Power Ratings 2014-15 Proposal - Passed

[beauchenecoach]

Power Ratings Proposal for 2014-2015

proposed by Ted Nixon (St. Louis Principal) and co authored by Keith James (Beau Chene Prinicpal)

The following are just parts of the proposed ammendment that show you the important parts of the formula)

As you all know, Power Ratings are inevitable. It would have happened last year at the January convention, but the proposal was pulled due to the formula needed to be ammended. Well... I am happy to say that we finally have the formula that feels the best for our sport. Coach Jason Oertling (St. Louis) has really taken this up to task and with some input from many coaches and lots of power rating examples from the past 6-7 years on Laprep... we are going with the following...

18.5.4 Determining Power Rating:
1. The power rating for each school shall be determined as follows:
Result of Contest Add
Win (5 points) Opponents’ Wins (100%)
Loss (0 points) Opponents’ Wins (50%)
Tie (2.5 points) Opponents’ Wins (75%)
*a tie will be considered .5 of a win and .5 of a loss
*a non-district game that is tied after regulation shall be considered a tie if the LHSAA tie-breaking criteria is not used to decide
the game
2. A school’s power rating shall be the total power points of games played divided by the number of total games played during the
regular season. Refer to the LHSAA website for an example of how the power rating is determined.
3. Contests played against out of state opponents, sub-varsity opponents and district playoff (tie-breaker) games shall not count in
determining a school’s power rating.

18.6.3
Schools that failed to play at least 15 games during the regular season, including district play and invitational tournament play, shall
be ranked separately using the same ranking system used to rank schools that played at least 15 games or more during the regular
season. These schools shall be ranked at the bottom of the bracket and seeded accordingly until all the remaining positions on the
bracket are filled.




Also... ONLY District champions will qualify automatically and the rest of the bracket will be filled in with wildcards.


Explanation of how we are using this proposal to have a power ratings (example only this season, not official yet)for this season. This will show all of us how it work starting next season when this is voted in. And rest assured, as we always knew, when power ratings are proposed, it will be voted in.

All games results as of the end of regulation will be what is put into the formula. For this year, since it isn't official yet, we are depending on you to report when a game goes into OT and/or PKs. Most tournaments have already clarified in their rules that knockout round (semifinal or final) games can end in a draw. Most of these tournaments are using a PK shootout immediately after regulation to determine who advances to next round or wins the tournament. BUT, both teams report a draw on their record. Next year, along with the power ratings proposal, the elimination of OT and PK shootouts in regular season will also be proposed and should pass easily according to the survey. PK shootouts will only be used in regular season for tiebreaker purpopses in tournaments and if a district has that listed as a tiebreaker option for standings or playoff reporting.

So in short, this years power ratings formula used on this site is a preview of next season and how it will be. The only thing different next year will be that each coach will have to input their schedule at the LHSAA member site and report results after every game. So the LHSAA will start tracking everything once power ratings goes into effect. We will be like EVERY other team sport in the LHSAA.

So enjoy the power ratings once the start posting sometime in late December. Look at how certain things effect your power rating. This is a valuable tool to use for scheduling next year when it is officially in effect.

Let us know if you have any questions.

[Boomer]

Nov 25, 2013 12:36:35 GMT -6 beauchenecoach said:

Power Ratings Proposal for 2014-2015

proposed by Ted Nixon (St. Louis Principal) and co authored by Keith James (Beau Chene Prinicpal)

The following are just parts of the proposed ammendment that show you the important parts of the formula)

As you all know, Power Ratings are inevitable. It would have happened last year at the January convention, but the proposal was pulled due to the formula needed to be ammended. Well... I am happy to say that we finally have the formula that feels the best for our sport. Coach Jason Oertling (St. Louis) has really taken this up to task and with some input from many coaches and lots of power rating examples from the past 6-7 years on Laprep... we are going with the following...


Let us know if you have any questions.

Well, I do have some concerns and questions. 

1.  Will the PR be used to seed teams, or just to determine who makes playoffs?

The good basketball teams HATE the PR seeding, and the PR seeding in football is increasingly in question. Most of the good basketball programs would like to get rid of automatic seeding but can't now because so many weak teams benefit from the system. 

