Not Very Upsetting

Posted on April 8, 2019 by vanbraman

The 2019 NCAA Basketball Tournament came to a close earlier tonight. So, it is now time to look at the bracket and compare it to past years.

I evaluate how upsetting a tournament is by looking at two stats that I keep during the tournament each year.

UF (Upset Factor) is a number that is a sum of the seed differences when a lower seed knocks off a team with a higher seeding. For instance, when a 15 seed knocks off a 2 seed the UF is incremented by 13. If an 9 seed knocks off a 8 seed then the UF goes up by 1. If a 10 seed beats a 15 seed, there are no UF points since the higher seed was the winner.

BP (Bracket Points) is probably familiar to most sports fans. When scoring your bracket you get 1 point for a first round win, 2 points for the second round and then 4, 8, 16 and 32 for the following rounds. Basically, you fill out the bracket with the higher seeded team winning each game. You then add up the points based on the tourney results. For the Final Four, the points are given when a #1 seed wins.

Bracket Points, NCAA Tournament, 2019 tournamentHere is an example of a perfect tournament where the higher seed always wins. Of course, there has never been a tournament even close to perfect.

2019 bracket, ncaa basketball tournament, final 4, VirginiaThis year the final count for BP was 124 and the UF was 62.

A BP of 124 does not even make it into the top 10, but the UF of 62 was one of the lowest in tournament history.

The tournament did start out with a lot of upsets with 12 lower seeds winning in the 1st round. The most lower seeds to win in the 1st round is 13 which happened twice (2001 and 2016).

However, in the 2nd round only one lower seed won, which diminished the chance of further large upsets.

Upset factor chart, NCAA tournament, 2019, Virginia, basketballIn the chart above you can see that only five years have had a lower UF than this year.2007 NCAA Tournament, least upsetting, VCU, WinthropThe tournament in 2007 had the lowest UF, with Winthrop and VCU the only double digit seeds making it to the 2nd round.  You can also see that there were only five upsets in the 1st round.

In the 2000 tournament there were only three upsets in the 1st round, but there were some big upsets in the 2nd round which lead to a higher UF for the tournament.

2014, highest UF, NCAA TournamentThe highest UF was in 2014. You may remember this tournament where an 11 seed Dayton made it to the 4th round and an 8 seed (Kentucky) played a 7 seed (Connecticut) in the final game.

The tournament this year was exciting with many close games.

There was also an interesting storyline with Virginia winning the tournament a year after being embarrassed in the first round last year by being the first 1 seed to lose to a 16 seed. Virginia did however have to go to overtime in two games, including the final, and barely won the semi-final in the last seconds.

It was an exciting tournament, but now it is time for baseball.

Play Ball!

Steven

 

 

 

Would you want to see a tournament that had a perfect bracket? I think it would be a lot less exciting.

There is some excitement seeing the top seeds play each other in the final, but it is also fun to see upsets along the way.

Posted in Culture, Sports | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Mustich 1000 Reads

Posted on April 7, 2019 by vanbraman

Tonight I will share a few more of the recent books I have read that are on the Mustich 1000 list.

Half of a Yellos Sun, Mustich 1000, books to read, africa, historyHalf of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is set in Nigeria and Biafra in the late 1960’s. The story follows the lives of several people involved in the creation of the short lived Republic of Biafra and how war affected their lives. The book is a great look at this time period and was a good read.

Epic of Gilgamesh, Flood narrative, Mustich 1000Now we go way back in time to The Epic of Gilgamesh. This epic poem is from the 3rd millennium B.C. and includes the Mesopotamian flood narrative that is much talked about. Some claim that it is the source of the story of Noah in the Bible. However, there are many flood narratives which reinforces the fact that there was a global flood and not just a local flood.

Nature of the UniverseOn the Nature of the Universe by Lucretius is an interesting look into what was known about the the nature of life in the first century B.C. It is interesting to see what was known about Anatomy and Physiology as well as what today we would put under the classification of Physics. Also, what was known about Biology and Botany. I think you would be surprised as to how much was known by the educated, even if they did have a lot of things wrong. Lucretius was a great observer of what was happening around him.

The Double Helix, Watson and Crick, DNA, ScienceNow on to the 1950’s and the discovery of the structure of DNA by Watson and Crick.

The Double Helix: A Personal Account of the Discovery of the Structure of DNA by James D. Watson was a very interesting read. The book was a bit controversial, especially as Watson was not to kind to some of the other participants in the discovery in what he wrote.

However, it was an interesting story which gave a glimpse into the discovery process in Science.

A Beautiful Mind, John Nash, MathamaticsMany of you may have seen the movie A Beautiful Mind. Did you know that there is much more to the story than what was portrayed in the movie?

A Beautiful Mind: The Life of Mathematical Genius and Nobel Laureate John Nash by Sylvia Nasar is the book that the movie was based on.

I have really enjoyed reading this book and have just a few more chapters to finish. If you liked the movie, I think that you would enjoy the book.

My current count of books read from the Mustich 1000 list is now up to 345. I have a long way to go.

Steven

Posted in Books, Culture, History | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment