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NCAA Bracket Analysis

Posted by Huckleberry on March 17th, 2009 under Basketball

Using my college basketball ratings, I ran an analysis on the NCAA tournament. I only used the power and standard deviation numbers, not the ones that account for wins and losses, so teams that make a habit of winning close games will not be adjusted in this run. This is the first time I’ve run such a look at the tourney, and the extent to which favorites are favored surprised me somewhat, but we’ll have to see how it goes. First things first, here’s the table (HTML Gods willing it will look decent):

Reg Team 1R 2R S16 E8 F4 NC Title
M
I
D
W
E
S
T
Louisville 100.00% 99.84% 87.27% 64.51% 40.42% 21.20% 9.66%
Alabama St. 40.75% 0.03% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00%
Morehead St. 59.25% 0.12% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00%
Ohio St. 100.00% 78.00% 11.73% 4.20% 1.03% 0.14% 0.02%
Siena 100.00% 22.00% 1.00% 0.14% 0.01% 0.00% 0.00%
Utah 100.00% 54.85% 20.42% 4.70% 1.34% 0.23% 0.03%
Arizona 100.00% 45.15% 15.20% 3.13% 0.80% 0.12% 0.02%
Wake Forest 100.00% 92.19% 63.10% 23.25% 10.29% 3.33% 0.90%
Cleveland St. 100.00% 7.81% 1.29% 0.07% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00%
West Virginia 100.00% 93.98% 52.60% 34.62% 17.95% 8.04% 3.08%
Dayton 100.00% 6.02% 0.60% 0.08% 0.01% 0.00% 0.00%
Kansas 100.00% 93.65% 46.30% 29.00% 14.12% 5.84% 2.06%
North Dakota St. 100.00% 6.35% 0.50% 0.06% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00%
Boston College 100.00% 29.16% 6.56% 1.00% 0.16% 0.02% 0.00%
Southern Cal 100.00% 70.84% 26.00% 7.02% 1.98% 0.37% 0.06%
Michigan St. 100.00% 98.06% 67.36% 28.22% 11.89% 4.10% 1.19%
Robert Morris 100.00% 1.94% 0.07% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00%
W
E
S
T
Connecticut 100.00% 99.99% 80.10% 58.75% 30.71% 18.40% 8.30%
Chattanooga 100.00% 0.01% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00%
BYU 100.00% 79.82% 18.85% 8.84% 2.54% 0.93% 0.22%
Texas A&M 100.00% 20.18% 1.06% 0.20% 0.02% 0.00% 0.00%
Purdue 100.00% 93.89% 49.68% 16.04% 5.06% 1.99% 0.52%
Northern Iowa 100.00% 6.11% 0.53% 0.01% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00%
Washington 100.00% 85.66% 47.00% 15.95% 5.27% 2.17% 0.59%
Mississippi St. 100.00% 14.34% 2.79% 0.22% 0.02% 0.00% 0.00%
Marquette 100.00% 78.60% 26.01% 6.95% 2.24% 0.79% 0.18%
Utah St. 100.00% 21.40% 2.60% 0.19% 0.02% 0.00% 0.00%
Missouri 100.00% 96.66% 71.05% 32.75% 17.47% 9.48% 3.91%
Cornell 100.00% 3.34% 0.34% 0.01% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00%
California 100.00% 66.01% 9.65% 2.88% 0.68% 0.19% 0.03%
Maryland 100.00% 33.99% 2.95% 0.58% 0.08% 0.01% 0.00%
Memphis 100.00% 99.30% 87.33% 56.64% 35.89% 22.63% 11.12%
Cal St.-Northridge 100.00% 0.70% 0.07% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00%
E
A
S
T
Pittsburgh 100.00% 99.69% 86.37% 77.60% 46.58% 23.73% 13.95%
East Tennessee St. 100.00% 0.31% 0.02% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00%
Oklahoma St. 100.00% 49.47% 5.74% 3.13% 0.66% 0.11% 0.02%
Tennessee 100.00% 50.53% 7.87% 4.28% 1.04% 0.21% 0.05%
Florida St. 100.00% 42.94% 16.65% 1.69% 0.22% 0.02% 0.00%
Wisconsin 100.00% 57.06% 25.84% 3.41% 0.58% 0.08% 0.01%
Xavier 100.00% 94.85% 57.11% 9.88% 2.16% 0.38% 0.08%
Portland St. 100.00% 5.15% 0.40% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00%
UCLA 100.00% 94.94% 65.44% 32.97% 16.28% 6.98% 3.45%
Virginia Commonwealth 100.00% 5.06% 0.51% 0.03% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00%
Villanova 100.00% 99.53% 34.05% 10.96% 3.37% 0.88% 0.27%
American 100.00% 0.47% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00%
Texas 100.00% 65.28% 12.61% 3.74% 0.89% 0.18% 0.04%
Minnesota 100.00% 34.72% 4.13% 0.79% 0.12% 0.02% 0.00%
Duke 100.00% 99.93% 83.27% 51.50% 28.10% 13.37% 7.30%
Binghamton 100.00% 0.07% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00%
S
O
U
T
H
North Carolina 100.00% 99.96% 93.75% 69.73% 56.32% 37.78% 26.17%
Radford 100.00% 0.04% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00%
LSU 100.00% 60.12% 4.97% 1.17% 0.32% 0.05% 0.01%
Butler 100.00% 39.88% 1.28% 0.18% 0.03% 0.00% 0.00%
Illinois 100.00% 91.14% 26.01% 4.26% 1.63% 0.38% 0.10%
Western Kentucky 100.00% 8.86% 0.34% 0.01% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00%
Gonzaga 100.00% 98.05% 73.43% 24.65% 15.54% 7.17% 3.52%
Akron 100.00% 1.95% 0.21% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00%
Arizona St. 100.00% 86.50% 44.05% 22.99% 6.35% 2.17% 0.81%
Temple 100.00% 13.50% 1.79% 0.24% 0.01% 0.00% 0.00%
Syracuse 100.00% 98.33% 54.09% 28.20% 7.49% 2.49% 0.90%
Stephen F. Austin 100.00% 1.67% 0.07% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00%
Clemson 100.00% 72.06% 30.46% 13.70% 3.23% 0.95% 0.30%
Michigan 100.00% 27.94% 5.45% 1.27% 0.13% 0.02% 0.00%
Oklahoma 100.00% 99.86% 64.09% 33.60% 8.96% 3.02% 1.12%
Morgan St. 100.00% 0.14% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00% 0.00%