Mark my words... whatever PR is adopted for soccer, however sophisticated, if it is used for seeding you will sooner rather than later have some confounding issues:  such as Jesuit and St. Paul's being seeded 2nd and 6th, meeting in the third round on someone's home field.  And the dicey seeding is always worse in the lower divisions.  There you will see some truly bad rankings ... that will even have a regional bias for certain mathmatical reasons.

All the good basketball programs dispise the dumbing down of schedules and the weakening of seasonal play. The mediocre teams all like it because they can minipulate the system by only playing each other, and that is already happening. 

I have respect for those proposing this ... but they also proposed the current system of qualifying for playoffs.  It is OK, but in my opinion, it was designed for specific elements unique to D-II, and specifically for the top teams.  Consider the current system from a middle of the pack D-III perspective.  

What has happened this year with the WC based on division record and two district teams qualify, is that the weaker division teams are reluctant to schedule stronger out-of-district teams because they are all striving for division qualification record.  This means a modestly strong team can only get division games against the strongest teams - if a slot is available.  Those teams are usually playing up against State-quality teams and have few slots to spare.  It also means that come playoffs, teams will preferentially qualify for WC by playing coed teams, who play other coed teams while strong teams in strong districts cannot get division games. 

 This is a harbinger of what seeding by PR will introduce, in my opinion. You might even see games "cancled" late in the season to preserve a certain seeding position.

2.  Why is it acceptable that "whenever a PR is proposed, it is adopted?"  That doesn't mean it SHOULD be adopted, or that it is the right thing.  We SHOULD have opted out of that stupid NFHS uniform rules.   However, if the PR is a determinant for eligibility only and the coaches continue to seed, in my mind that would be acceptable, probably as good or better than what we have now.   

[Crusader soccer]

As usual, Boomer says it well. I agree with him!

Things have been working pretty well for quite some time and I hate having to start pulling out my few strands of hair over scheduling nightmares. Many other factors go into scheduling such as travel limitations, etc.

[thirdcoast]

Dec 7, 2013 16:57:15 GMT -6 Boomer said:

Nov 25, 2013 12:36:35 GMT -6 beauchenecoach said:

Power Ratings Proposal for 2014-2015

proposed by Ted Nixon (St. Louis Principal) and co authored by Keith James (Beau Chene Prinicpal)

The following are just parts of the proposed ammendment that show you the important parts of the formula)

As you all know, Power Ratings are inevitable. It would have happened last year at the January convention, but the proposal was pulled due to the formula needed to be ammended. Well... I am happy to say that we finally have the formula that feels the best for our sport. Coach Jason Oertling (St. Louis) has really taken this up to task and with some input from many coaches and lots of power rating examples from the past 6-7 years on Laprep... we are going with the following...


Let us know if you have any questions.

Well, I do have some concerns and questions. 

1.  Will the PR be used to seed teams, or just to determine who makes playoffs?

The good basketball teams HATE the PR seeding, and the PR seeding in football is increasingly in question. Most of the good basketball programs would like to get rid of automatic seeding but can't now because so many weak teams benefit from the system. 

Mark my words... whatever PR is adopted for soccer, however sophisticated, if it is used for seeding you will sooner rather than later have some confounding issues:  such as Jesuit and St. Paul's being seeded 2nd and 6th, meeting in the third round on someone's home field.  And the dicey seeding is always worse in the lower divisions.  There you will see some truly bad rankings ... that will even have a regional bias for certain mathmatical reasons.

All the good basketball programs dispise the dumbing down of schedules and the weakening of seasonal play. The mediocre teams all like it because they can minipulate the system by only playing each other, and that is already happening. 

I have respect for those proposing this ... but they also proposed the current system of qualifying for playoffs.  It is OK, but in my opinion, it was designed for specific elements unique to D-II, and specifically for the top teams.  Consider the current system from a middle of the pack D-III perspective.  

What has happened this year with the WC based on division record and two district teams qualify, is that the weaker division teams are reluctant to schedule stronger out-of-district teams because they are all striving for division qualification record.  This means a modestly strong team can only get division games against the strongest teams - if a slot is available.  Those teams are usually playing up against State-quality teams and have few slots to spare.  It also means that come playoffs, teams will preferentially qualify for WC by playing coed teams, who play other coed teams while strong teams in strong districts cannot get division games. 

