Never Apologize, Never Explain 2023-24

This page describes the methodology for this year's TBRW? Predictions.  As always, if you catch an error please contact me.

RS

RS is each team's points (real points, not derp points) in the prior ECAC regular season:

	RS
Brown	13
Clarkson	21
Colgate	25
Cornell	31
Dartmouth	9
Harvard	36
Princeton	16
Quinnipiac	40
RPI	18
SLU	24
Union	17
Yale	16

PS

PS is the number of upset (lower seed) advances (+1) or eliminations (-1) in the previous season's ECAC tournament.  The consolation game is ignored.

The upsets in the last season's ECAC tournament were:

• 1R #10 Yale upsets #7 RPI
• 1R #9 Princeton upsets #8 Union
• QF #5 Colgate upsets #4 St. Lawrence
• SF #5 Colgate upsets #1 Quinnipiac
• F #5 Colgate upsets #2 Harvard

	PS
Brown	0
Clarkson	0
Colgate	+3
Cornell	0
Dartmouth	0
Harvard	-1
Princeton	+1
Quinnipiac	-1
RPI	-1
SLU	-1
Union	-1
Yale	+1

Imp

Imp is the difference in points gained in the second half (games 12-22) minus the first half (games 1-11) of the prior ECAC regular season, divided by 2, rounded down.  A positive Imp indicates the team had a better second half:

	Pts	2nd ½	1st ½	Diff	Imp
Brown	13	7	6	+1	0
Clarkson	21	11	10	+1	0
Colgate	25	9	16	-7	-3
Cornell	31	15	16	-1	0
Dartmouth	9	4	5	-1	0
Harvard	36	18	18	0	0
Princeton	16	6	10	-4	-2
Quinnipiac	40	18	22	-4	-2
RPI	18	12	6	+6	+3
SLU	24	12	12	0	0
Union	17	11	6	+5	+2
Yale	16	11	5	+6	+3

RP%: Returning Points Percentage -- A Fond Farewell

Returning points was the percentage of prior year's points not lost to graduation or early departure.  The increase in players moving between teams through the portal has rendered this less sigificant, as teams tend to compensate for extensive losses. To be honest, it also makes it far more labor intensive to calculate. Therefore, TBRW is dropping it from the calculation.

RA: Returning Awardees

Returning Awardees is the net return (or loss) of ECAC First Team, POTY, and ROTY awards.  The potential repetition of a player (e.g., First Team and POTY) is intentional to allow for the impact of unusually talented players.

The prior ECAC awardees were:

Award	Name	Team	Status
ECAC F	Colin Graf	Quinnipiac	Return
ECAC F	Sean Farrell	Harvard	Loss
ECAC F	Alex Young	Colgate	Loss
ECAC D	Henry Thrun	Harvard	Loss
ECAC D	Sam Malinski	Cornell	Loss
ECAC G	Yaniv Perets	Quinnipiac	Loss
POTY	Sean Farrell	Harvard	Loss
DF	Skyler Brind’Amour	Quinnipiac	Loss
DD	Henry Thrun	Harvard	Loss
ROTY	Sam Lipkin	Quinnipiac	Return

The calculation: add one point for each returning awardee while subtracting one for each departure:

	Return	Depart	RA
Brown	0	0	0
Clarkson	0	0	0
Colgate	0	1	-1
Cornell	0	1	-1
Dartmouth	0	0	0
Harvard	0	4	-4
Princeton	0	0	0
Quinnipiac	2	2	0
RPI	0	0	0
SLU	0	0	0
Union	0	0	0
Yale	0	0	0

Avg10

Avg10 measures traditional program strength, by taking the team's mean number of Points over the prior 10 seasons.

	Brn	Clk	Cgt	Cor	Drt	Hvd	Prn	Qpc	RPI	SLU	Uni	Yal
2013	20	19	15	19	22	14	20	37	27	22	24	25
2014	17	24	29	24	16	16	8	28	21	18	37	24
2015	13	19	26	22	26	25	6	35	18	29	17	28
2016	12	23	14	22	22	28	9	37	23	25	18	31
2017	7	23	15	31	16	34	19	27	12	28	34	18
2018	15	29	23	36	23	25	22	20	10	7	33	21
2019	21	28	17	30	23	28	18	30	16	8	22	23
2020	18	33	21	38	22	27	8	30	27	6	12	22
2022	16	32	22	28	12	30	15	35	20	19	20	15
2023	13	21	25	31	9	36	16	40	18	24	17	16
Pts	152	267	221	283	191	263	141	343	192	196	234	221
Avg10	15.2	26.7	22.1	28.3	19.1	26.3	14.1	34.3	19.2	19.6	23.4	22.1

Summary:

	Avg10
Brown	15.2
Clarkson	26.7
Colgate	22.1
Cornell	28.3
Dartmouth	19.1
Harvard	26.3
Princeton	14.1
Quinnipiac	34.3
RPI	19.2
SLU	19.6
Union	23.4
Yale	22.1

Putting it All Together

Now we put everything together to predict the final standings, by taking half from the Past and half from the Future.

The Past

Prior, the quality, is the sum of RS, PS, Imp, and RA.

Past, the relative measure of returning strength, is Prior times 1/2, rounded down.

The Future

Secondly, we want to make the same two estimates for the incoming players: their quality and quantity.

Avg10 above, carried down.

Fut, the relative estimate of incoming strength, equals Avg10 / 2.

Conclusion

All that's left to do is add Past and Fut together (Net). Multiply by Norm = (22 - mean of Net)/12, to get the normalized RS strength (Nieu). Then rank order to get the ECAC standing (Pred).

Norm = .992854

Total: