Do you mean they can go no less than a ninth seed because right now they are at the 7th seed which in my book is perfect for them advancing far in the tournament.  If they keep the 7th, they most likely will get Central Michigan on Tuesday and then face Western or Ball on noon Thursday.  I'd rather face West teams early and get the momentum going to advance to the semis and the 'ship. 

It was great that the Bobcats won last night over BGSU, or course, but by my estimation we received NO help in the other games across the MAC.  It especially hurts that CMU won on the road at NIU. 

Our three remaining games are all going to be exceedingly tough.  CMU is hanging around ready to steal the #8 seed from us and push us into the #9 seed.  This could happen (someone correct me if I'm wrong) even if we finish 8-8. 

That loss at CMU could come back to haunt us. 

Tiebreaker rules changed this year.  Division record is now the first tiebreaker after head-to-head.

Dragon, I am aware of that -- we and BG are both 3-4 vs. the East. Should Buffalo lose, they will be 3-4 as well.

Flomo: "NOTE: Once a three-team tie has been reduced to two teams, the two-team tiebreaker will go into effect."

http://mac-sports.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=9400&ATC...

UB would beat us out with their first win against Kent.

That doesn't seem fair.  Teams from the East are going to be at severe disadvantage.  That is fine if the tied teams are from the same division but if they are from different divisions it really hurts the team from the stronger division. They should make it your record against the Division of the team you are tied with compared to their record against yours.

No, you are right UpSan about the time.  But, I've just noticed that in the past years of my MAC tourney travels, they have the number 2 seed play at noon.  So, if we get that seven seed and win Tuesday night, I have to make sure to be there by noon but hopefully I won't be so rushed.  Especially since my little girl doesn't go to school til 9:40 that day and it takes 2 1/2 hours to get to Cleveland.  Ouch!! 

I had the same thought at first, but the more I think about it the more I think that it makes sense.  Because head-to-head is the first tie-breaker, I believe the intra-divisional record tie-breaker will only come into play when two teams from the same division are tied.  In other words, because East teams only play West teams once per year, any tie between two teams from different divisions will always be broken by head-to-head record. 

Even in the case of a multi-way tie, the tie would first be broken by selecting the team with the best head-to-head record amongst the group, followed by the team with the best head-to-head record among the remaining teams, and so on until only two teams remain.  The remaining two teams would then be sorted based on their head-to-head record, so again here, the intra-divisional record would only come into play if the two tied teams are from the same division.

I'm not sure if the MAC office actually thought it through like that or not, of course, but in the end it seems to make sense.

how bout an update based on tonight's win and other games - Akron over Buf, etc.

So this took a lot longer than I thought it would, but in short we have not yet clinched a first round home game.  But we're close. 

We are basically competing with four teams to avoid the 9th seed: CMU (6-8), BGSU (7-7), and Buffalo (7-7).  Ohio can finish no worse than 8-8.  CMU would have to win out to finish 8-8 (at Toledo, vs. WMU).  Meanwhile, either BGSU (vs. Kent, vs. Buffalo) or UB (vs. Miami, at BGSU) is guaranteed to finish no better than 8-8, as they play each other in the season finale.

We will clinch at least the 8th seed should any one of the following occur:

Ohio wins one more game
CMU loses one more game
BGSU loses two more games
Buffalo loses two more games

However, should Ohio lose out, CMU win out, and both BGSU and Buffalo win at least one of their last two games, then then we'd be in either a 3-way or 4-way tie with CMU and either/both BGSU and Buffalo.   This is where things get complicated.

In a 3-way tie between Ohio, CMU, and BGSU (i.e., Ohio loses out, CMU wins out, Buffalo wins out, and BGSU beats Kent but loses to Buffalo), CMU would win the 7th seed by having gone 2-0 vs. Ohio and BGSU.  BGSU and Ohio split head-to-head, so the next tie-breaker would be intra-divisional record.  In this hypothetical, both Ohio and BGSU would be 4-6.  Thus, we'd proceed to best record vs. the first seed, second seed, and so on, until the tie is broken.  This gets messy, as a number of different teams could still win the #1 seed.  Because Ohio and BGSU would have the same head-to-head record vs. Kent, Ball State, and WMU, the tie-breaker would come down to whether Akron or Miami finished higher.  If Akron, Ohio would win the 8th seed.  If Miami finishes better, BGSU would finish 8th, and Ohio 9th.

In a 3-way tie between Ohio, CMU, and Buffalo (i.e., Ohio loses out, CMU wins out, BGSU wins out, and Buffalo beats Miami but loses to BGSU), Buffalo would win the 7th seed by going 2-1 vs. us and CMU.  That would leave us in a head-to-head tie with CMU, who would get the 8th seed by having beaten us.

In a 4-way tie between Ohio, CMU, Buffalo, and BGSU (i.e., Ohio loses out, CMU wins out, and Buffalo and BGSU both split), CMU would be 2-1 vs. the other three tied teams, Ohio would be 2-3, Buffalo would be either 3-2 or 2-3 (depending on who wins UB-BGSU), and BGSU would be either 3-2 or 2-3 (depending again on who wins UB-BGSU).  In this case, CMU would win the 6th seed, and the winner of Buffalo-BGSU would win the 7th seed.  We'd be tied with the loser of Buffalo-BGSU for the 8th seed.  Because we split with both, we'd go to intra-divisional records, which would again be tied (4-6 in this scenario for Ohio, BGSU, and UB).  Then it would again come down to who has the best record against the highest finishing team.  Versus BGSU, it would again depend on whether Akron or Miami finishes higher.  Versus Buffalo, UB would win if WMU wins the West, while Ohio would win if Ball State wins the West (we would both be 1-1 vs. potential East champs Kent, Miami, and Akron).

So, in short, the 9th seed is still a possibility if we lose twice.  Hopefully we take care of business vs. Akron and make this all moot.

Flomo, that is an AMAZING post!  Thank you so much for the effort you put into that.  

We just need to take care of business vs. Akron at the Convo Tuesday night to clinch the home game...it will probably not be easy.  Hopefully, Akron is due for something of an "off" game, though they are extremely hot right now.