 This is a harbinger of what seeding by PR will introduce, in my opinion. You might even see games "cancled" late in the season to preserve a certain seeding position.

2.  Why is it acceptable that "whenever a PR is proposed, it is adopted?"  That doesn't mean it SHOULD be adopted, or that it is the right thing.  We SHOULD have opted out of that stupid NFHS uniform rules.   However, if the PR is a determinant for eligibility only and the coaches continue to seed, in my mind that would be acceptable, probably as good or better than what we have now.   

I agree to Boomer's points, but I have more to add:

1) Teams do not have a choice on what district they are in.  Why is it fair to play in a district that usually means 2 games per team and those teams are terrible?  They won't have decent records and the better teams are 'penalized' for playoff position by winning games against teams that won't pull wins against anyone.  Not fair.

2) Why not just have the district champs be auto qualifiers and every other playoff spot be a wildcard team voted in, without any restrictions on the wild card team 'selection' (ex. - remove the division win pct. clause among other things)?  This would benefit the stronger districts so all of their 'worthy playoff' teams could qualify.

3) Good luck if you are at a small school and your football team makes the state finals and you need players from that team to play soccer.  Seriously, it would be a test to get 15 games in, so you'd be penalized and not be able to play in the top 15 spots for playoffs - is that really in the kid's best interests?  Who are we and why are we penalizing here....

4)  We are NOT like every other sport in the LHSAA if we adopt this.  I'm not 100% on this but I would guess that almost every other sport in our high schools have much longer seasons that we do, they can get more games in.  We are in a shortened season compared to those AND we have Thanksgiving AND Christmas AND mid-terms to deal with.  

5) Schedules and Results are posted pretty well and accurately on the LaPrep site.  Even if they are off a bit (my school's record has been wrong for the last 3 weeks - BTW), it's not a problem to have that fixed by playoff time.  Soon we're going to have to rely on LHSAA to keep track of that and then the possibility of the LHSAA to add penalties (I would think that would be inevitable) if scores aren't reported that night or the next day.  Why set ourselves up for that racket?  

6)  Why should teams be penalized for playing teams out of state?  I know several schools have traveled to MS to play Gulfport and Ocean Springs and those are super strong programs (I'm guessing there are other examples up north too).  Basically the power rankings would prevent those teams (well, at least the incentive to play those caliber teams), from proving that they are strong teams.  I'm by no means saying to include those out of state games in the rankings, BUT it does show our strength when it comes to NSCAA rankings, oddly enough one of the writers of this bill won a national championship due to traveling to these out-of-state games/tournaments.  Without those games, I wonder how much respect those teams would get in the NSCAA voting......

The ranking system for the last few years has been very good and very accurate, what is everyone voting for this new power ranking seeing as a problem to what we have now?  I am sure that I may catch some slack from the writers of this proposal (2 long time friends) but I feel that this proposal will significantly hurt my team when it comes to playoff seeding in the near term and I have to defend that.  I would love to hear any responses to open my eyes to a different feeling towards this proposal.

Billy Smith
Country Day Soccer

[p_malinich]

I pulled the posts related to the PR proposal out of the Standings & Scores thread and into its own thread.  We expect to roll out the Power Ratings for this year between now and the end of the year.  Since we are using the proposals for calculating this year (to give a sense of what's being proposed), I'm assuming that there will be debate & discussion, which can take place in this thread.

[p_malinich]

The biggest change in the Power Rating proposal is that non-district games that are tied at the end of regulation will be considered as a tie for Power Rating purposes (regardless of what happens in OT and/or Shootouts).

There is a 2nd proposal that would allow District games to end in ties just like non-district games.

Therefore, for this year's Power Rating calculation, we are allowing the "what if" to be seen by calculating Power Ratings as if both of those proposals were to pass.

Will that be confusing this year?
* It probably will be to a degree, but we want to provide vision into what next year could look like.
* We're straddling the old & the proposed new.
* So an OT win will be a win for Standings, but will only count as a tie (1/2 of a win) for Power Ratings. And the reverse for an OT loss.

