jimdahl

An early lead goes to our new friend (or at least new pseudonym, which isn't necessarily polite when read backwards): http://siouxsports.com/hockey/bracketleaders.php Suspiciously, the #2 slot is currently occupied by one of SiouxSports.com's own (I'm not sure what that tiebreaker is), though there are a lot of games left...

As I said: Of course, as much as I tease, I think I picked SCSU to finally win one, too....

I've actually never calculated them before because someone else always has and posted them. This year I waited until Thursday for someone to hand me a complete set, but no one ever did Looking back, I guess it was actually my demands that changed this year, because the one I saw last year on eLynah (2007 KRACH odds) only had the first round and Frozen Four, the same as Dave Berger had calculated for his blog post. Without taking the time to extrapolate those KRACH ratings out to the final game right now, Michigan's 67.5% chance of making the FF is higher than Minnesota 60.8% last year. Maybe if Mrs. SiouxSports.com makes me watch any more basketball this weekend, I'll grab the laptop and punch the last decade's KRACHs into the spreadsheet I made.

It looks to me like you have picks in, you can go back to the page and try loading them to be sure (and feel free to drop me a note letting me know what made you think it didn't work, as you're the second person to make a similar report).

Surely there's some exception for when the few are Heidi and I?

Following Dave's blog's rendition of the ever-popular What are the KRACH odds for the tourney? writeup, it's also always fun to compare the SiouxSports.com bracket picks to the KRACH predictions. KRACH vs. SiouxSports.com members predicting the tourney Biggest surprise: Sioux fans gave Miami pretty much the right amount credit Biggest difference: UNH-Notre Dame -- KRACH called this one 69%-31%, Sioux fans called it 96%-4% Least surprising: Sioux fans give Princeton a 0% chance of beating UND, to KRACH's 20.4% How to separate yourself in the bracket contest: Sioux fans give SCSU an 82% chance of winning an NCAA tournament game. Bunch of new fans this year? Repeat-shmeepeat: Only 11% of Sioux fans think Michigan State will survive its first round contest with Colorado College in the bracket o' death

Lee really happy to play for Senators - Fargo Forum

They read my advice above Remember -- white brat basket with spicy fries.

Nitty Gritty is the closest bar and will be absolutely jammed around game time. Can't go wrong with State Street Brats (FYI -- white brat basket and spicy fries). Taken a step further, you can't go wrong strolling up State St. and stopping wherever grabs your fancy. If you don't mind walking, if you make it up State St. all the way up to the Capitol neighborhood the Great Dane is a decent brewpub. The Essen Haus, which has been threatened for demolition/condo conversion for about 5 years now, has always been on my "must do" list if it's still standing (get a boot or a 5L of your favorite German beer -- mine is Spaten Optimator). I used to hang out on Regent St. a lot, though that's probably less interesting for visitors on non-football days. The union is very nice and does serve beer, but the best part about it really is the terrace out back on Lake Mendota. Unfortunately, with the winter you guys have been having, my understanding is that its far too early for that to be pleasant or even open.

Ah, but you DO have a special character in your name. That's the one known/confirmed problem. I just need to make a small change to the bracket so it can handle the > correctly -- give me about five minutes and try again.

Hmmm... I think I can see them. If you visit the page, type in your username/password, and hit Load do you get them back?

Not much love for the Gophers winning it all yet, though the BC-Minnesota bracket is the one with the most spread.... Bracket Consensus Picks

Hmmm... there are no weird characters in your username and I was able to submit a bracket with a nearly identical name. Look for a PM from me, and I'll do a little digging on my end (I wonder if there could be an issue with special characters in passwords?)

Princeton over UND Just kidding. Yep, I see them. For everyone -- I actually made a change this year so you can only make picks using an existing SiouxSports.com ID. This should make it less confusing, in that if you hit "Save" it will only work if you've entered a valid id/password. You can also double-check your picks by visiting the page empty, typing in your username/password, and hitting load.

Oh, that's almost certainly the problem. You continue to pay the price for an overly creative username. I'll look into it tonight.

There has been some discussion here, more when NDSU was transitioning than lately, about the effect of higher-level athletics on academics at a school. Schools Score Big When Sports Teams Win

That was exactly my concern. I also frequently grab quotes from a couple different posts. You can still do that manually by quoting one post, copying the result to your clipboard, canceling, then quoting another post and pasting in the quote. So, the tradeoff is inconveniencing people who really want to quote a couple posts vs. reducing the noise from people who just mindlessly hit reply and end up quoting 10 posts.

The sixth (or something like that) annual SiouxSports.com NCAA Hockey Tournament bracket challenge is up. Fill out a bracket I mentioned it buried away in another thread, so quite a few people have already tested it so I think I got it right this year You'll be able to change your picks up until the first puck drops. Consensus picks will be made available before picks close, probably mid-week.

Hah -- I actually had tested a full bracket before posting it, but it worked if you picked UND but not if you picked anyone else. Now fixed.

Alright, I think I have this right: NCAA Tournament Bracket Of course, I think about 33% of the time I've made a mistake that required throwing away all the picks, so let me know if you see an error. I'm never sure whether the Frozen Four will be W vs. E or MW vs. E. Update: both the NCAA bracket and USCHO bracket look the same.

Agreed. UND (and WCHA) hockey players being one signature away from playing in the NHL is also a relatively recent phenomenon to which the league continues to fail to properly react (e.g. permitting rampant obstruction).

I didn't defend anyone , I said I had sympathy for them. Clearly Sheppard has been making huge mistakes, which is why I'm sympathetic for these guys personally that the changing world has changed the scrutiny to which they're subjected. Once upon a time it was a somewhat anonymous job that you did for fun and you did your best and there weren't many consequences when you messed up. Now every fan knows every official and their mistakes are quickly viewed and scrutinized around the world. It's a tough situation for those refs and the conference to be in, but officials and officiating clearly need to change somehow to reflect this new reality. But that's a discussion for a different thread.

Listening to the same interview, I'm reasonably sympathetic to his point. The refs are all essentially volunteers who are doing it for the love of the game. While lots of the constructive discussions about officiating have wondered if the ref jobs could somehow be made more professional, I do have some sympathy for the current guys who I generally believe are amateurs just doing their best. The results are varied, but now come under tremendous scrutiny due to the Internet. It's similar to the Internet's change in public criticism of players, coaches, and UND officials, except not many people try to stick up for the refs

You did better than I, when I tuned the game in CC scored within 10 seconds. Agree that establishing momentum could be a big deal in this game. Despite some thinking it's heresy to say anything negative, the people I trust who were at yesterday's game generally agree that the Sioux looked as flat as they ever have this year. It's important psychologically for the players to feel like good offense will generate goals.

Looking at the CC vs. UND comparison only, 2 CC losses + 1 UND win (including 1 over CC) should flip TUC to UND and possibly RPI, plus give UND one more H2H point. Without RPI, that would leave the comparison at 3-3 with CC owning RPI and UND H2H (I'm not sure which the committee would use as a tie-breaker); with RPI, UND wins the comparison 4-2. RPI should be within .001 or so in that situation, so some of the other games could nudge it around enough to matter. Of course, other things could move a little, with the comparison so tight, but a Minnesota win over CC and subsequent UND win over CC seems to be UND’s best chance.