2) Coaching/tournament prep differences
We have heard it all before, Cael can’t coach all he can do is recruit. Well, even if this is true, if recruiting leads to winning and Cael is the best at it you are a complete fool for making this argument. But UFF is here to show you this isn’t true. UFF has compiled some interesting statistics shown as PSU, Iowa, and national average:
#1 seeds who win – 77%, 40%, 53%. Cael gets his #1 seeds to win championships better than any other coach.
% of qualifiers who All-american – 69%, 61%, NA (didn’t calculate)
#6 seed or better who DNP – 13.7%, 15.3%, 15.8%. Cael has less of his wrestlers who are seeded high not place.
Now you could say all of these are influenced by the fact that PSU has had more highly seeded wrestlers, and that is true. We can look at some other metrics that aren’t influenced.
#4 seeds or lower who win – 5%, 0%, 0.6% (Iowa is 0 for 80, PSU 2 for 40). This is a low probability event but Cael has done it, Brands has not.
Ratio of worse than seed / better or equal to seed – 0.44, 0.84, 1.12. This is very telling, overall a seeded wrestler is more likely to wrestle below seed than above it (this is why you can't just throw seeds into a spreadsheet and predict the tournament winner). However, by more than a 2 to 1 margin Cael has his wrestlers perform better or equal to their seeds. Brands is better than average but not by much.
Ratio of plus 4 in place compared to seed to minus 4 in place compared to seed – 1.5, 0.4, NA. Cael has many more wrestlers that finish 4 or more places higher than their seed to those that are 4 or more places lower. Brands is the opposite by a wide margin.
Unless Iowa is doing something tremendously different this year in tournament prep it further helps PSU close the gap. Adding this effect to the seeds and rerunning the simulation changes the win probabilities to PSU 55% Iowa 45%. That’s right, PSU is a slight favorite. Shocking! Math can be that way sometimes.
We have heard it all before, Cael can’t coach all he can do is recruit. Well, even if this is true, if recruiting leads to winning and Cael is the best at it you are a complete fool for making this argument. But UFF is here to show you this isn’t true. UFF has compiled some interesting statistics shown as PSU, Iowa, and national average:
#1 seeds who win – 77%, 40%, 53%. Cael gets his #1 seeds to win championships better than any other coach.
% of qualifiers who All-american – 69%, 61%, NA (didn’t calculate)
#6 seed or better who DNP – 13.7%, 15.3%, 15.8%. Cael has less of his wrestlers who are seeded high not place.
Now you could say all of these are influenced by the fact that PSU has had more highly seeded wrestlers, and that is true. We can look at some other metrics that aren’t influenced.
#4 seeds or lower who win – 5%, 0%, 0.6% (Iowa is 0 for 80, PSU 2 for 40). This is a low probability event but Cael has done it, Brands has not.
Ratio of worse than seed / better or equal to seed – 0.44, 0.84, 1.12. This is very telling, overall a seeded wrestler is more likely to wrestle below seed than above it (this is why you can't just throw seeds into a spreadsheet and predict the tournament winner). However, by more than a 2 to 1 margin Cael has his wrestlers perform better or equal to their seeds. Brands is better than average but not by much.
Ratio of plus 4 in place compared to seed to minus 4 in place compared to seed – 1.5, 0.4, NA. Cael has many more wrestlers that finish 4 or more places higher than their seed to those that are 4 or more places lower. Brands is the opposite by a wide margin.
Unless Iowa is doing something tremendously different this year in tournament prep it further helps PSU close the gap. Adding this effect to the seeds and rerunning the simulation changes the win probabilities to PSU 55% Iowa 45%. That’s right, PSU is a slight favorite. Shocking! Math can be that way sometimes.