Ties and Overtime

[Gregory Sager]

Maybe it's where I grew up (MI in the 70s), but I heard a boat load of stuff about how soccer was a communist sport because it allows/rewards ties.

Heh. I used to think that North Park's old SID was the only person who called soccer a "communist sport." He was only joking ... I think ...

I really like your post, overall and agree with much of it. But there is absolutely a stigma with many when it comes to ties... Kissing your sister and all that.

I'm guessing that you probably didn't enjoy my joke about the Colby White Mules (3-2-7) having a season-long makeout session with their sisters.

The illustrious Jack Kemp shortly after the U.S. was awarded the 1992 World Cup...

“I think it is important for all those young out there, who someday hope to play real football, where you throw it and kick it and run with it and put it in your hands, a distinction should be made that football is democratic, capitalism, whereas soccer is a European socialist sport.”
— Jack Kemp to Congress in 1988

Of course, Jack Kemp has a stadium named after him at Occidental College in California, his alma mater. Shame Oxy gave up football a few years ago and now Jack Kemp Stadium which encompasses W.C. Patterson Field is used for men's and women's soccer, lacrosse and field hockey.

Kind of poetic in a way.

Some people would also say it's poetic justice that the pro football team for which Kemp played, the Buffalo Bills (Kemp later represented part of the Buffalo metro area in Congress), has never won a Super Bowl despite Kemp's extolling the sport's virtues over those of soccer. As a Bills fan, I would never say that, but some people might.

[Kuiper]

The illustrious Jack Kemp shortly after the U.S. was awarded the 1992 World Cup...

“I think it is important for all those young men out there, who someday hope to play real football, where you throw it and kick it and run with it and put it in your hands, a distinction should be made that football is democratic, capitalism, whereas soccer is a European socialist sport.”
— Jack Kemp to Congress in 1988

Of course, Jack Kemp has a stadium named after him at Occidental College in California, his alma mater. Shame Oxy gave up football a few years ago and now Jack Kemp Stadium which encompasses W.C. Patterson Field is used for men's and women's soccer, lacrosse and field hockey.

Kind of poetic in a way.

It is totally ironic.  With the new turf, there isn't a trace of football lines anywhere left on the field, but Jack Kemp's name is prominently displayed on the wall behind one of the goals.  And the soccer teams now use all of the facilities created for American football, including locker rooms, meeting rooms, weight rooms, great recovery spaces etc.  It's a sad reality that a D3 football facility is so much better than most D1 soccer facilities.

[PaulNewman]

I must be missing something....I sometimes struggle putting my fan poll ballot together, some weeks more than others, but not once have my process and choices been impacted by confusion resulting from teams having too many ties and not knowing what to do about that.  Draws always have been considered a blemish, but less of a blemish than a loss.  And when it comes to the real regional rankings and RecordsvsRanked ties are better than losses or no ranked games at all.  I had more difficulty last year with a team like Chicago who we all knew was good (but maybe not how good) when the Maroons had a stretch midseason of going 3-3-1 and then picked up another loss within a week or so.  i don't see any reason why the selection cmte would have a harder time just because there are more draws.

If folks don't like ties that's fine with me.  What I disagree with is any suggestion implied or otherwise that superior teams are being put at a disadvantage in some inherent way or that teams are exploiting or gaming the new rule...that basically something unfair is happening.  I haven't seen evidence of that and honestly I haven't seen an evidence of teams playing for draws.  If anything, I've noticed presumed superior teams scoring very late to gain a draw and avoid a loss (and being very excited when they do as GAC did last night with 7.5 seconds left).

I would just underscore that there is a difference between teams playing for ties (I don't see that) and an increase in matches ending in ties (definitely true almost tautologically). 

[Christan Shirk]

From the D3soccer.com database:

Year	Matches	Ties
2014	3850+	8.6 %
2015	3850+	8.5 %
2016	3850+	9.1 %
2017	3800+	8.8 %
2018	3800+	8.4 %
2019	3900+	8.8 %
2021	3650+	8.3 %
2022	2400+	18.9 %

The total number of ties so far this season has already exceeded the total in all previous seasons by approximately 33%.

