I'm a little leery about doing this this year, as COVID-19 protocols have
played havoc with scheduling and I'm pretty sure we're not done with it,
but anyway...

Once again, it's time to announce 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 several parts.  I don't know how many yet,
but Atlantic Hockey is starting their post-season this weekend, so this
part of the contest will deal only with Atlantic Hockey.  Separate mailings
will follow for the other conferences.

As in the past, 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, the winners of last year's rather
abbreviated contest were:

                    Contest #1             Contest #2
ECAC:               Andy Weise             John Edwards
WCHA:               Bill Fenwick           Andy Weise
Atlantic Hockey:    Mark Lewin             John Edwards
Big Ten:            Nathan Hampton         John Edwards
Overall:            Nathan Hampton         Nathan Hampton

(The Hockey East and NCHC tournaments did not have any games played)

The first playoff games are on Sunday, March 7th at 5:00 PM EST, so the
deadline for this part of the contest will be Sunday, March 7th at 4:00 PM
EST.

The tournament formats (for the moment, anyway) are as follows:

Atlantic Hockey (scheduled to begin March 7th):

All eleven teams make the playoffs.  The first round and quarterfinals are
seeded based on Atlantic Hockey’s East and West scheduling pods.  Based on
the teams' overall seeding, the top two seeds in the East and top three in
the West receive a bye into the quarterfinals.
The remaining six meet in the first round in their respective pods, with
the #3E, #4E, and #4W seeds hosting.  They play a single game "to
conclusion".
The three first-round winners advance and are reseeded in their pods.
In the quarterfinal round, the top two seeds in each pod host a best-of-
three series.  Within each pod, the lowest-remaining seed plays at #1 and
the second-lowest plays at #2.
In the semifinal round, the highest-remaining East seed hosts the lowest-
remaining West seed, while the highest-remaining West seed hosts the
lowest-remaining East seed.
The semifinal winners meet in the championship game.  There is no
consolation game.

Hockey East (scheduled to begin March 10th):

All eleven teams make the playoffs.  The top five seeds receive a bye into
the quarterfinals, while the remaining six meet in the first round in a
single game.  Seeds 6 through 8 host the first-round games.  All games are
played "to conclusion".
The three first-round winners advance and are reseeded.
The top four seeds host the single-game quarterfinal round.  Among the
first-round winners, the lowest-remaining seed plays at #1, the second-
lowest at #2, and so on.  The #5 seed plays at #4.
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.  Games are hosted by the higher seeds.
The semifinal winners meet in the championship game, hosted by the higher
seed.  There is no consolation game.

WCHA (scheduled to begin March 12th):

All eight teams make the playoffs.  The top four seeds host the quarter-
finals, which are a best-of-three series.  All games are played "to
conclusion".
The four winners advance and are reseeded.
The semifinal round is a single game, in which the highest seed hosts the
lowest seed, while the second-highest seed hosts the third seed.
The semifinal winners meet in the championship game, which the higher
seed hosts.   There is no consolation game.

NCHC (scheduled to begin March 12th):

All eight teams make the playoffs, and all games will be at one site.
The quarterfinal round is a single game, with #1 playing #8, #2 playing
#7, and so on.  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.

Big Ten (scheduled to begin March 14th):

All seven teams make the playoffs, and all games will be at one site.
The top seed receives a bye into the semifinals, while the remaining six
meet in the single-game quarterfinal round.  Seed #2 will play #7, #3 will
play #6, and so on.  All games are played "to conclusion".
The three quarterfinal winners advance and are reseeded.
The #1 seed meets the lowest seed 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.

ECAC (scheduled to begin March 18th):

All four teams make the playoffs.
The highest and lowest seed meet in one semifinal, while the other two
seeds meet in the other semifinal.  The semifinal games are played "to
conclusion" and are hosted by the higher seeds.
The semifinal winners meet in the championship game, hosted by the higher
seed.  There is no consolation game.


Scoring:

Contest #1:

Each correct first round/quarterfinal winner is worth 3 points.  For a
best-of-three series (Atlantic Hockey and WCHA quarterfinals only), 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.

Correct semifinal game winners are worth 8 points.

Correct championship game winners are worth 16 points.

So the maximum total points for each league would be:

Atlantic Hockey  57
Hockey East      53
WCHA             48
NCHC             44
Big Ten          41
ECAC             32

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 2 points.  So you get 2 points
for each quarterfinal/first round winner you pick (regardless of whether or
not you forecast the correct number of games), 2 points for each semifinal
winner you pick, and so on.

The maximum total points for each league would be:

Atlantic Hockey  20
Hockey East      20
WCHA             14
NCHC             14
Big Ten          12
ECAC              6

Tiebreakers will be the same as for Contest #1.

One other scoring note:  It's possible that a team may have to withdraw
from a tournament due to COVID-19 restrictions and will have to forfeit a
playoff game or series.  In that case, the game/series will be counted as
a win for the non-forfeiting team (a 2-0 sweep if it's a series).

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!

Bill Fenwick
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