Tuesday, September 29, 2009

Polls Should Be Motivation For Seawolves

Pretty much just as I predicted on September 20th, below are the two main WCHA polls. These polls mean only one general thing to me. That UAA players ought to play every single minute of this season with a massive chip on their shoulder. They should take offense at it and play harder than they've ever played the game before. It's the best motivation their competitors could give them. They should remember it as being disrespected. They should manufacture a double-hulled super-tanker load of "I told ya so" each and every time they hit the ice. Let it piss you off fellas. And let that motivate you. You DO have something to prove. And this is your opportunity.


Here's what I predicted the WCHA Coaches poll would look like:
1. DU, 2. UND, 3. UW, 4. UofM, 5. SCSU, 6. UMD, 7. MSUM, 8. CC, 9. UAA, 10. MTU

Here's how I would have voted if I'd been asked to fill one out:
1. DU, 2. UW, 3. UND, 4. UAA, 5. UofM, 6. UMD, 7. SCSU, 8. MSUM, 9. CC, 10. MTU
Coaches are not allowed to vote for their own teams in the Coaches Poll. So clearly every coach picked MTU last. If every coach had picked UAA 9th then the total would have been 18 (even though I lack any algebraic skills, I can do that much math). It looks to me that 8 of them picked UAA 9th and one picked them 7th.

The two media representatives from Alaska (out of a total of 25 voters) who voted in the Media Poll are Kurt Haider and Doyle Woody. I can't easily come up with a clear combination of votes to get to the number of points listed. I suppose several variations would put it at those numbers. Any math whiz willing to do the analysis and comment is welcome.

12 comments:

vizoroo said...

Donald, You may be optimistic about your Seawolves, but in my opinion they should be or at least I want them in the 5-7 range. After last year I know we don't want to see you in Denver in the 1st round of the playoffs.

Donald Dunlop said...

I think the results of those two playoffs games had a lot to do with who's ice they were played on.

It was clear to me that 3 out of the last 4 games they played against DU that the Seawolves were every bit DU's equal on the ice. The results of course didn't show that.

I'm honestly expecting everyone to be saying ... "Shit I really underestimated them" at the end of the year.

Anonymous said...

This year hopefully the coach will allow players to act like men, the curfew issue cost us games. In und and minnesota, they would have addressed the issue differently and got on with winning games.
Sitting players cost us games.
The other teams in the league took it to us, let our leaders lead, we have the talent.

All the best

Fan

DC said...

"Any math whiz willing to do the analysis and comment is welcome."

Well, hello there.

Ok, here's what we know:
1. Ciskie voted UAA 8th
2. Chris Dilks voted UAA 9th
3. Two people voted MTU not last (one 8th, one 9th). One is most likely Dirk. ASSUME those people picked UAA last.

So you have:
57 total points - 3 for Ciskie - 2 for Dilks - 2 for the two assumed last places = 50 points. 25 voters total - 4 accounted for = 21 unaccounted for.

Ok, people probably voted them 8th or 9th.

So you have:
3x + 2y = 50
x + y = 21

That leaves 8 people who voted UAA 8th and 13 that voted them 9th.

There is no way to solve for more than 2 variables though, so if someone voted them higher than 8th or 9th it's impossible to figure out.

Donald Dunlop said...

I asked Doyle Woody on his blog how he voted but whether he'll answer is an open question.

Donald Dunlop said...

And um ... I meant to say thanks. That was very helpful.

Anonymous said...

Polls are for losers,winning on the ice is everything. We have a talented group of players, let's promote them, develop a top line power play unit, strong penalty killing and never say die attiutde.
We have a big tough team with talented snipers up front.
Let's play like philly in the nhl. and hersehy in the ahl.
Winning team will fill the sully every week, let's finish no worst than fifth.
Fan

Donald Dunlop said...

Just for the record Doyle Woody put UAA at #9 on his ballot.

Anonymous said...

of course he would

Anonymous said...

Your picks are good for a chuckle.

Anonymous said...

4th? Talk about rose colored glasses.

Anonymous said...

Theresa Spisak from USCHO.com had the Seawolves 7th too.

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