Can you do the same comparing prior years if they ended at 90 vs this year?  It's a mathematical truism that the number would be significantly higher now.  And the focus on this taints the picture in the direction of proving that the change is not a good one.  Which means buying into the idea that draws are inherently unwanted.

So, the NCAA keeps track of overtime games and looking at the 2018 and 2019 D-III Men's soccer seasons (somethings not working to get the overtime data for the 2021 season) shows a similar number of games being tied after 90 minutes as we are seeing this season.  Not sure based on just two previous seasons and 2/3's of the current season that we can conclude that the number of games tied at the end of regulation are actually down this season, but it's possible (probable) that knowing there is no overtime causes some teams to push harder for the winner in the final minutes of regulation than they would have in the past.  The opposite effect could also be true in some cases.

D-III Men's Soccer Overtime Games

Year	Ties (w/ OT)	Tied after 90 min.
2018	8.4 %	19.4 %
2019	8.8 %	19.3 %
2022	n/a	18.9 %

I am not sure where I heard, but someone told me at some point that 50% of games that went into OT ended in ties.   If that is/was true and not a figment of my hyper active imagination, then the amount of draws makes sense.  Maybe a little higher, but all in all in line with what that would look like in a year of "more" ties.

SC.

Well, that's about right.  Looking at the overtime games from the 2018 and 2019 D-III Men's soccer seasons, around 45% ended still tied while the tie was broken in about 55% of cases.  However, that means that the current year numbers represent a slight reduction in the percentage of games tied after 90 minutes versus 2018 and 2019 as shown above in this post.

D-III Men's Soccer Overtime Games

	Game	Winner	Ended
Year	1st OT	2nd OT	Tie
2018	34.0 %	22.7 %	43.3 %
2019	33.1 %	21.4 %	45.5 %

[Christan Shirk]

2018 D-III Men's Soccer Overtime Games

	Overtime	Game	Winner	Ended
Week	Games	1st OT	2nd OT	Tie
Opening Weekend	71	29	17	25
Week 2	73	26	12	35
Week 3	77	24	25	28
Week 4	78	25	15	38
Week 5	78	28	21	29
Week 6	75	26	16	33
Week 7	91	26	23	42
Week 8	63	20	16	27
Week 9	66	27	11	28
Week 10	49	16	8	25
NCAA 1st/2nd Rnds	12	2	3	7
NCAA Sectionals	2	1	0	1
NCAA Final Four	--	--	--	--
TOTAL	735	250	167	318
		(34.0%)	(22.7%)	(43.3%)

2019 D-III Men's Soccer Overtime Games

	Overtime	Game	Winner	Ended
Week	Games	1st OT	2nd OT	Tie
Opening Weekend	68	26	14	28
Week 2	71	22	8	41
Week 3	72	30	15	27
Week 4	76	26	8	42
Week 5	76	21	23	32
Week 6	71	27	11	33
Week 7	71	23	18	30
Week 8	59	23	15	21
Week 9	64	14	14	36
Week 10	62	21	21	20
Week 11	40	8	10	22
NCAA 1st/2nd Rnds	11	2	1	8
NCAA Sectionals	8	5	2	1
NCAA Final Four	--	--	--	--
TOTAL	749	248	160	341
		(33.1%)	(21.4%)	(45.5%)

[Hopkins92]

Might be a little too early to tell, but Coach.myer raised it, so maybe folks have already started crunching numbers on the lack of Sudden Victory and its impact... Lots more PKs as teams play more conservatively in the OTs?

[Coach.myers]

Curious as to thoughts on the NCAA OT policy as it relates to the 22-23 season. As we all know the NCAA eliminated OT in regular season therefore resulting in a significant numbers of tied matches. Secondly (I may be wrong about this) but dropping sudden victory and having two full OT periods seems to have resulted in too many matches that went to PKs which I’m sure many agree is not the best way to end a match. I believe there were 5 matches determined by PKs in 21-22 and so far after two rounds we have already seen 10 this year in tournament.

[Flying Weasel]

Curious as to thoughts on the NCAA OT policy as it relates to the 22-23 season. As we all know the NCAA eliminated OT in regular season therefore resulting in a significant numbers of tied matches.

