One More to Go: A CCIW Update

The regular season concludes tomorrow for the CCIW... which means we have to look at how the CCIW Tournament races are shaping up.

This is an annual feature for me where I look at all the different clinching scenarios. Earlier this week I had thought about trying to crunch numbers with two games to go for odds of each team getting certain tournament seeds. The math proved to be a little too much for me, but I will include the numbers here now that there's just one game to go and the math becomes much more simple.

As usual, a lot of the tournament spots have been claimed already, but seeding is all still well up for grabs. I consider it the advantage in Year Two of having a six team tournament instead of only four. Let's have a look.

Women's Basketball

The top of the field is set, though the order still remains to be determined. Meanwhile, we still have three teams fighting for the final two spots. This Saturday's schedule has one early game at 2pm, with the remaining three tipping at 5pm. This is... messy.

• Wheaton: Has clinched the #1 seed
• North Park: Clinches the #2 seed with:
• A win at Augustana
• An Illinois Wesleyan loss at Carthage AND a Millikin loss at Carroll
• North Park: Clinches the #3 seed with:
• A Millikin loss at Carroll
• An Illinois Wesleyan loss at Carthage
• Illinois Wesleyan: Clinches the #2 seed with:
• A win at Carthage AND a North Park loss at Augustana
• Illinois Wesleyan: clinches the #3 seed with:
• A win at Carthage
• A Millikin loss at Carroll
• Millikin: Clinches the #2 seed with: 
• A win at Carroll AND a North Park loss at Augustana AND an Illinois Wesleyan loss at Carthage
• Millikin: Clinches the #3 seed with:
• A win at Carroll AND
• A North Park loss at Augustana
• An Illinois Wesleyan loss at Carthage
• North Central: Clinches the #5 seed with:
• A win at Wheaton
• An Augustana loss vs North Park
• North Central: Clinches the #6 seed with:
• A Carthage loss vs Illinois Wesleyan
• Augustana: Clinches the #5 seed with:
• A win vs North Park AND a North Central loss at Wheaton
• Augustana: Clinches the #6 seed with: 
• A win vs North Park
• A Carthage loss vs Illinois Wesleyan
• Carthage: Clinches the #6 seed with:
• A win vs Illinois Wesleyan AND a North Central loss at Wheaton AND an Augustana loss vs North Park

Tiebreakers

• Wheaton holds the tiebreaker over North Park due to a sweep of Illinois Wesleyan; North Park split with Illinois Wesleyan (Tiebreaker 3)
• Wheaton holds the tiebreaker over Illinois Wesleyan due to a head to head sweep (Tiebreaker 1)
• North Park holds the tiebreaker over Illinois Wesleyan due to a split with Wheaton; Wheaton swept Illinois Wesleyan (Tiebreaker 2)
• Millikin holds the tiebreaker over North Park due to a sweep of Augustana/North Central; North Park split with North Central and would split with Augustana in this scenario (Tiebreaker 3)
• Millikin holds the tiebreaker over Illinois Wesleyan due to a split with Wheaton; Wheaton swept Illinois Wesleyan (Tiebreaker 2)
• North Central holds the tiebreaker over Augustana due to a head to head sweep (Tiebreaker 1)
• North Central holds the three-way tiebreaker over Augustana and Carthage due to a 3-1 head to head record; Carthage is 2-2, Augustana is 1-3 (Tiebreaker 1)
• Augustana holds the tiebreaker over Carthage due to a split with Wheaton; Wheaton swept Carthage (Tiebreaker 2)
• Carthage holds the two-way tiebreaker over North Central due to a 2-2 composite record against North Park and Illinois Wesleyan (3-3 if you add in Millikin); North Central has a composite 1-3 (1-5) composite record against those teams (Tiebreaker 2)

Complicated, but thankfully the folks at the CCIW office put together a primer for all of the scenarios. It's just a little crazy that only one seed is locked up, then you have three teams fighting for the second first round bye, then three more teams fighting for the final two spots and road games on Tuesday. Two of the three teams have a good head start based on the numbers with that one game lead going into the weekend, but some tiebreakers do benefit Carthage. Based on the Massey ratings, here's the seedings odds for everyone:

	Wheaton	North Park	IWU	Millikin	NCC	Augie	Carthage
#1	100%	-	-	-	-	-	-
#2	-	49.9%	38.8%	11.3%	-	-	-
#3	-	26.0%	41.4%	32.6%	-	-	-
#4	-	24.1%	19.8%	56.1%	-	-	-
#5	-	-	-	-	51.0%	49.0%	-
#6	-	-	-	-	33.3%	49.8%	16.9%

Men's Basketball

This one is a lot simpler. The teams in are set and have been since this past Saturday; we're just seeing some final jockeying for position tomorrow. Like on the women's side, we have one game early (scheduled for 4pm), with the other three scheduled for 7pm.

• North Central: Has clinched the #1 seed
• Augustana: Clinches the #2 seed with:
• A win vs North Park
• An Illinois Wesleyan loss at Carthage
• Illinois Wesleyan: Clinches the #2 seed with:
• A win at Carthage AND an Augustana loss vs North Park
• Illinois Wesleyan: Clinches the #3 seed with:
• A win at Carthage
• Illinois Wesleyan: Clinches the #4 seed with:
• A Wheaton loss vs North Central
• Elmhurst: Clinches the #3 seed with:
• An Illinois Wesleyan loss at Carthage
• Wheaton: Clinches the #4 seed with:
• A win vs North Central AND an Illinois Wesleyan loss at Carthage
• Carthage: Has clinched the #6 seed'

Tiebreakers

• Illinois Wesleyan holds the tiebreaker over Augustana due to a split with North Central; North Central swept Augustana (Tiebreaker 2)
• Illinois Wesleyan holds the tiebreaker over Elmhurst due to a split with North Central; North Central swept Elmhurst (Tiebreaker 2)
• Augustana holds the tiebreaker over Elmhurst due to a sweep of Carthage; Elmhurst split with Carthage (Tiebreaker 3)
• Wheaton holds the tiebreaker over Illinois Wesleyan due to a head to head sweep (Tiebreaker 1)

So much cleaner. Illinois Wesleyan is the fun case because they can, in theory, finish anywhere from second to fifth. For reference, that's the difference between getting a bye directly to Friday in Naperville and, in this scenario, having to go back to King Arena just a week and a half after Nyameye Adom beat them at the buzzer. Based on the Massey ratings, here are the seeding odds for everyone:

	NCC	Augie	Elmhurst	IWU	Wheaton	Carthage
#1	100%	-	-	-	-	-
#2	-	99.1%	-	0.9%	-	-
#3	-	0.9%	56%	43.1%	-	-
#4	-	-	44%	34.7%	21.3%	-
#5	-	-	-	21.3%	78.7%	-
#6	-	-	-	-	-	100%