Announcing this year's Pick the Post-season Tournaments contest! Try out
your prognosticating skills by predicting the game results and champions of
each of the six Division I conference tournaments! (!!)
This year's contest will be in two parts. The ECACHL and CCHA regular
seasons have ended, while the other four leagues will continue through this
weekend. So this part of the contest will deal only with the ECACHL and
CCHA. After next weekend, I'll send out a separate mailing for Hockey
East, the CCHA, WCHA, Atlantic Hockey, and CHA.
As I did last year, I'll be running two contests in one. The first will
give higher weighting to the latter stages of the tournaments, and the
second will give equal weight to all results (see under Scoring below).
There will be contest #1 and #2 winners for each of the six tournaments,
plus #1 and #2 overall Prognosticating Gods.
Just to preserve their immortality, last year's winners were:
Contest #1 Contest #2
ECACHL: Wayne Smith Nick Markham
Hockey East: Jim Dixon Andy Weise
CCHA: Wayne Smith Wayne Smith
WCHA: Jim Edwards Jim Dixon
Atlantic Hockey: Bill Fenwick Bill Fenwick
CHA: Thom Davis Thom Davis
Overall: Nick Markham Nick Markham and Wayne Smith
The first playoff games are on Friday, March 3 at 7:00 PM EST, so the
deadline for this contest will be Friday, March 3 at 6:00 PM EST.
The tournament formats are as follows:
ECACHL:
All twelve teams make the playoffs. The top four seeds receive a bye into
the quarterfinals, while the remaining eight meet in the first round in a
best-of-three series. Seeds 5 through 8 host the first-round games. All
games are played "to conclusion".
The four first-round winners advance and are reseeded.
The top four seeds host the quarterfinal round, which is a best-of-three
series. The lowest-remaining seed plays at #1, the second-lowest at #2,
and so on.
The four quarterfinal winners advance and are reseeded.
The highest and lowest seed meet in one semifinal, while the other two
seeds meet in the other semifinal.
The semifinal losers meet in the consolation game.
The semifinal winners meet in the championship game.
CCHA:
All twelve teams make the playoffs. The top four seeds receive a bye into
the quarterfinals, while the remaining eight meet in the first round in a
best-of-three series. Seeds 5 through 8 host the first-round games. All
games are played "to conclusion".
The four first-round winners advance and are reseeded.
The top four seeds host the quarterfinal round, which is a best-of-three
series. The lowest-remaining seed plays at #1, the second-lowest at #2,
and so on.
The four quarterfinal winners advance and are reseeded.
The highest and lowest seed meet in one semifinal, while the other two
seeds meet in the other semifinal.
The semifinal losers meet in the consolation game.
The semifinal winners meet in the championship game.
Hockey East (starts next week):
Eight teams meet in the quarterfinals, with the top four seeds hosting a
best-of-three series. All games are played "to conclusion".
The four winners advance and are reseeded.
The highest and lowest seed meet in one semifinal, while the other two
seeds meet in the other semifinal.
The semifinal winners meet in the championship game. There is no
consolation game.
WCHA (starts next week):
Ten teams meet in the first round, with the top five seeds hosting a
best-of-three series. All games are played "to conclusion".
The five winners advance and are reseeded.
The lowest and second-lowest seeds meet in a Finals Qualifier (5 vs 4
play-in game).
The winner of that game advances to the semifinals and plays the highest
remaining seed. The other two seeds meet in the other semifinal.
The semifinal losers meet in the consolation game.
The semifinal winners meet in the championship game.
Atlantic Hockey (starts next week):
All eight teams make the playoffs. The top four seeds host single
quarterfinal games.
The four winners advance and are reseeded.
The highest and lowest seed meet in one semifinal, while the other two
seeds meet in the other semifinal.
The semifinal winners meet in the championship game. There is no
consolation game.
CHA (starts next week):
All six teams make the playoffs. The four lowest seeds meet in Finals
Qualifier games, with 6 playing 3 and 5 playing 4.
The winners of those games advance to the semifinals, with the 5-4 game
winner playing the #1 seed and the 6-3 winner playing #2 (there is no
reseeding).
The semifinal winners meet in the championship game. There is no
consolation game.
Scoring:
Contest #1:
Each correct quarterfinal/first-round winner is worth 3 points. Giving the
correct number of games in the series is worth an additional point. Sorry,
but if you get the winner wrong, you get zippo, even if you get the number
of games right. Since the Atlantic Hockey quarterfinals are all single
games, there are no bonus points there. The CHA has no quarterfinal/first
round; their tournament starts with the play-in games.
Correct play-in game winners are worth 4 points. (WCHA and CHA only)
Correct semifinal game winners are worth 8 points.
Correct consolation game winners are worth 4 points. (ECACHL, CCHA, and
WCHA only)
Correct championship game winners are worth 16 points.
So the maximum total points for each league would be:
ECACHL 68
Hockey East 48
CCHA 68
WCHA 60
Atlantic Hockey 44
CHA 40
There will also be two tiebreakers for each conference. The first will be
the predicted final score of the championship game, with the closest score
winning. For example, if you predict 5-2 and the actual score is 4-2,
you're one off; if the actual score is 4-3, you're two off.
The second tiebreaker will be the total number of goals scored in the
entire tournament.
If there is a tie for the overall winner, the tiebreaker will be who
performed best in the greater number of individual tournaments.
Contest #2:
Each correct result from each round is worth one point. So you get one
point for each quarterfinal/first round winner you pick (regardless of
whether or not you forecast the correct number of games), one point for
each semifinal winner you pick, and so on.
The maximum total points for each league would be:
ECACHL 12
Hockey East 7
CCHA 12
WCHA 10
Atlantic Hockey 7
CHA 5
Tiebreakers will be the same as for Contest #1.
An official entry form will follow as soon as I post this. Questions,
comments, and entries can be sent to [log in to unmask] . Simply
hitting "reply" MAY NOT WORK -- be sure to check the Email address before
you send.
Thanks and good luck!
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