- Bracketology
Bracketology is the process of predicting the field of the NCAA Basketball Tournament, named as such because it is commonly used to fill in tournament brackets for the postseason. It incorporates some method of predicting what the
NCAA Selection Committee will use as itsRatings Percentage Index in order to determine at-large (non-conference winning) teams to complete the field of 65 teams, and, to seed the field by ranking all teams from first through sixty-fifth.ESPN 'sJoe Lunardi is the inventor of the term "bracketology", starting first as the owner and editor of the Blue Ribbon College Basketball Yearbook and ending up with a gig as the resident bracketologist on ESPN. [http://home.hamptonroads.com/stories/story.cfm?story=100214&ran=19569]Process
Using the
NCAA basketball tournament selection process , the RPI, and the seeding and balancing process, a "bracketologist" places teams in the tournament in the various regions (East, West, Midwest, and South). Some bracketologists go as far as placing teams in which "pods" they will play in the first and second rounds.Fact|date=March 2008 Generally, the lists also show the last four teams in and the first four teams out. However, these brackets change daily as conference tournaments continue and teams automatically qualify for the tournament.A bracketologist's credibility is judged on how many teams he predicts correctly being in the tournament and the average difference between the bracketologist's projected seed and the actual seed assigned by the NCAA Selection Committee. The difference between projected matchups and the differences between the "pods" selected in the first and second rounds are less important.Fact|date=March 2008
A similar process now exists for the
National Invitation Tournament called "NIT-ology". This was made possible by officials of NIT (now owned by the NCAA) publishing their selection and seeding process. In the past, NIT selections were made not only on athletic merit, but also on fan base and potential audience, because of the NIT operator's agreement with ESPN. Such can be found at * [http://tcaa.puretecmo.com/nit06.html NIT-ology] .Fact|date=March 2008Motivations
There are many motivations for a bracketologist.Fact|date=March 2008 For Lunardi, he was already gathering statistics and information in his role as Sports Information Director for
St. Joseph's University and editor of the "Blue Ribbon Yearbook" on men's college basketball, so it was not much more effort to predict the brackets. Others are motivated at perceived flaws in other bracketologist's predictions, such as putting too much (or too little) emphasis in the RPI, favoring lesser or major conferences, or failing to consider factors such as performance in the last few games.Fact|date=March 2008ee also
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College basketball
*NCAA Selection Committee
*Bracket (tournament) External links
* [http://bracketproject.atspace.com/comparison.htm The Bracket Project- Compilation of 52 different bracket projections]
* [http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/12/sports/ncaabasketball/12bracket.html?ex=1299819600&en=656129a3d782aee8&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss Bracketology article in New York Times]
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