Just to review what was demonstrated/concluded further up in the thread: the lack of overtime during the regular season did not change how many games were tied after 90 minutes.  Naturally, because some overtime games have game-winning goals, the lack of overtime drove up ties.

Secondly (I may be wrong about this) but dropping sudden victory and having two full OT periods seems to have resulted in too many matches that went to PKs which I’m sure many agree is not the best way to end a match. I believe there were 5 matches determined by PKs in 21-22 and so far after two rounds we have already seen 10 this year in tournament.

You could only conclude that dropping the "golden goal" resulted in too many matches going to PK's IF there were games in which one team scored in overtime and then the other team equalized.  That did not happen in any of the 14 overtime games so far in this year's tournament.  10 of those 14 overtimes games saw no goal scored leading to PK's.  3 games had one team score a single goal and win, and 1 game had a team score twice and win.  Thus the lack of the "golden goal" made zero difference in how often games went to PK's.  Unless you are making the argument that because an overtime goal could be equalized, teams had less incentive to try to score versus taking their chances in the PK shootout.  Not sure I'd buy that that.  Most times an overtime will stand up (not be equalized), so I doubt there would have been any significant change in motivation to chase after an overtime goal.  Like in the past, inferior teams may feel their interests are best served by playing for the tie and PK's while superior teams prefer to try to score and avoid the chap shoot of a PK shootout.

From the full-season numbers given a few posts above, games that go to overtime had a game-winner ("golden goal") roughly 55% of the time and finished tied 45% of the time.  In this year's tournament, only 28.6% of overtime games had an overtime goal scored, while 71.4% remained tied.  That begs the question: Are there less goals scored in overtime in the tournament (over time, not just this year) than across the regular season in years past when there was overtime (but no Pks)?  Given how much is on the line, do teams play more conservative and take less risks in the tournament than they would in the regular season?  It's possible, BUT in a regular season overtime game (thinking of years past, of course), there is no PK shootout so if you can remain tied you get the point and avoid a loss unlike in the tournament where the shootout looms which could end your season.  That would seem to motivate better teams to go for the win in a tournament overtime game rather than take their chances in the shootout.

I believe there were 5 matches determined by PKs in 21-22 and so far after two rounds we have already seen 10 this year in tournament.

In 2019, there were 11 overtime games the first weekend, 8 of which went to penalty kick shootouts.  Sure, 10 is more than 8, and 10 could very well be the most PK shootouts the opening weekend, but these things do fluctuate and only by looking further back as well as waiting to see what happens in the coming years could any firm conclusions be reached as to an abrupt shift due to changes with overtime (no "golden goal") versus a trend versus randomness.  I suspect it's largely random fluctuations.  Over time I expect the random overtime game in which both teams score in overtime resulting in a shootout that would not have occurred with the "golden goal" in place.  Probably won't happen often enough to significantly change the numbers/percentages of games going to PK shootouts.

[Christan Shirk]

So, here's some historic data to provide factual context for a discussion of the impact of the elimination of the sudden victory (aka "golden goal") in overtime of tournament games.  The following tables provide data on overtime games in the previous ten NCAA Tournaments (2011 - 2021, minus 2020).

	TOTAL	NCAA	OVERTIME	GAMES
YEAR	GAMES	1st Weekend	Sectionals	Final Four	TOTAL	PCT.
2021	63	6	1	3	10	16%
2019	63	11	7	0	18	29%
2018	61	11	2	0	13	21%
2017	61	7	3	2	12	20%
2016	61	11	6	1	18	30%
2015	60	9	4	1	14	23%
2014	60	11	2	1	14	23%
2013	60	7	2	2	11	18%
2012	61	12	2	1	15	25%
2011	61	6	6	0	12	20%
TOTAL	611	91	35	11	137	22%

	TOTAL	NCAA	PENALTY KICK	SHOOTOUTS
YEAR	GAMES	1st Weekend	Sectionals	Final Four	TOTAL	PCT.
2021	63	4	0	1	5	8%
2019	63	8	1	0	9	14%
2018	61	7	1	0	8	13%
2017	61	4	2	1	7	11%
2016	61	4	1	0	5	8%
2015	60	2	0	1	3	5%
2014	60	8	2	0	10	17%
2013	60	3	0	0	3	5%
2012	61	6	2	0	8	13%
2011	61	3	2	0	5	8%
TOTAL	611	49	11	3	63	10%