[p_malinich]

As a referesher, the Power Rating for each school shall be determined based on the following:

* Win = 5 points + 100% of Opponents’ Power Rating Wins
* Tie (at end of Regulation) = 2.5 points + 75% of Opponents’ Power Rating Wins
* Loss = 0 points + 50 % of Opponents’ Power Rating Wins

Notes: 
A) A tie will be considered as 1/2 of a win and 1/2 of a loss
B) It's based on Power Ratings Wins (proposed), NOT Standings Wins (current) when awarding points to opponent
C) Getting destroyed by a very strong opponent can earn you more Power Rating points than blowing out a winless opponent

[p_malinich]

I've also created a similar thread on the Girl's side that you may want to follow.

[p_malinich]

No discussion at all? I guess everyone's waiting to see where their team winds up before deciding to comment...

Regardless, I've finished up the testing of the new calculation for Power Ratings and the math seems to be working as intended. I plan to publish the actual numbers Sunday night or Monday morning after this weekend's tournament (and individual game) scores have been reported on LA Prep and entered in the spreadsheet.

See my earlier posts as to how the PR calc works and what can affect it. I'm sure you will all find both support for it and questions about it as you dig into the details.

Another thing to keep in mind is that the strength of opponent component in the calculation is based on the end-of-season number of Power Rating wins (regardless of when you play them). So if you beat a top team early in the season, you can cheer for them for the rest of the year because every time they win, you get that win factored into your Power Rating.

I think that's it for now.  But please DO ASK questions so that we can work to a solid understanding for everyone.

[jk52]

I guess I'll get it started.

1) The way I understand it is that the Power Rankings will determine who makes the playoffs and where they are seeded. Please correct me if I am wrong. As Boomer said, it will result in teams not being seeded as accurately as the coach seeding does.
2) It will also result in teams who deserve to be in the playoffs not making it due to being in a tough district or because another coach has done a better job scheduling as opposed to earning it on the field.
(see Boomer's comments regarding basketball Power Rankings)
3) The fact that a very weak team gets more points for losing to a stronger team than the stronger does for winning is somewhat disconcerting. Theoretically, a real weak team could schedule games only against strong teams that play a lot of games and have a decent power ranking.
4)As Billy says, D3 teams with football players have issues that could greatly affect their rankings.
5) Does a team with 20 games and a 10.0 power ranking get in the playoffs ahead of team with 14 games and a 12.0 power ranking? With football season, exams, holidays and bad weather, it is not inconceivable that a worthy team may not get 15 games played. I sure would hate to be a No. 5 seed playing a very good No. 28 seed in the first round just because they were unable to play 15 games.
6) The soccer seedings have been vastly superior and more accurate than any other LHSAA sport the last several years. Personally, I love the power rankings as a tool to help seed the teams at the end of the year. They are fun and interesting to follow. I like the idea of requiring coaches to post their scores because it will be more up-to-date than hoping some coaches or a fan will post their score on this site (See missing scores thread.)But as Boomer said, do we want our two best teams meeting in a quarterfinal? (Well, I guess I would if was the third best team).

I have not yet decided how I am going to advise my principal to vote. I will continue to review and listen before I advise.

[beauchenecoach]

There is no better way to get the best 32 (24 teams in Division II) into the playoffs. All those saying its less fair than what we currently have are not even close! Now seeding wise, it does have some spots where a team can be a spot or two lower or one team can get a very high seed due to geographically dominating a weaker region. But to get the most qualified teams into the playoffs.... power ratings are the best way by far. This will pass with flying colors. I wouldn't mind using coaches seeding after power ratings qualify the teams and that could be something to propose down the road IF there are too many anomalies with power ratings... But in order to get the best teams in, this is the best way.

And yes, districts will be a bit more meaningless as only the champions get an auto qualification and they would be the only teams that could play less than the minimum number of games and still make the playoffs. They would be placed after all the teams that do indeed meet the minimum games criteria. Seriously, 15 games are simple to achieve. Also... This current divisional scheduling patterns will cease to exist and teams will now schedule smarter and attempt to schedule teams that will get a lot of wins that they can compete with or teams they feel that they can beat that will win a fair amount... Teams also won't get hit hard if they schedule and lose to a powerful team that will win a ton of games.

