Saturday, March 03, 2007

ACC seeding possibilities

I wanted to figure out what all the possible ACC tournament seedings would be. So, armed with a pen and pad, the ACC standings/results, and the ACC's tiebreakers, I ended up confusing myself to no end. Maryland beating NCSU and Wake beating Virginia make it even more complicated. With only 3 games to play there are still eight different scenarios, including one with FOUR 11-5 teams. In addition, a GT win over BC would give GT the #6 seed paired with a Duke loss would drop Duke all the way to #7. Here's the scenarios:

UNC, VT, and BC all win.
#1: Virginia Tech (4-2 against other 11-5 teams)
#2: UNC (beat BC)
#3: BC
#4: UVA
#5: Maryland v #12 Miami
#6: Duke v #11 Wake
#7: GT v #10 NC State
#8: FSU v #9 Clemson

If UNC and VT win but BC loses to GT:
#1 VT
#2 UNC
#3 UVA
#4 BC
#5 Maryland v #12 Miami
#6 Georgia Tech (0-1 v VT, 1-1 v UNC) v #11 Wake
#7 Duke (0-1 v VT, 0-2 v UNC) v #10 NC State
#8 FSU v #9 Clemson

If VT and BC win, UNC loses:
#1 BC (2-1 v VT and UVA)
#2 VT (2-2 v BC and UVA)
#3 UVA (1-2 v VT and BC)
#4 Maryland
#5 UNC v #12 Miami
#6 Duke v #11 Wake
#7 GT v #10 NCSU
#8 FSU v #9 Clemson

If UNC and BC win, VT loses to Clemson:
#1 UNC
#2 BC
#3 UVA
#4 VT
#5 Maryland v #12 Miami
#6 Duke v #11 Wake
#7 FSU v #10 NCSU
#8 GT v #9 Clemson

If UNC wins, but VT and BC lose:
#1 UNC
#2 UVA
#3 VT
#4 BC
#5 Maryland v #12 Miami
#6 Georgia Tech v #11 Wake
#7 Duke v #10 NCSU
#8 Clemson v #9 FSU

If VT wins, UNC/BC lose:
#1 VT
#2 UVA
#3 BC
#4 Maryland
#5 UNC v #12 Miami
#6 Duke v #11 Wake
#7 GT v #10 NCSU
#8 FSU v #9 Clemson
This one is the most complicated. With two teams at 11-6 (and UVA/VT split their two games) and three teams at 10-5 (who are all 1-1 versus each other), I believe that record within all five of these teams is what matters. UNC's loss to MD places them in the fifth seed.

If BC wins, UNC/VT lose:
#1 UVA
#2 BC
#3 VT
#4 Maryland
#5 UNC v #12 Miami
#6 Duke v #11 Wake
#7 GT v #10 NCSU
#8 FSU v #9 Clemson

If UNC, BC, and VT all lose:
#1 UVA
#2 VT
#3 BC
#4 Maryland
#5 UNC v #12 Miami
#6 Duke v #11 Wake
#7 GT v #10 NCSU
#8 FSU v #9 Clemson

Well, then. That... clears things up? From Duke's perspective, they can only play either Wake or NCSU, who they handled easily back in January. In the next round, the thing to root for sure seems like a third game against Boston College. If so, be sure to root for Virginia Tech in the early game, as wins by VT, GT, and Duke would lead to a #3 seed for the Golden Eagles. If you'd rather face UVA in the second round (my preference- on a neutral court I think Duke wins by ten), root for VT and BC tomorrow. If VT is your target, root for Clemson and BC. (Note: Duke could still face all three of these teams even if they lose tomorrow- but I'm assuming most people reading this will be rooting for Duke tomorrow).

It will be a crazy day of games tomorrow. Some might even call it... madness.

Check back for a UNC game preview tomorrow.

1 comment:

Xenod said...

I'm probably pretty sure it'll all work out for the best.