March Madness - NCAA '14
 

HELLO.

With the recent release of this year's March Madness bracket, I have decided to simulate the tournament in NCAA '14. Because, well why not? It's Spring Break and I've got time to kill.

With 68 teams in the MM field, there's plenty of teams in NCAA '14 able to be used in the bracket. The rosters will be the OS created by vikesfan and his team, props to them. :appl:

Ideally, I will use the 68 seeded teams and match them with their best OVR partners in NCAA '14. For example, Duke (MM) = Bama (NCAA 14), UNC (MM) = Clemson (NCAA 14), and so on all the way down to NC Central. A Google Sheets link will be provided once the team list is set.

I will sim every game using sliders (TBD) and post the results round-by-round on this thread. Also, I'll update the bracket found on the Google sheet.

Hope you all enjoy!

*any team suggestions/storylines please leave them on the thread*

Re: March Madness - NCAA '14
 

TEAM REVEALS

Without further ado, here is "Selection Sunday". My main criteria for assigning teams were 1) even talent distribution and realism 2) assign matching pairs IF within reason 3) geography 4) potential cinderellas or upsets within reason and 5) big dropoff starting with 13 seeds since those upsets rarely happen.

I will group by seed on the pairings below and also attach the link to the Google sheet. Hopefully, I can get some sims in today and have the play in games complete by tomorrow. Thanks for reading along!

1 SEEDS
- Duke will be represented by Alabama (97 OVR)
- Virginia by Notre Dame (95)
- North Carolina by Clemson (97)
- Gonzaga by Ohio State (95)

2 SEEDS
- Tennessee by Oklahoma (95)
- Michigan State by Georgia (93)
- Kentucky by Washington (93)
- Michigan by Michigan* (95)

3 SEEDS
- Houston by Oregon (91)
- Texas Tech by Texas (91)
- LSU by LSU* (91)
- Purdue by Stanford (91)

4 SEEDS
- Kansas by USC (91)
- Florida State by Florida (90)
- Kansas State by Texas A&M (91)
- Virginia Tech by West Virginia (91)

5 SEEDS
- Marquette by Penn State (90)
- Auburn by Auburn* (90)
- Wisconsin by Miami (90)
- Mississippi State by Mississippi State* (90)

6 SEEDS
- Villanova by Boston College (88)
- Maryland by Tennesse (90)
- Buffalo by South Carolina (90)
- Iowa State by Iowa State* (90)

7 SEEDS
- Louisville by Arizona State (88)
- Nevada by Michigan State (88)
- Cincinnati by Kentucky (88)
- Wofford by NC State (88)

8 SEEDS
- VCU by Kansas State (88)
- Syracuse by Syracuse* (86)
- Ole Miss by Ole Miss* (88)
- Utah State by Utah (90)

9 SEEDS
- Washington by Washington State (86)
- UCF by UCF* (88)
- Baylor by Baylor* (86)
- Oklahoma by Oklahoma State (88)

10 SEEDS
- Iowa by Iowa* (86)
- Seton Hall by Boise State (86)
- Minnesota by Nebraska (86)
- Florida by UCLA (88)

11 SEEDS
- Ohio State by Purdue (86)
- Belmont by Vanderbilt (86)
- Temple by Maryland (84)
- Saint Mary's by Cal (86)
- Arizona State by Arizona (88)
- Saint John's by Cincinnati (81)

12 SEEDS
- Murray State by Wisconsin (86)
- Oregon by Florida State (84)
- New Mexico State by Texas Tech (86)
- Liberty by TCU (86)

13 SEEDS
- UC Irvine by New Mexico State (79)
- Vermont by Buffalo (75)
- Saint Louis by Indiana (79)
- Northeastern by Rutgers (79)

14 SEEDS
- Yale by UMASS (77)
- Old Dominion by Old Dominion* (75)
- Georgia State by Georgia State* (72)
- Northern Kentucky by Western Kentucky (72)

15 SEEDS
- Montana by Kent State (74)
- Colgate by Southern Miss (72)
- Bradley by South Alabama (72)
- Abilene Christian by New Mexico (70)

16 SEEDS
- Gardner-Webb by San Jose State (70)
- Iona by Louisiana (70)
- Prairie View by Texas State (70)
- Fairleigh Dickinson by UTEP (70)
- North Dakota State by Rice (67)
- NC Central by Idaho (67)

* represents pair.
Please note the teams were solely matched based off given criteria, not performance in 2018 FBS season.

GOOGLE SHEETS LINK: HERE

Re: March Madness - NCAA '14
 

REGIONAL BREAKDOWN

Time for me to put on my best Andy Katz shoe or try out my Jay Bilas impression. I will go in-depth on each region giving my predictions for who will come out on top. Following the regional breakdown, I will award my nominees for the favorite, Final Four, Cinderella, and the best potential upsets. First Four games should be simmed tonight/tomorrow in time for the real-life March Madness to begin. Here we go!

EAST


WEST


SOUTH


MIDWEST


Final Four prediction: Duke (Bama) vs Michigan and Tennessee (Oklahoma) vs North Carolina (Clemson)
Favorite: Duke (Alabama)
Best Potential R64 Upset: Wisconsin over Penn. State
Cinderella: 7-seed Michigan State
Double-Digit Cinderella: 11-seed Purdue

Re: March Madness - NCAA '14
 

COMMUNITY INTERACTION

Before I begin simming games and due to the gambling nature that March Madness brings. I wanted to bring a few concepts to the table to get everyone involved rather than me sim games and you guys read on it.

1) Bracket Contest
- Your typical March Madness bracket contest where everyone fills out their projected brackets. This would be a free contest with no prizes given away. I will compose a Google form and keep track of round-by-round picks if interested.

2) Sports Book
- Everyone will be given a $5,000 bankroll to begin the tournament with. Of course, this is virtual currency and no real money or prizes are involved. I will set up straight lines, O/U, Team O/U, and Parlays. Unfortunately, due to time constraints and such, no prop bets or 2nd half totals will be in play. Maybe for the Final Four, we can open it up, but again this is just for fun.

3) Fantasy Football
- IF and a big IF at that, we can find a decent amount of teams, we can hold a draft before the tournament with normal fantasy scoring/rules. I am planning on keeping a stats book regardless and posting to the Google sheet to keep everyone informed and to compile All-Region, All-Tournament teams. We hold a draft at the start of the tournament, and after each round, we keep X amount of players and hold another draft.

If these sound fun or of interest to you, please let me know either on this thread or via DM. I think this could be a big project that the entire community could get behind. Hope you all enjoy!

Re: March Madness - NCAA '14
 

Wtf is this?