	OVERTIME	GOLDEN	TIED /
Year	GAMES	GOAL	PK'S
2021	10	5	5
2019	18	9	9
2018	13	5	8
2017	12	5	7
2016	18	13	5
2015	14	11	3
2014	14	4	10
2013	11	8	3
2012	15	7	8
2011	12	7	5
TOTAL	137	74	63
		(54%)	(46%)

[Christan Shirk]

In the small sample size that is the NCAA tournament (just 63 games with a 64-team field, versus almost 3900 games across an entire season), the numbers fluctuate significantly from year to year.  But, despite all that fluctuation, over time the numbers for the NCAA Tournament closely match that of the regular season.  We already established that across entire seasons, approx. 56% of overtime games had a game-winning goal scored while approx. 44% remained tied.  Over the past 10 NCAA Tournaments (611 total games, approx. 15% of a full season), the numbers match that fairly closely, with a 54%/46% breakdown.

This year's NCAA Tournament:
- is having more over time games: 14 the first weekend vs. the 10-year high of 12 and 10-year avg. of 9 for the first weekend
- is having more penalty kick shootouts:  10 the first weekend vs. the 10-year high of 8 and 10-year avg. of 5 for the first weekend
but the percentage of overtime games going to penalty kick shootouts, while high is not outside of the range of the past 10 years:
- 71% of overtimes went to PK's the first weekend vs. the 10-year high of 73% and 10-year avg. of 54% for the first weekend

Another thing to note if you dissect the numbers a bit more than I did in the tables above, overtime games tend to go to penalty kick shootouts more so the first weekend (49 of 91, 54%) then in subsequent rounds (14 of 46, 30%).  This might be explained by having more mismatches the first weekend and having inferior teams who, for all intents and purposes are playing for a tie and PK's, versus the later stages of the tournament when a higher percentage of teams are genuinely trying to win and avoid PK's.  But that is just a theory, because on the other hand, mismatches would be thought to result in goals more so than a battle of evenly matched opponents who could be expected to play to a stalemate.

I think the historical fluctuation from year-to-year with no discernable trend means that we can't jump to conclusions about this year's numbers and where things may be heading.  And as has already been clarified, with no equalizing goals in overtime so far in this year's tournament, the elimination of sudden victory (aka "golden goal") in overtime of tournament games has had no impact thus far in this year's tournament.

Anyway, I hope the data helps us have a more informed discussion on the topic.

[Hopkins92]

Thanks Christan!!

[lastguyoffthebench]

Hopkins92 might be able to answer this one…

What was the OT format in 80s and 90s when tournament games went to 4 OT?

Was it 2 5min OT fully played and if no winner a second set of 2 5s?

[Flying Weasel]

If I'm not mistaken, at one point overtime was two 15 minute periods with no sudden victory/golden goal, then, if still tied, up to two 10- or 15-minute sudden victory periods, for a potential 50 or 60 minutes of overtime. 

[BlueJay95]

In the early 90s it was two mandatory 15-minute OTs, followed by two 15-minute periods of golden goal before going to PKs. I was Etown '95 and we lost to Messiah in 3OT in the Round of 16 (believe the tourney only had 32 teams then) in 1993 and in 1992 I watched from the sidelines as Etown and then Trenton State played a 4OT game that went to PKs that was 2-2 after regulation, probably the greatest game I've ever seen in person.

[BlueJay95]

In the early 90s it was two mandatory 15-minute OTs, followed by two 15-minute periods of golden goal before going to PKs. I was Etown '95 and we lost to Messiah in 3OT in the Round of 16 (believe the tourney only had 32 teams then) in 1993 and in 1992 I watched from the sidelines as Etown and then Trenton State played a 4OT game that went to PKs that was 2-2 after regulation, probably the greatest game I've ever seen in person.

Final of that Etown/Trenton game was 3-3, with Trenton winning on PKs.