The weather isn't looking great right now, hoping that clears up to avoid a tarpcon situation.

Good for McMurry, but not the best look for the tournament as a whole. There shouldn't be 15s and 30s thrown up in a regional, especially with at-large teams on the receiving end.

Does Schreiner leave the SCAC in 25-26 or the year after?

Surprised that I'm the first to post this...

https://trinitytigers.com/news/2025/5/15/mbb_elrakabawy.aspx

Quote from: DickWhitman on May 12, 2025, 09:28:55 AM

Quote from: Bmo on May 10, 2025, 11:43:50 AMThe best solution I can come up with would be to add an in-region kicker into the NPI equation.  This would incentivize teams to schedule in-region while not punishing teams who can't schedule out of region.  Maybe  1.1 on in-region wins and losses. Any other ideas? 

By doing this though, do you devalue wins for the teams that can schedule harder games?

Yes, you would, but should teams schedule 50%+ of their games out of region just because they can, as several regions are within 100 miles of their campus?  Maybe the kicker should be 1.05 or something less as to not disuade high-level games out of region.  Or maybe you limit the number of out-of-region games that you can count to 15 or some other number.

I hope Keystone had an ice bath.  Morales needed one after that game.

The NCAA stats site shows a game between Keystone and RIT on 3-8-2020 with 67 HBP's.  They were either out for blood or I'm worried about NCAA stats data quality.

Elbow guard is the second most important piece of equipment in that league.

They will probably hit the easy button and just swap Pomona and Concordia.

Man, these SCIAC pitchers aren't afraid to pitch inside.

Fly-in crisis averted as Pomona rallies back from a 5 run deficit to get into the championship round.  Pretty ugly game with 12 HBP, one ugly one that ended the day for the CMS catcher.  That should be enough to book their place in the regional and avoid having 2 top 25 human poll teams miss the playoffs.

The best solution I can come up with would be to add an in-region kicker into the NPI equation.  This would incentivize teams to schedule in-region while not punishing teams who can't schedule out of region.  Maybe  1.1 on in-region wins and losses. Any other ideas?   

It is funny that the NCAA will spend more money to fly teams to the West regionals when better teams within 500 miles are sitting home.

I guess the question is, does it matter that CalLu, Pomona, Redlands, some NWC team(s), and maybe McMurry could win a series against 50%(+) of the current at-large selections (but probably won't be in the tournament), or are we good with the status quo?  The previous system, flawed as it was, did have the human element to course correct.  Right now, we are trending towards two fly-ins(from out of region) into the two west regionals.

I agree that matchups matter. However, the NWC is a good example of the NPI floor being artificially low in region X due to a lack of out-of-region scheduling. The conference, as a whole, went 10-3 out of region X, with the last-place team, George Fox, going 5-1.  On the field, George Fox is probably more than a match for any team non-region X in the 200s, but they are currently 288 NPI. 

This is certainly hypothetical, but I do find it odd that no other top teams in different regions have "hiccup" losses to sub-300 teams like region X. Maybe those teams are better focused, better coached, or have more depth. Or maybe region X opponents are better than their NPI.

Quote from: DickWhitman on May 09, 2025, 10:53:24 AMI saw that. Just seems odd and something that should be looked at with the formula in the offseason.

I saw a couple of posts on X yesterday highlighting the fact CLU is a top 25 team in the polls and 50+ NPI. I have no doubt CLU would take a series against at least half the teams ahead of them, the formula worked against them in every way imaginable this year.

I do think Region X's bottom-tier rankings are impacted much more than other regions, which in turn impacts the upper-tier team's NPI.  In other regions, you just don't see upper-tier teams take losses to bottom-tier teams at the same volume that you see in Region X.  This is likely due to geography, which requires teams to schedule a higher percentage of their games in the region.  The weaker teams get pounded, but they would likely be mid-tier in other regions.