Convenient Treatment of Vacated Wins

Like most of you that will read this, I have been following the 2013 NCAA basketball tournament and Michigan's run to the Final Four. Congratulations to those players and best of luck next week against Syracuse and beyond.

Now that that is out of the way, let me talk about what has interested me since long before this tournament- vacated wins, particularly as a penalty for rules violations.  The theory of this penalty makes sense to me but the gray area of its application has always been confusing.  I searched high and low for a good definition of what it means to vacate a win by the NCAA's standards without any luck.  The best definition I found (by what I imagine the NCAA implies) was from Merriam-Webster: "To give up incumbency or occupancy". In other words, when a team vacates a win, they no longer occupy the position that victory provided; they have vacated it, leaving the position empty or unclaimed.

The #2 image result for the search: Michigan Basketball

The gray area I referred to is most visible in the media's treatment of vacated wins.

1. Before the  tournament, I posted a link to a rivals.com blog post that tallied the Big Ten schools' historical tournament performances.  The article counted wins and achievements of Michigan, Minnesota and Ohio State with no mention that they had been vacated due to various infractions.  
2. As CBS televised Michigan's games this weekend, the references to the school's last Final Four run(s) were unsurprisingly a main storyline complete with images of Steve Fisher hugging various players.  
3. Last night mgoblue.com, THE official website of University of Michigan athletics, posted a write-up on the current team's run that couldn't get past the first sentence without referencing the schools last Final Four.

The only reason I can see for the inconsistencies is convenience.  It makes an easy storyline to sell. It's difficult to make allowances for people ignorant of the back-story.  It's easy to say how two things are the same. It's difficult to say how they are different.  It's easy to subtract wins on paper. It's difficult to reconcile that achievements were a benefit of those vacated wins.  Just to make a point on that, with all of the references to Michigan's Final Four appearances, when do you think you'll next hear Joe Paterno referred to as the winningest college football coach?

Vacating wins is obviously something the NCAA is serious about as evidenced by its actions.  Schools obviously don't want to vacate wins as evidenced by their appeals to the punishment.  Why then does the NCAA not enforce logical reporting and treatment of vacated games by its partners (CBS) and members (UofM)?

For further reading on vacated wins I recommend:

• The Theory and Practice of Vacating Games from the NCAA's own blog
• What does vacating wins really mean? from ESPN

 

Big Ten Scenarios and Tournament Seeding

The B1G hoops season has one week to go with five teams in the mix for a piece of the title and one of the top four seeds in the conference tournament.  Indiana has locked up at least a share and can win the conference outright with either a win at home against Ohio State or at Michigan.  The other four, Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State and Wisconsin are also battling for a Thursday bye in the conference tournament as they jockey for a more favorable NCAA seeding.

In the next week, these five teams play seven games amongst themselves. Seven games means there are 128 potential possible endings (2^7) to the regular season.  The games to be played are:

March 5: OSU @ IU
March 6: UM @ Purdue
March 7: UW @ MSU
March 10: UW @ PSU, UI @ OSU, IU @ UM, NU @ MSU

128 possibilities is far too much to look at but luckily each outcome is not equally likely.  Four of the above games are "handle your business" games (they are the un-bolded games); if those teams handle their business, the league finish will get decided by three games with eight (2^3) more or less equally likely scenarios.  I know it's the B1G and handling your business is not always just that.  Should any one of the teams lose games they are expected to win they would likely drop to fifth place and lose a bye in the conference tourney.  If multiple teams fail to handle their business, well it becomes a shit-storm and you can throw this whole thing out the window.

Bullet Points:

• Today, Indiana has a better than 75% chance of winning the conference outright.  Tuesday's game against OSU will decide a lot and is arguably the least in doubt of the big three (yellow bolded) games.
• If all teams handle their business, Michigan will need to beat Indiana to avoid the 5-seed regardless of anything else. They really get stung by tie-breakers having lost their only game against Wisconsin.
• If Indiana beats OSU on Tuesday, the title is decided leaving the other teams scrapping for a tournament bye with four scenarios.  In two of those scenarios, Michigan falls to the 5-seed. In another scenario, OSU gets the 5-seed.  In the final scenario where MSU loses to Wisconsin, MSU and OSU would go deep into tie-breakers for fourth place relying on the finish of Minnesota and/or Illinois.
• If OSU and Michigan both beat Indiana, it likely creates a four-way tie and the MSU-UW game becomes very important with the winner sharing the B1G title and the loser falling to the 5-seed.  Wisconsin would also get the #1 seed with a win over MSU.

Disclaimer: This all relies on my proper interpretation of the B1G tie-break procedures which I got here.  Go State.