The power ratings that we are showing this year as a preview of next year would be to help coaches see how to schedule dose next season when this goes live. But we need to get the playoff teams in correctly first and foremost... And let's study the seeding results as we go into this and see what it shakes out as. It is a other step in the right direction, just as division win percentage was way better than district win percentage as the first wildcard criteria. Baby steps and continued improvement...

[methuselah]

My take as an admitted non expert on the subject:

Breaking it down between selecting teams and seeding them, I'd say:

- It seems this way pretty much is guaranteed to be better than the existing sysetem. The system now is almost arbitrary with some districts with as few as 3 (or less?) teams and some with quite a bit more.  Heck, some districts are so small teams are almost automatically qualified.  Also, some districts are killers and some are much easier. This new  way teams will have a way to overcome that and it seems to me that more teams that are competitive will make it into the playoffs making for more competitive and thus more entertaining playoff games.

- I can't argue with the results of the coach seedings. They seem to have been accurate in predicting the strength of teams. But, I think that is because the sport has been very fortunate to have seeders that go out of their way not only to be impartial but also to try to inform themselves of teams and games that are not necessarily geographically close to them. There is nothing to say that this good fortune will continue as the years go by and the sport (hopefully) continues growing. It seems like a controversy waiting to happen sooner or later. The power point system has the advantage of being objective at the very least. Also, since seeding is somewhat of a self fulfilling prophecy (ie: teams seeded lower are more likely to play on the road and against higher ranked opponents and so more likely to lose). So it remains to be seen how this seeding will compare to the present system until it's implemented.

[neutralfan]

Quote "There is no better way to get the best 32 (24 teams in Dicision II) into the playoffs. All those saying its less fair than what we currently have are not even close!........" 

Nothing like being open to discussion and seeing the opposing views of other coaches.

I have followed the playoffs for a number of years down here, and I believe for the most part you get it right. 

Also what is the point of open discussion if as has been quoted " But to get the most qualified teams into the playoffs.... power ratings are the best way by far. This will pass with flying colors."

I think you are having a major overhaul of a system for the sake of change.  Surely the best way is, quote " Baby steps and continued improvement... " not major change then fix it.  Look at the BCS.

Just my opinion

[pOkLE]

Does anyone have the math that supports the negative arguments? I'm leery of conclusions without support.
Can't really evaluate without examples or extrapolations.

Current system is far from perfect and crafty scheduling (and schedule adjustments) occur presently. So....Is LHSAA (proposal) requiring contracts?

[kevin]

Here's what I posted in the thread about LHSAA proposals. I'll repost it here. Please note that it uses the formula that was used last year, which I believe is slightly different from what's in the proposal. I don't know how much difference it would make.

I looked at all six tournament brackets from last year (DI, II, and III for girls and boys). I think the coaches do a good job in terms of seeding the teams. But how would the power ratings do? For each playoff matchup, I looked at what the coaches seeding would predict and what the power rating would predict. This is what I came up with:

2013 D1 girls
seedings:
14-2 1st round
8-0 2nd round
4-0 3rd round
2-0 semis
0-1 final
28-3 total

power ratings:
11-5 1st round
7-1 2nd round...
4-0
2-0
1-0
25-6 total


2013 D2 girls
seedings:
7-1 1st round
7-1 2nd...
3-1
1-1
0-1
18-5 total

power ratings:
6-2 1st round
8-0 2nd...
3-1
1-1
0-1
18-5 total


2013 D3 girls
seedings:
13-3 1st
6-2 2nd
3-1
1-1
0-1
23-8 total

power ratings:
13-3
7-1
3-1
1-1
0-1
24-7 total


2013 D1 boys
seedings:
16-0
8-0
3-1
1-1
1-0
29-2 total

power ratings:
15-1
8-0
4-0
0-2
1-0
28-3 total


2013 D2 boys
seedings:
8-0
7-1
3-1
2-0
1-0
21-2 total

power ratings:
8-0
7-1
3-1
2-0
1-0
21-2 total


2013 D3 boys
seedings:
15-1
6-2
2-2
2-0
0-1
25-6 total

power ratings:
15-1
6-2
2-2
2-0
0-1
26-5 total

As you can see, there's no big difference in terms of predictive power between the coaches' seedings and the power ratings. Obviously, this is partly because the coaches are likely influenced by the power ratings. I personally have to ask: if it isn't broken, why fix it? Power ratings do not appear to be a clearly better way of seeding teams. And there is always the chance that some teams would try to game the system, or that certain regions of the state could have an inflated power rating. Furthermore, while the 15-game "minimum" would likely encourage some teams to schedule more matches, power ratings look only at the opponents wins. A win over a 2-6 team counts less than a win over a 4-12 team, even though the two teams have identical winning percentages. A team that plays in a district where most of the other teams only play a bare minimum district slate would be unfairly disadvantaged.

On the other hand, would power ratings be better at determining which teams make the playoffs? Currently the top two from each district go in, along with the teams with the best division record. Power ratings would see only district champs qualify automatically, with the rest of the bracket filled out by teams with the best power rating. I tried to go through the brackets and power rating from last year and determine which teams would have gotten in under the power rating proposals, and which teams they would have replaced. It's possible there may be some mistakes (I checked to make sure that each district got a team in, but I didn't check for co-champions or to see which team actually won the district), and I'm not sure if or how the proposed calculation differs from what was on last year's spreadsheet. But here's what I figured (teams listed as "in" would have gotten into the playoffs had power ratings been used last year):

D1 girls
in: Chapelle, Airline
out: Destrehan, Thomas Jefferson

D2 girls
in: Wossman, South Terrebonne
out: Belle Chasse, Minden

D3 girls
in: North Caddo, St. Martin’s
out: Fisher, Lusher

D1 boys
in: Rummel, Pineville
out: Ehret, Covington

D2 boys
in: Leesville
out: West Ouachita

D3 boys
in: Evangel, Pope John Paul, Redemptorist, Opelousas Catholic
out: Houma Christian, Lafayette Christian, Ouachita Christian, Grace Christian

As you can see, the vast majority of the qualifiers would be the same. I don't really know enough about most of these divisions to say whether the teams that would've gotten in under power ratings are better than the teams that actually did make it. I will point out, however, that for the D1 girls Airline had a couple of good results against playoff teams, while Chapelle beat Destrehan twice and Thomas Jefferson once during the regular season.

So would power ratings be a better way of selecting teams to make the playoffs? One advantage is that teams wouldn't be so afraid to schedule games against comparable same-division opponents (perhaps this might make a Bonnabel-Lutheran match less likely). A loss to a decent same-division team wouldn't be as harmful as it is now.

My personal opinion is that there's no real advantage to using power ratings for seedings. However, I do think that power ratings would be better than the current use of division records in determining the playoff seeds. I don't know if it's feasible for the two parts of the proposal to be split up so that power ratings would determine the qualifying teams, which would then be seeded by the coaches. I don't know if that would pass if someone tried to amend it (or if the LHSAA would allow that amendment to the current proposal).

I'd like to hear the arguments about whether power ratings would produce a better playoff field and improve the regular season (by encouraging more same-division matchups between good teams). I can't decide whether those advantages outweigh the risk of power ratings screwing up the seeding.

[neutralfan]

Kevin
Thanks for all the good work, and you showed, in my opinion, that we are trying to fix something that is not broken.  May need tweaking, but not an overhaul like is being proposed.  Also another thing that is being overlooked is that last year the coaches did not truly understand how to "play the system"  but as the understanding grows so to will the number of undeserving teams making the playoffs based solely on power rankings. 
Finally, surely a system is not right when Mandeville ends up with fewer power points than Hammond, after they won by a landslide, is both stupid and unfair.
Thanks

[p_malinich]

Just got updated file from this weekend's games.  Headed out to church, but intend to do some final audits this afternoon & expect to publish by early evening at the latest.

