Well by the end of this weekend, Selection Sunday will be 4 weeks away and as we all know this is the time of year where bracketologists like Joe Lunardi, Jerry Palm, etc make their money. This past week I floated an idea in my head that I think could be fun if we can execute it right and today, I saw the NCAA is holding it’s annual mock exercise for media members.
Essentially the idea is for Operation Sports to have our own mock selection committee, the week leading up to Selection Sunday. It would be a 10 member committee like the real one with some alternates in case someone can’t participate on a certain day or can no longer do it. The purpose of doing this is to have fun and to try to do this in as timely a fashion as possible, I know we all have commitments in life that preclude us from giving nearly the time that the actual committee does. I think it could be fun to compare an OS Bracket to the real bracket and see how close we came, etc.
I’ve read up on the selection process over the last couple years so I have a good idea of how the process works with the initial research, the selecting of at large teams, the seeding and then the creation of the bracket.
My plan for the 10 member committee is to break up the 32 conferences among 8 of the 10 members of the committee. The goal would be to research and put together information on teams in your conferences that either have a chance at getting the automatic bid or could receive an at large bid. For example: W-L, SOS, RPI, BPI, Wins vs. Top whatever, etc for each a team… basically a profile we could refer to during Championship Week. The research would primarily go from now to Sunday, March 9th, the last day of the regular season with some minor updates during Championship Week. I think the early we could start this the better; so that people don’t become overwhelmed with it.
The other 2 members of the committee would be responsible for finishing up whatever needed to be done for the bracket on Selection Sunday. If we needed to add any more at large teams, seed teams or put together the actual bracket; those 2 people would be primarily responsible for that on Selection Sunday. If anyone else had the time on that Sunday to help, the more help the better. I know it’s hard to ask a lot of people to commit a significant amount of time on a Sunday so I think doing it this way would be best.
Essentially here is a timeline of events for this if anyone was interested:
Between now and March 9th: Split up conferences, research teams.
The night of March 9th (Sunday): Submit research and then all 10 committee members submit their initial ballot of teams that should be in as an at large. In another post, I will explain this initial voting process but by the end of this night we will have voted in X # of teams into the tournament already.
March 10th (Monday): Vote in another 4 teams as an at large. Basically the day goes like this:
By morning or afternoon, TBD: Submit 8 teams you think should be consider for an at large bid.
By night: The 8 teams with the most votes move onto the at large ballot. From there, each member ranks the 8 from 1 (best) to 8 (worst); the 4 teams with the lowest score are added to our at-large field from Sunday night. As an fyi, teams can be removed from the at large field in the future if we no longer think they deserve a bid. I will have more information on that later, if there is enough interest.
Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday: Repeat the above process for adding at large teams if necessary. We can begin seeding teams whenever we want to, the process works very similar to the at large ballot process; so we could do the same day and night process for this. I will provide a link explaining the seeding process and other things we need to know in a post below.
Sunday: Finish whatever needs to be done for the bracket. Submit our bracket to OS around 530 PM ET or the end of the Big 10 championship.
So if anyone is interested, just let me know. We can figure out how we want to set up a group chat, etc from there. If nobody is interested, that's cool... the snowstorm gave me some time to think of how it could be done. I know it may sound like a lot but I think if it can be divided up like this; it could reduce the time commitment necessary.
Interest List:
1. phenom1990
2. tovarich
3. HustlinOwl
4. sportznut02
5. Kriech23
6.Thurley2010
7. XXstormxx
8.
9.
10.
Essentially the idea is for Operation Sports to have our own mock selection committee, the week leading up to Selection Sunday. It would be a 10 member committee like the real one with some alternates in case someone can’t participate on a certain day or can no longer do it. The purpose of doing this is to have fun and to try to do this in as timely a fashion as possible, I know we all have commitments in life that preclude us from giving nearly the time that the actual committee does. I think it could be fun to compare an OS Bracket to the real bracket and see how close we came, etc.
I’ve read up on the selection process over the last couple years so I have a good idea of how the process works with the initial research, the selecting of at large teams, the seeding and then the creation of the bracket.
My plan for the 10 member committee is to break up the 32 conferences among 8 of the 10 members of the committee. The goal would be to research and put together information on teams in your conferences that either have a chance at getting the automatic bid or could receive an at large bid. For example: W-L, SOS, RPI, BPI, Wins vs. Top whatever, etc for each a team… basically a profile we could refer to during Championship Week. The research would primarily go from now to Sunday, March 9th, the last day of the regular season with some minor updates during Championship Week. I think the early we could start this the better; so that people don’t become overwhelmed with it.
The other 2 members of the committee would be responsible for finishing up whatever needed to be done for the bracket on Selection Sunday. If we needed to add any more at large teams, seed teams or put together the actual bracket; those 2 people would be primarily responsible for that on Selection Sunday. If anyone else had the time on that Sunday to help, the more help the better. I know it’s hard to ask a lot of people to commit a significant amount of time on a Sunday so I think doing it this way would be best.
Essentially here is a timeline of events for this if anyone was interested:
Between now and March 9th: Split up conferences, research teams.
The night of March 9th (Sunday): Submit research and then all 10 committee members submit their initial ballot of teams that should be in as an at large. In another post, I will explain this initial voting process but by the end of this night we will have voted in X # of teams into the tournament already.
March 10th (Monday): Vote in another 4 teams as an at large. Basically the day goes like this:
By morning or afternoon, TBD: Submit 8 teams you think should be consider for an at large bid.
By night: The 8 teams with the most votes move onto the at large ballot. From there, each member ranks the 8 from 1 (best) to 8 (worst); the 4 teams with the lowest score are added to our at-large field from Sunday night. As an fyi, teams can be removed from the at large field in the future if we no longer think they deserve a bid. I will have more information on that later, if there is enough interest.
Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday: Repeat the above process for adding at large teams if necessary. We can begin seeding teams whenever we want to, the process works very similar to the at large ballot process; so we could do the same day and night process for this. I will provide a link explaining the seeding process and other things we need to know in a post below.
Sunday: Finish whatever needs to be done for the bracket. Submit our bracket to OS around 530 PM ET or the end of the Big 10 championship.
So if anyone is interested, just let me know. We can figure out how we want to set up a group chat, etc from there. If nobody is interested, that's cool... the snowstorm gave me some time to think of how it could be done. I know it may sound like a lot but I think if it can be divided up like this; it could reduce the time commitment necessary.
Interest List:
1. phenom1990
2. tovarich
3. HustlinOwl
4. sportznut02
5. Kriech23
6.Thurley2010
7. XXstormxx
8.
9.
10.
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