The big PWR game of the week is #14 Yale vs. #10 Quinnipiac. They only play one game vs. each other, but then another each vs. #56 Princeton and #48 Brown, respectively.
A single win this weekend for either most likely results in a small decline in ranking. The interesting outcome is if the loser of the head-to-head also loses their other game, which could result in falling of at-large bid position in the PWR.
The runner-up big PWR game is #23 Western Michigan vs. #2 North Dakota. North Dakota isn’t moving much, even if they get swept; it doesn’t seem possible to overtake idle #1 Minnesota State this weekend. However, Western Michigan could jump just below the bubble with a sweep.
Methodology
Forecasts include the results of games played through Sunday of this week, unless otherwise noted.
Each forecast is based on at least one million monte carlo simulations of the games in the described period. For each simulation, the PairWise Ranking (PWR) is calculated and the results tallied. The probabilities presented in the forecasts are the share of simulations in which a particular outcome occurred.
The outcome of each game in each simulation is determined by random draw, with the probability of victory for each team set by their relative KRACH ratings. So, if the simulation set included a contest between team A with KRACH 300 and team B with KRACH 100, team A will win the game in very close to 75% of the simulations. I don’t simulate ties or home ice advantage.
Resources
- Current PWR Rankings (SiouxSports.com)
- Current RPI Rankings (SiouxSports.com)
- CHN PWR Rankings (CollegeHockeyNews.com)
- USCHO PWR Rankings (USCHO.com)
- Explanation of how PWR mimics NCAA tournament selection (CollegeHockeyNews.com)
Jim, what are the odds of Mankato losing #1 overall at the end of the regular season? And the odds of UND taking over #1?
Depends how each team does. If Minnesota State wins out, they’ll be nearly (but not quite) impossible to catch. Of course, that’s also assuming UND puts together a near-perfect performance.
Realistically, UND probably needs about 2 more of its remaining games than Minnesota State does.
Thank you.
Jim, is there any way to run the numbers on Minnesota to see if they’re basically a lock to make the tourney now?
I’ll probably wait until after the Beanpot to run this week’s simulations, so should have more info on that mid-week.
Awesome, there are a few people asking why Minnesota s still at 11? This is after they lost this weekend. I am thinking the B.C. win is huge right now.
As of a few weeks ago, Jim mentioned that Minnesota needed to win about 9 of their remaining reg season games to get to the bubble. They’ve gone 5 out of 6 since then, which leads me to believe they need about 4 more wins to be a lock. I think some of the other results out east have helped Minnesota over the past few weekends, though, so I’m not sure if that changes anything drastically or not. Looking forward to the updated numbers!
Why Minnesota is 11 — in short, a road split against Penn State shows Minnesota to be a little better in RPI than they were previously (they passed both Providence and Bowling Green).
Minnesota’s RPI went up for a couple reasons — Penn. St actually has among the better win% of Minnesota’s opponents; and with RPI weightings the road win counts 50% more than the road loss, so a split is actually a positive outcome.