[beauchenecoach]

Dec 29, 2013 9:45:17 GMT -6 neutralfan said:

Kevin
Thanks for all the good work, and you showed, in my opinion, that we are trying to fix something that is not broken.  May need tweaking, but not an overhaul like is being proposed.  Also another thing that is being overlooked is that last year the coaches did not truly understand how to "play the system"  but as the understanding grows so to will the number of undeserving teams making the playoffs based solely on power rankings. 
Finally, surely a system is not right when Mandeville ends up with fewer power points than Hammond, after they won by a landslide, is both stupid and unfair.
Thanks

This argument has been going on for nearly a decade now... Back when Flat3 first devised the soccer power rating that would work best with LHSAA.  We have DISCUSSED it, used it, tweaked it, and studied it for years now.  I was always a proponent of coaches seeding.  There are problems with it... But all in all it does a good job of seeding.  The biggest problem we face is having teams qualifying that should not be in the playoffs over teams that should!  If that doesn't mean your current system is BROKEN, then what does?  Teams that played around less than 10 games last year and won 3 or 4 getting in over a team like Opelousas Catholic who would have been somewhere around 16 or 17 in power ratings for Division III!  Any playoff system that omits a team that might have even hosted a playoff game in favor of a team that the top 12 teams JV could defeat is not a fair playoff system.

power ratings has been asked of us for years now... And the time has come to step up and be a sport like the rest of every other LHSAA sport.  Report our schedules, play our matches, report our scores!  No more sitting at home and only reporting when you win games to laprep.  No more canceling your games cause you don't feel like going... There are cancellation policies in the LHSAA once they take over with power ratings! This sport has grown by leaps and bounds over the past few years and its time to be a part of the LHSAA system like EVERY other team sport.  I'd rather see a team get a seed too high or too low (it happens now with seeding anyway, go ask Northlake Christian about last year) than a team that absolutely should be in the playoffs not make it.  A team that finished fourth in a district that had 3 top 10 teams that could win most other districts in their division...  The time for too much emphasis on district play is over in other sports and power ratings reward the district champs only... Then the strongest team fill the bracket!  Once a seasons worth of games are played... Power ratings are usually spot on.  Sure, they look funny at times during the season or after a game in particular.... But once a season is played out... It is usually spot on and the teams that deserve to be in the playoffs will be in it.
once it is in... We will have the LHSAA official records being posted for ALL teams!  We will know exactly what EVeRY team is doing!  It will be like every other team sport and we will finally stop being the one team sport that the LHSAA doesn't have info on nor knows what is going on...  And most importantly, the right teams will all get in the playoffs!

Neutralfan... what example of power point are you using with the last statement with Mandeville and Hammond? We have not released any power ratings this year nor in any other year with the finally agreed upon formula that uses a mix of flat3 and LHSAA regular formula.  This isn't a sudden proposal... This has been studied and tested for years now.  And today we will roll out the first example of the proposed agreed formula to show what is happening in regards to if this season would already be using it... And once the end of the season data is completed, it should be a great comparison to the current model in place.

[jk52]

A couple of questions for beauchenecoach.

1. Will teams be required to have their coaches/principals sign game contracts for all games and/or tournaments when this proposal passes?
2. What will be the penalties for cancelled games (or dropping out of a tournament at the last minute)? If a team wants to cancel a game to protect its ratings and declares their field unplayable, what could be done about that? If a contract is signed for a game and it gets rained out and one team wants to reschedule but the other does not, will the game have to be rescheduled?

Teams like Chapelle and Opelousas Catholic not getting into the playoffs last year is the most compelling argument for the power rankings.
Getting the LHSAA more involved and being more like all other sports in some ways are the least compelling arguments. BTW, in all other sports, teams get bonus points for playing teams in higher divisions but their is no allowance for that in this system.

I do agree with you that getting 15 games should be no problem for any team that wants to.

[rlb2024]

I'm OK (to a certain extent) with a power ratings-type system determining which teams make the playoffs, but not for seeding. Here's a couple of reasons why:

1) The Power Ratings system ignores games against out-of-state teams. If a team wants to play a good team from Texas, Mississippi, etc., to get some different competition that shouldn't be ignored. Coaches that are knowledgeable about these situations can take this into consideration when ranking teams rather than having them thrown out.

2) A system based solely on numbers takes away factors such as injuries, weather, etc., that human eyes and discussion on boards such as this one can take into consideration. Should a team that lost a couple of games in the rain and slop in early December, while missing some players due to football playoffs, but is peaking and healthy in late January be penalized in the seeding -- while a team that had early success but has lost ground for whatever reason late in the year be rewarded?