Thomas in a 2nd round matchup? Just another reason to make it a national tournament, rather than regionally.

[Greek Tragedy]

Big upset at Goldfarb Gym in Baltimore, as host Johns Hopkins goes down in overtime to first-time tourney participant PSU-Harrisburg, 104-96, behind Donyae Baylor-Carroll's 45 points. JHU star Connor Delaney was hurt and missed most of the game.

Did the ban of fans attending the JHU-PSU-Harrisburg game make it almost a "Neutral Court"? Just thinking...

There's probably less of a home court advantage, but you get familiar lockerrooms and a normal schedule.  It's definitely not netural.

I did a little research on this in grad school. Crowd support is an oft-cited home advantage factor, but based on a study of European soccer where teams would have to play in front of empty crowds, or another that factored in two clubs that shared a stadium, crowd support isn't as big a factor as you think it would be. I'd have to go back and look at the actual study and data though.

I really don't think you can compare soccer and basketball. In basketball, the crowd is right on top of you, it's indoors, so the noise level can be a lot louder than an outdoor stadium.

[Ryan Scott (Hoops Fan)]

While I'm on the topic, Platteville v St. Thomas in a 2nd round matchup? Just another reason to make it a national tournament, rather than regionally.

This is obviously the one that happens due to geography.  One extra flight and we'd be able to seed it a little better - switch St Thomas and Benedictine, for example.  You'd love to see NCC and UWO meet later, but Oshkosh's record justifies their spot.

[jamtod]

Big upset at Goldfarb Gym in Baltimore, as host Johns Hopkins goes down in overtime to first-time tourney participant PSU-Harrisburg, 104-96, behind Donyae Baylor-Carroll's 45 points. JHU star Connor Delaney was hurt and missed most of the game.

Did the ban of fans attending the JHU-PSU-Harrisburg game make it almost a "Neutral Court"? Just thinking...

There's probably less of a home court advantage, but you get familiar lockerrooms and a normal schedule.  It's definitely not netural.

I did a little research on this in grad school. Crowd support is an oft-cited home advantage factor, but based on a study of European soccer where teams would have to play in front of empty crowds, or another that factored in two clubs that shared a stadium, crowd support isn't as big a factor as you think it would be. I'd have to go back and look at the actual study and data though.

I've read some of these studies, mostly at the professional level and the conclusion was that home crowds subtly impacted refereeing decisions, to account for the slight home field advantage.
Not sure how this translates to D3

[Titan Q]

You'd love to see NCC and UWO meet later, but Oshkosh's record justifies their spot.

When you say "Oshkosh's record justifies their spot", I think that is one of the challenges of the selection/seeding process -- the weighting on winning percentage.

Oshkosh's final resume was: .704/.601/6-6.

In the D3 selection/seeding process, that is considered kinda "bubble" because of the .704. But for me, that should be considered a great resume.  I mean a .704 WP vs a .601 SOS...12 games played vs RRO and 6 wins.

Since the D3 selection/seeding process is heavily data-driven (WP/SOS/RRO), a few other data-driven sources for us to consider:

* Massey has Oshkosh #8 in the country - https://www.masseyratings.com/cb2020/ncaa-d3/ratings.

* Matt Snyder's Efficiency Ratings have Oshkosh #10 - http://tomaroonandgold.blogspot.com/p/division-iii-mens-basketball-efficiency.html

* Matt Snyder's RPI system, using WP/SOS/RRO, has Oshkosh #15 - https://tomaroonandgold.blogspot.com/p/division-iii-mens-regional-rankings.html

In other words, these analytics-based sources have Oshkosh as a highly ranked team -- which I believe most of us, based on the eye test, would agree with. 

These databases seem to capture the realistic ranking of Oshkosh a lot better than the D3 selection process does...because the D3 selection process is so heavily WP weighted.

[Gregory Sager]

This is what Massey is predicting for today:

Swarthmore 83, Ithaca 77	(SC 70%, IC 30%)
UT-Dallas 75, Whitworth 72	(UTD 58%, WU 42%)
Brockport 83, Middlebury 79	CB 63%, MC 37%)
Tufts 70, RPI 64	(TU 72%, RPI 28%)
UW-Platteville 72, St. Thomas (MN) 71	(UWP 52%, UST 48%)
St. John's 69, UW-Eau Claire 59	(SJU 82%, UWEC 18%)
Emory 84, Pomona-Pitzer 80	(EU 62%, PP 38%)
Elmhurst 82, Grove City 65	(EC 93%, GCC 7%)
Mount Union 84, York (PA) 73	(UMU 84%, YCP 16%)
Wittenberg 78, Susquehanna 69	(WU 81%, SU 19%)
Randolph-Macon 71, TCNJ 63	(RMC 78%, TCNJ 22%)
Yeshiva 88, PSU-Harrisburg 78	(YU 82%, PSUH 18%)
Springfield 72, Hobart 66	(SC 69%, HWSC 21%)
Christopher Newport 82, Nichols 71	(CNU 83%, NC 17%)
Nebraska Wesleyan 77, Washington (MO) 73	(NWU 63%, WU 37%)
UW-Oshkosh 70, North Central (IL) 69	(UWO 52%, NCC 48%)

[thebear]

Penn State Harrisburg vs. Yeshiva - at Johns Hopkins, last game tonight.

Intriguing matchup - PS-H has Donyae Baylor-Carroll, all 5'7" of him, who went off for 45 last night against Johns Hopkins, against 6'7" Ryan Turell from Yeshiva who had 41 against WPI in the first round.  Imagine both listed as guards, but a foot difference in height.

Yeshiva also has 6'5" Gabriel Liefer, who is averaging 16 points 13 rebounds and 7 assists per game, who was held a bit in check by WPI last night with 4 pts, 8 rebs, and 8 assists.

[Veni Vidi Vici]

Second round games I'm interested in today:

All of 'em

[sac]

While I'm on the topic, Platteville v St. Thomas in a 2nd round matchup? Just another reason to make it a national tournament, rather than regionally.

This is essentially the St. Thomas vs Neb. Wesleyan match-up of a year ago in the 2nd round in Lincoln.

[SpringSt7]

Wish they did the staggered starts for today's games as well---the change to that yesterday was awesome.

[WUPHF]

How about Friday-Saturday and Saturday-Sunday games?

[Pat Coleman]

Wish they did the staggered starts for today's games as well---the change to that yesterday was awesome.

They are staggered -- the old textbook would be that everyone started at 7 p.m. local time.

[SpringSt7]

Wish they did the staggered starts for today's games as well---the change to that yesterday was awesome.

They are staggered -- the old textbook would be that everyone started at 7 p.m. local time.

Maybe I'm just greedy and wanted to watch basketball all day!

[Greek Tragedy]

Brock holds on 84-81. Middlebury with a good look at a corner 3 for the win. Brock nearly shot themselves in the foot missing FTs at the end. A lane violation, by the FT shooter after a miss gave Middlebury a shot to win with about 8 seconds left.

[Gregory Sager]

Brock holds on 84-81. Middlebury with a good look at a corner 3 for the win. Brock nearly shot themselves in the foot missing FTs at the end. A lane violation, by the FT shooter after a miss gave Middlebury a shot to win with about 8 seconds left.

Ken Massey's computer nearly prognosticated that one perfectly.