Ralph Slate writes:
 
>I'm a little surprised that the ECAC doesn't use the number of wins
>as a tiebreaker. If I was Dartmouth, I'd be feeling a little boned
>here. In my book, a win and a loss is better than two ties.
 
As it turns out, the ECAC *does* use the number of league wins as a tie-
breaker, but only at the Division III level.  In the ECAC's D-3 leagues,
the first tiebreaker is number of wins, and then they go to the head-to-
head, record against top four, top eight, etc. that the ECAC Division I
league uses.
 
From the list of tiebreakers I have, it appears that both Hockey East
and the WCHA use league wins as their second tiebreaker, after head-to-
head.  Actually, I'm not sure whether "wins in the league" for Hockey
East includes shootout wins or not... I would guess not.
 
I'm against using number of wins as a tiebreaker, at least in the ECAC,
because points-wise, a win and a loss is *identical* to two ties.  And
with all the odd things that went on in the ECAC this year, I doubt a
case could be made for a win being better than a pair of ties.  I will
admit, however, that using league wins would make the ECAC tiebreaking
system a whole lot easier to understand than it is now.  (Top 4?  Top 8?
What's going on here?)
--
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Bill Fenwick                        |  Send your HOCKEY-L poll responses to:
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LET'S GO RED!!                                                  DJF  5/27/94
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