It’s a Monday, and it’s now time to formally start the process known as Bracketology—predicting the teams that will make up March’s NCAA Tournament field.
Here are the facts:
• Sixteen teams are selected to participate in the national tournament.
• There are four regional sites (East — Providence, R.I.; Northeast — Manchester, N.H.; Midwest — Toledo, Ohio; West — Grand Rapids, Mich.).
• A host institution which is invited to the tournament plays in the regional for which it is the host and cannot be moved. There are four host institutions this year: Brown in Providence, New Hampshire in Manchester, Bowling Green in Toledo and Michigan in Grand Rapids.
• Seedings will not be switched, as opposed to years past. To avoid undesirable first-round matchups, including intra-conference games (see below), teams will be moved among regionals, not reseeded.
Knowing those, let’s give you the top twenty teams in the latest iteration of the Pairwise rankings. They are, in order: Quinnipiac, Minnesota, Boston College, New Hampshire, Yale, North Dakota, UMass-Lowell, Miami-Ohio, Dartmouth, Notre Dame, Denver, Western Michigan, Boston University, St. Cloud State, Minnesota State, Northern Michigan, Niagara, Alaska-Fairbanks, Nebraska-Omaha, and Cornell.
We determine the top sixteen by taking the five conference champions (assumed) along with eleven teams that are determined via at-large bids by the NCAA committee. These are, with Niagara in as the Atlantic Hockey assumed champion: Quinnipiac, Minnesota, Boston College, New Hampshire, Yale, North Dakota, UMass-Lowell, Miami-Ohio, Dartmouth, Notre Dame, Denver, Western Michigan, Boston University, St. Cloud State, Minnesota State, and Niagara. Niagara effectively replaces Northern Michigan in this regard.
Let’s now assign the seeds. Notice how I’m identifying them by band, as you cannot move a team in one band to another band to avoid an undesirable first round matchup (inter-conference):
1 Seeds: Quinnipiac, Minnesota, Boston College, New Hampshire
2 Seeds: Yale, North Dakota, UMass-Lowell, Miami-Ohio
3 Seeds: Dartmouth, Notre Dame, Denver, Western Michigan
4 Seeds: Boston University, St Cloud State, Minnesota State, Niagara
Our bracketing system is such where one regional seeds seeds 1, 8, 9, and 16 together. 2, 7, 10, and 15 make another regional, while seeds 3, 6, 11, and 14 make up the third regional. Finally, seeds 4, 5, 12, and 13 make up the last one.
Our default bracket, with the top four seeds placed in regionals, looks like this:
Toledo
1 Quinnipiac
16 Niagara
8 Miami-Ohio
9 Dartmouth
Providence
3 Boston College
14 St. Cloud State
6 North Dakota
11 Denver
Manchester
4 New Hampshire
13 Boston University
5 Yale
12 Western Michigan
Grand Rapids
2 Minnesota
15 Minnesota State
7 UMass-Lowell
10 Notre Dame
Remember that we cannot have any inter-conference games in the first round, and in the above bracket, I see three games that must be avoided. North Dakota-Denver, Minnesota-Minnesota State, and New Hampshire-Boston University.
From the above bracket, let’s move #15 Minnesota State to Toledo and replace them with #16 Niagara in Grand Rapids. Let’s then move #15 Niagara to Manchester, while moving #13 BU now to Grand Rapids. Let’s move #11 Denver to Grand Rapids, thus moving #10 Notre Dame to Providence. Finally, for attendance purposes, let’s move #12 Western Michigan to Grand Rapids while moving #10 Denver to Manchester. All of that gives you this:
Toledo
1 Quinnipiac
16 Minnesota State
8 Miami-Ohio
9 Dartmouth
Providence
3 Boston College
14 St. Cloud State
6 North Dakota
11 Notre Dame
Manchester
4 New Hampshire
13 Niagara
5 Yale
12 Denver
Grand Rapids
2 Minnesota
15 Boston University
7 UMass-Lowell
10 Western Michigan
Inter-conference games = gone. Attendance = improved. You have a balance of teams from western and eastern climes in each location, and the NCAA couldn’t be happier. I like the way this looks. That’s it…until next week.
Geoff Discher is Examiner.com's National College Hockey Examiner as well as the Minnesota Golden Gophers Hockey Examiner. Leave a comment below, or feel free to reach him at Disch61@hotmail.com with comments, story ideas, or any general talk surrounding college hockey. You can find him on Facebook as well by clicking here and here, joining the conversation from the social media side as well. He's always chock full of fact and opinion.
Until next time, I’ll see you at the rink!
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