As expected, North Carolina is the favorite heading in and is expected to win the tournament a quarter of the time. That they are nearly twice as likely to win as the next most likely team, Pittsburgh, was very surprising to me.

And, of course, the draw affects a team’s outlook. Louisville is 6th in the power ratings but the #1 seed moves them to 4th most likely to win the tournament. Pittsburgh is calculated as the most likely team to reach the regional final as the other half of their 8-team subregion is weaker than North Carolina’s (mostly due to the Zags being in the South).

The good news for Texas fans is that the odds of the Longhorns winning the tournament are roughly the same as the odds of a PGA tour golfer making a hole-in-one on any given Par 3 hole. So it could happen.

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14 Responses

  1. This is awesome, Huck. Thanks.

    The weakness of the Midwest is notable. I really like Louisville to walk out of there easily.

    UConn almost as likely to win as…Duke? Wow.

  2. Your ratings suck. This dude’s will be better.

    http://dehn.slu.edu/sports/tournament/index.html

    Even though he can’t spell ‘coming.’

  3. You could probably go ahead and round those numbers to integer percentages – I think presenting two significant digits lends a level of accuracy that can most kindly be described as hopeful.

  4. Art Vandelay said:

    March 17th, 2009 at 1:17 pm

    Except for Memphis why is there such a large discrepancy between #1 and #2 seeds? For example: Pittsburgh has a 12.8% better chance of winning it all than Michigan St.?

  5. HenryJames – that Leschner dude is all wrong. The percentage of ESPN voters who pick a given team to reach the final four is not a “perceived probability.” That’s a cross-level inference error. I could perceive that Team A has only a 25-30% chance of making the final four, but when I have to make an actual pick, the odds ratio for that team might be 2-1 over the next best competitor, so it makes sense that people pick them 2/3 of the time.

  6. I pay attention to these things not at all. I just like to mock Huckleberry’s statistical faggotry.

  7. statistical faggotry said:

    March 17th, 2009 at 2:03 pm

    Did I hear my name called?

  8. Bob in Houston said:

    March 17th, 2009 at 2:11 pm

    So you’re sayin’ there’s a chance…

  9. Longhorn in Canada said:

    March 17th, 2009 at 2:29 pm

    HJ – while I might listen to a math geek who can’t spell “coming”, I am less inclined to believe one who can’t spell “two”.

  10. Ag -

    Actually, they were rounded once upon a time, but that got lost when I copy-and-pasted into notepad so I could format the table. And there’s no way I’m going through it to erase all the decimal places.

  11. No problem – in my line of work, the number of significant digits presented in data has meaning.

    Hence, while some denizens of the Intrawebs are “Grammar Nazis”, I am a “Significant Digit Nazi” – a small and detestable lot to which I belong.

  12. Well, to be fair, my ratings are accurate to at least the millionths digit, so I think I’m okay anyway. Excel’s calculation precision is the only possible limiter on the number of significant digits I am able to display.

    The very notion that I may introduce some sort of error into the process is nothing short of preposterous!!!

  13. “Significant Digit Nazi”

    This is one of those things that sounds a whole lot dirtier than it really is.

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