The Bracket Project

Sunday, December 6, 2009

BCS 2009

Now for my annual BCS post. Today's announcement that Alabama and Texas will play for the BCS championship may satisfy most people but what about TCU? Cincinnati? Boise State? As I've said before, a playoff is inevitable but probably won't be done in the near future. But sometime, the next step has to be a plus-one. This is how I would do it. It's the same thing as last year with a couple of tweaks.

1. Promote the Cotton Bowl to BCS status. This will keep the 10 team system the BCS has.
2. The champion from each of the BCS conferences receives an automatic berth.
3. The top non-BCS conference champion (or Notre Dame) will receive an automatic berth provided it is ranked higher than the lowest ranked BCS conference champion. If this lowest ranked team is unranked in the BCS, then the non-BCS team (or Notre Dame) must be ranked in the top 25.
4. Fill out the rest of the lineup with the highest ranked teams remaining in BCS order. Ignore the two-team limit per conference.
5. Pull out the Pac-10 and Big 10 champions and place them in the Rose Bowl.
6. The top 4 teams remaining will play each other. The highest ranked of these 4 will play the lowest ranked team of these 4 that avoids a rematch. Then the remaining two teams will play each other. The same will apply to the bottom 4 teams.
7. Once matchups are determined, assign them to bowls. Apply conference affiliations (Big 12-Fiesta, ACC-Orange, SEC-Sugar) with the remaining game to the Cotton Bowl. If a bowl needs to give up a conference affiliated with them to another bowl, that bowl will have priority over the Cotton Bowl.
8. Play the games!
9. After the games are played, run the BCS system one more time and pit the top 2 teams against each other for a BCS champion.

So how would it work this year?

This year's BCS conference champions were 1. Alabama (SEC), 2. Texas (Big 12), 3. Cincinnati (Big East), 7. Oregon (Pac-10), 8. Ohio State (Big Ten), and 10. Georgia Tech (ACC).

The highest ranked non-BCS conference champion was 4. TCU and it gets an automatic berth since it's ranked higher than Georgia Tech.

The highest ranked teams left in the BCS are 5. Florida, 6. Boise State, and 10. Iowa.

Thus, the matchups would be:

Rose: 7. Oregon vs. 8. Ohio State
Fiesta: 2. Texas vs. 3. Cincinnati
Sugar: 1. Alabama vs. 4. TCU
Orange: 9. Georgia Tech vs. 6. Boise State
Cotton: 5. Florida vs. 10. Iowa

Then use the BCS after these games are played and then match the top 2 teams. It allows TCU and Cincinnati to at least have a shot at the championship. Ok, it doesn't solve Boise State, but years down the line when a playoff is viable, that problem will be solved too.

Tuesday, December 1, 2009

Bracket - November 30

Lots of changes fill this week's bracket. The big winners were Syracuse, which won the Coaches v. Cancer tournament beating California and North Carolina in the process, Florida, with its impressive win over Michigan State, and UNLV, which is undefeated and has a win over Louisville. Portland also made its first appearance in the bracket, but has since lost to Portland State to fall back to earth.

Chief among the losers is UCLA. Sure, it lost a few key guys from last year and the rest are pretty much injured, but the Bruins were still expected to contend for best team in the Pac-10 behind Washington and Cal. But losses to Cal State Fullerton, Portland, Butler, and Long Beach State mean they may be fighting to avoid last place in the conference, which itself is going through a down year.

Next bracket will be posted on December 14.

http://bracketproject.50webs.com/PDFS/113009.pdf

Monday, November 9, 2009

First matrix of 2009-10 posted

The next update is on November 16.

http://bracketproject.50webs.com/matrix.htm

Want to contribute??? Read this!

1. You need to set up a web site to place your bracket that will be consistent throughout the season. A blog will do. A web site will most definitely do. A bracket posted on a message board will not do. The link will change frequently and will get lost in various discussions, making it difficult for the average reader to find it. (Exception: A message board devoted exclusively to bracketology.) Also, you can't post it on Facebook, Myspace, or some other social networking site because not everyone can access it.

2. You have to tell me where your site is. I don't have a sixth sense when it comes to finding these things. I rely on you and readers like you to tell me what kind of sites to add to this page.

3. The NCAA sets up procedures and principles for building a bracket. Read them! A seriously flawed bracket won't be posted. However, if your seedings are out of the norm, I'll still most likely post it provided that the principles are followed and you have an explanation as to why you've built the bracket like you did. I reserve the right to not post a bracket with something like a winless team as a #1 seed.

4. Please date-stamp your bracket. Brackets of a certain age will be removed from the list, and if there's no date-stamp, obviously I can't tell when your bracket was updated.

5. To make it easier on me, please format your bracket so that at least half of it can be seen on the screen at any one time. You can make it even easier for me by publishing a seed list of your 65 teams. Brackets must have at least 48 seeded teams to be listed in the matrix. Sites that merely list teams with no seeding can be linked to the page but will not be added to the matrix.

6. No new sites will be added to the 2010 page after March 1, 2010 unless you have appeared in previous versions of this page, in which case, you will be grandfathered in. In addition, no bracket will be accepted to the final matrix of the season after the beginning of the Selection Sunday show.

7. Link to my site! I've linked to yours!

8. I'm only one guy. If this could pay me what I get at my regular job, I'd update this site 24/7. That simply is not the case. If someone else can do this better, I'll gladly step aside, but from the looks of it, I'm the only (crazy) one. So if you don't see your site on here, an update hasn't been done for a while or I don't respond to you, I hope you'll understand why.

Sunday, November 8, 2009

Pre-season Bracket 2009-10

The 50webs homepage now features The Bracket Project's preseason bracket. As always, throw this bracket out once the games begin.

The Bracket Matrix will release its first edition Monday night. Currently, there are 12 brackets in the matrix.

If you would like to submit your own bracket for the matrix, publish it and lemme know where it is. New matrices will be published every Monday night until after the new year begins, at which point, the matrix will be updated every day. The matrix will include preseason brackets until the November 30th edition.

http://bracketproject.50webs.com/PDFS/Preseason_200910.pdf

Sunday, November 1, 2009

Welcome back!

It's November, so welcome to another season of The Bracket Project.

I will release my pre-season bracket for The Bracket Project next Sunday, November 8. Future releases will be as follows:

November 30
December 14, 28
January 4, 11, 18, 25
February 1, 5, 8, 12, 15, 19, 22, 26
March 1, 5, 8, 12, 13, 14

Most people, however, come here for The Bracket Matrix. The first edition for this year will be published on Monday, November 9 and will be updated every Monday until January 4. After this day, the matrix will be updated once a day everyday (time permitting).

If you have a new bracket to submit to the matrix, please note that you have until March 1 to tell me about it and be sure to read the NCAA rules and regulations concerning the bracket to help you structure it and my own expectations.