How did USAU decide to handle seeding in such an unusual year?
October 13, 2021 by in News with 0 comments
The official seeding and associated pools for the 2021 USA Ultimate National Championships are now here! You can find the game schedules on Score Reporter.
Men’s Division
| POOL A | POOL B | POOL C | POOL D |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sockeye (1) | Machine (2) | Ring of Fire (3) | Sub Zero (4) |
| Rhino (8) | Truck Stop (7) | Revolver (6) | Chain Lightning (5) |
| Temper (12) | Condors (11) | Johnny Bravo (10) | PoNY (9) |
| Lotus (13) | DiG (14) | Sprout (15) | Killjoys (16) |
- Going in, we knew San Francisco Revolver was going to be a key point of distinction between predicted and actual seeding, as they could land in a wide range of places. Their regular-season resume is strong, but a loss to SoCal Condors in the Southwest Regional final dampened their outlook. Despite that recent red mark, Revolver landed at no. 6, well ahead of no. 11 Condors, as well as their no. 10 predicted seeding.
- The big jump for Revolver caused almost every other deviation from Charlie’s predicted seedings, pushing all of the predicted no. 6 through no. 10 seeds down one spot. The other change was flipping of the no. 4 and no. 5 seeds, with Minneapolis Sub Zero the ultimate winner of the least valuable gain in the top half of the board. Aside from the order of their opponents, these spots are scarcely distinguishable. Sub split with no. 5 Atlanta Chain Lightning, although Atlanta won the more recent matchup, so it is not a shock to see a change.
Mixed Division
| POOL A | POOL B | POOL C | POOL D |
|---|---|---|---|
| shame. (1) | BFG (2) | Mixtape (3) | Drag'n Thrust (4) |
| Slow (8) | Lawless (7) | Space Heater (6) | AMP (5) |
| NOISE (12) | 'Shine (11) | Sprocket (10) | Hybrid (9) |
| Lochsa (13) | Love Tractor (14) | Polar Bears (15) | XIST (16) |
- While the projected algorithmic rankings favored Minneapolis Drag’n Thrust over the Seattle duo, USAU rewarded BFG and Mixtape, landing D’nT at no. 4. That painful slide puts them in a pool with no. 5 Philadelphia AMP.
- Arizona Lawless may have stumbled at sectionals, losing to Los Angeles Lotus and San Diego California Burrito, but their Southwest crown was enough to elevate them to no. 7. Our predictions put them at the top of the bottom half of the seeds, but their jump came at the expense of Ann Arbor Hybrid, whose win-heavy resume against regional competition was not enough to get them above no. 9.
- San Francisco Polar Bears did not have a lot of resume to go on, so predicting their seeding was always a bit of a crapshoot. We predicted them at the front of their seeding window, at no. 12, but they got pushed to the back, all the way to no. 15.
Women’s Division
| POOL A | POOL B | POOL C | POOL D |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fury (1) | Molly Brown (2) | Brute Squad (3) | Phoenix (4) |
| BENT (8) | Schwa (7) | Riot (6) | Traffic (5) |
| Rival (12) | Nightlock (11) | Wildfire (10) | Nemesis (9) |
| Pop (13) | Siege (14) | Tabby Rosa (15) | Parcha (16) |
- If you only look at the top half of the seedings, our predictions were perfect! Too bad we only got one of the lower seven seeds correct. But that group had very little to work off of, given the limited results and connectivity present in the cohort.
- Pittsburgh Parcha is the newest club in the Championships lineup, and that lack of history may have been used against them. They fell all the way from our no. 10 prediction to the last seed, trapped in the always-challenging Pool D. To be fair, they went 0-2 against the field1 and only narrowly qualified in the regional final against Washington DC Grit. But their projected algorithmic ranking certainly made a higher seed look possible. Their head-to-head loss to Tabby Rosa seems to have been the decider.
- Deviating upward were the Southwest reps, no. 10 San Diego Wildfire and no. 11 San Francisco Nightlock. With so few results, their positions were going to be volatile, but USAU decided that some combination of their historical success and the strength of the Southwest was enough to justify pushing them upward.
- Boston Siege coming in at no. 14, well behind the Southwest clubs, could be taken as a sign as that USAU believes the Southwest to be stronger than the Northeast. Given how good Fury is and has been, that might be the right call.
Although it was their first two games. Ever. ↩