Price Fishback went back through the last six years, breaking down the psych sheets and actual results. We saw the first glimpse of how accurate the psych sheet scoring was last weekend at the women’s championships. The system is not perfect, but it paints a picture of what the meet could look like. The California women, for example, were only 8 points over their predicted score from the psych sheet of 505 with a total of 513 points at the end of the meet. This breakdown shows how close teams have been over the past few seasons.
There are a few teams that tend to lose points throughout the meet, but there are other teams like Texas that make huge leaps during the meet. Last year, Texas was not predicted in the top two, but finished second as a team to California. They improved 253.5 points from their seed, which is the most over the last 6 seasons
And the number that gives Cal fans across the globe hope: despite being vastly outseeded by their opponents from Texas, the defending champions have improved as compared to seed each of the last 5 years, including by 216.5 points last year.
Point differential from NCAA psych sheet scoring to actual scoring from 2009 to 2014:
|
diff-14 |
diff-13 |
diff-12 |
diff-11 |
diff-10 |
diff-09 |
|
|
Alabama |
-18.5 |
19 |
1 |
6 |
-18 |
15 |
|
Arizona State |
23 |
50 |
36 |
27 |
48 |
0 |
|
Auburn |
-3 |
-42.5 |
-51.5 |
-17.5 |
-81.5 |
94 |
|
Arizona |
-32.5 |
90.5 |
-12 |
59 |
53 |
47 |
|
California |
216.5 |
116.5 |
209.5 |
55 |
173 |
-34 |
|
duke |
36 |
54 |
3 |
35 |
50 |
|
|
eastern michigan |
15 |
12 |
0 |
|||
|
florida |
-4 |
-8 |
7 |
-79 |
-56 |
68 |
|
florida state |
-45 |
-95 |
-9 |
17 |
18 |
-36 |
|
georgia |
55 |
34 |
9.5 |
-28.5 |
-65.5 |
35 |
|
georgia tech |
-2.5 |
-30 |
-13 |
|||
|
Indiana |
28 |
-2 |
59 |
-46 |
41 |
16 |
|
Iowa |
14 |
-36 |
. |
|||
|
Kentucky |
8 |
45 |
33 |
-86 |
12 |
|
|
louisville |
27 |
34 |
11 |
60 |
34 |
-31 |
|
Louisiana State |
7 |
14 |
9 |
12 |
-16 |
0 |
|
Michigan |
-66 |
-30 |
-82 |
-25 |
-115 |
5 |
|
Minnesota |
-8 |
18 |
18 |
-3 |
31 |
24 |
|
Missouri |
91 |
47 |
44 |
31 |
44 |
0 |
|
North Carolina |
-8 |
38.5 |
59 |
4 |
-35 |
|
|
North Carolina State |
-146.5 |
-21 |
. |
|||
|
Notre Dame |
-21 |
-5 |
-5 |
|||
|
Northwestern |
-1 |
5 |
5 |
0 |
||
|
Ohio State |
-51 |
-14 |
-28 |
-49 |
-31 |
43 |
|
Penn State |
-26 |
-3 |
-13 |
-17 |
14 |
-4 |
|
Purdue |
-4 |
5 |
-16 |
62 |
88 |
72 |
|
SMU |
. |
-11 |
. |
-8 |
4 |
-4 |
|
Southern Cal |
25 |
30 |
-44 |
14 |
90 |
29 |
|
South Carolina |
8 |
-15 |
-11 |
2 |
-4 |
|
|
Stanford |
112 |
97 |
82.5 |
35 |
1 |
31.5 |
|
Texas A+M |
-29 |
-8 |
34 |
59.5 |
17.5 |
80 |
|
Tennessee |
-29 |
-54 |
17 |
-21.5 |
24.5 |
1 |
|
Texas |
253.5 |
134.5 |
246 |
147.5 |
106.5 |
79 |
|
UNLV |
20 |
9 |
. |
-35 |
56 |
-15 |
|
Utah |
-7 |
9 |
||||
|
Virginia |
-6 |
-13 |
-4 |
47 |
75 |
-46 |
|
Virginia Tech |
19 |
3 |
40 |
11 |
11 |
0.5 |
|
Wisconsin |
-28 |
28 |
-15 |
13 |
15 |
-11 |
|
Wyoming |
3 |
-3 |
. |
5 |
5 |
|
|
West Virginia |
5 |
3 |
7 |
-2 |
||
I assume that these are done where diving is counted in the actual results but not in the psych sheet predictions? If so, that would explain a lot of teams like Duke and Arizona State, along with some other good diving programs like Texas, Purdue, and Indiana that should have some lower scores. I am not trying to discredit any team here, but Texas for example, their 216 plus differential last year probably was not as high if you take the diving total away from the actual score. I would like to see it with diving taken out of the “actual scores” since you can’t score diving places from a psych sheet. And I dont want to start the whole… Read more »
Agree that something is amiss when Texas, on average, improves by 161 points. Now, I know that Texas can train hard up to an hour before their conference meet and still win by 200 points, but to taper well enough to experience an average improvement of that many points over that many years is indicative of something else. What is it that permits Texas to so greatly improve their actual performance from the psyche sheets? What accounts for Cal’s ability to improve by an average of 123 points?
They drop a ton more time from their seeded times than anyone else in the field. Average D1 swimmers add .21% to their seed at this meet. Cal drops .75%. Texas drops .55%. Those are massive margins.
Stanford has always had a rep for leaving their best at the conference meet. Boy is that wrong given the points pick up, and not what I’d have guessed. Kind of shocked the lowest on charts is Michigan. I would not have guessed them as a program slipping as a second taper from their conference to this meet.
All the Big 10 schools seem to leave too much at the conference meet. It’s an emotional meet and I think many get swept into the madness there. It will be interesting to see how they perform this year after a little more average Big 10’s.
On that note it will be interesting to see where USC ends up after their stellar Pac 12’s.
Related analysis (D1 is below D3):
http://d3swimming.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=6776
“California is another team to watch. Last year was the first year in the last six where they didn’t improve from their predicted seed.”
Typo?
http://swimswam.com/2014-mens-ncaa-championships-final-pre-meet-power-rankings/
Cal was the favorite, CSF.
But they still outperformed their seed I believe. A moot point now since the article seems to have been updated!