More Tournament Nonsense

But first...I watched Casino Royale this weekend. It's the best Bond movie in quite a while. Daniel Craig makes a very good 007. He's a little bit more mean-spirited than some of the previous incarnations as well. The movie was a tad too long (it went an hour before the main plot even started) but overall it was good times.

I did a ranking of the 16 teams remaining. That was based solely on my feelings of their "quality". But what about chances to win the national title? Surely that is different as some teams draws may be easier? Well it is. I did some calculations using Ken Pomeroy's ratings this weekend and thought I'd post them. He's already posted odds on his web site, but his numbers are very slightly different than mine. I think the biggest difference was 0.05%. So I'll rank based on my percentages. The ranking would be the same whether I used his numbers or mine. Just slightly different numbers.

1. Kansas: 22.68%
2. North Carolina: 22.24%
3. Florida: 16.95%
4. Ohio State: 9.59%
5. Georgetown 9.00%
6. Texas A&M: 6.81%
7. UCLA: 5.55%
8. Memphis 2.64%
9. Pittsburgh: 1.37%
10. Oregon: 1.24%
11. Butler 0.61%
12. Southern Illinois: 0.32%
13. USC: 0.30%
14. UNLV: 0.28%
15. Tennessee: 0.26% (sorry Ashley)
16. Vanderbilt: 0.18%

If you think these numbers are accurate, then it is looking good for my List of Eight. At the start of the tournament, I calculated that the national champion would come from my list was around 86.69%. Even without Wisconsin, the odds are up to 92.82%. It looks as if the only three possible candidates to put the list in danger are Memphis and Pittsburgh (which I expected before the tournament) and Oregon which seems to be getting the break in every matchup.

I ranked UNLV as the weakest team (which may be unfair but whatever). So how are they in front of Tennessee and Vanderbilt? Tennessee has to play #1 Ohio State. Vanderbilt has to play #2 Georgetown. UNLV gets to play a weak #3 seed Oregon. That's just the way things work.

What's interesting is the shuffling of the #1 seeds. I picked UNC to win it all because I thought they had the best chance of winning it. But Kansas has actually overtaken them in the odds. I'm guessing this is based on Kansas looking more impressive so far. But it also has something to do with potential Final Four matches. Kansas's potential foes are Florida, Oregon, Butler, and UNLV. North Carolina's are Texas A&M, Tennessee, Memphis, and Texas A&M. Since the best teams in the South have kept winning and the Midwest powers like Maryland, Notre Dame, Wisconsin, and Georgia Tech are out, Kansas's road has improved quite a bit more than Carolina's.

Also before the tournament, I thought Florida had the least likely chance of winning it all of the #1 seeds. Now with all the teams losing in their bracket, they've moved ahead of Ohio State and now have the best odds of any team to reach the Final Four. Once again this is because the "weaker" teams in their bracket keep winning. In Ohio State's bracket the teams I expected to be in the Sweet 16 are there. Also, Ohio State's near loss to Xavier didn't help their rating.

To close, these numbers are fun and somewhat helpful. But they aren't gospel. They only factor in past performance. They don't take into account intangibles such as emotion, injuries, momentum, etc. So sometimes their predictive abilities are weak. Of course I used them to fill out my bracket and I still have seven of eight Elite Eight teams left and all my Final Four teams. Of course I shouldn't speak too soon. I did the same last year, had all my Final Four teams left in the Elite Eight and lost all of them. So let's not count chickens before they've hatched.