Different leagues seed their county tournaments different ways.
In Somerset County, all the coaches make a pitch for their team, vote on a paper ballot, points are tallied, and the tournament is seeded.
In the GMC, it’s a mix of athletic directors, coaches and league officials. But they vote team-by-team. And unlike the Skyland Conference, where there’s no “conference” tournament – Somerset does its thing, and Hunterdon and Warren teams join Sussex County and do their thing – each division winner is guaranteed a top eight seed in the mammoth bracket.
But what happens when there are ties?
That’s the case in two of the GMC’s four divisions, where South Plainfield and Woodbridge are White Division Co-Champions, and Spotswood and Timothy Christian are Blue Division Co-Champions.
That doesn’t mean all four are guaranteed a top eight seed. The way the GMC seeding works is, all the teams are listed by division, in order of finish. Before the actual seeding begins, all ties are broken, so there is a clear order. No team can be seeded ahead of a team it’s behind. So, if Team A has two division losses, both to Team B, which is behind it, but has three losses, they don’t jump. Team A is first and Team B is second. Teams must come out of each division in order.
So, who will get the guaranteed top eight seeds from the Blue and White? (Keep in mind, however the tie is broken, they are still co-champs and will still raise a banner. The tiebreak is just for seeding purposes. Let’s take a closer look.
GMC White Division: South Plainfield vs. Woodbridge
Both teams finished 12-2 in the division. Woodbridge dropped a pre-Christmas game a home to South Plainfield 76-64, but then returned the favor on the road, with a 70-62 win a week ago, heard on Central Jersey Sports Radio. That’s one loss each.
Woodbridge lost by 14 at Sayreville on January 18th, but since then the Barrons finished strong, with six straight division wins, including the return trip win against the Tigers, then the division leader all on their own.
South Plainfield’s other loss was by 12 to Edison in the opener of their Anthony J. Cotoia Holiday Tournament.
Based on margin of victory head-to-head, South Plainfield would have a slight edge. Based on each team’s other loss, Woodbridge would have the edge. Sayreville will finish third in the division, while Edison is in the basement.
On overall records, South Plainfield is 15-6, Woodbridge 14-5. So the Barrons have one fewer win, but one fewer loss
What about crossovers?
Woodbridge lost 60-34 to Old Bridge (12-8) out of the Red in the finale of the Huskies Holiday Classic at Matawan, the only team they played “up” to. South Plainfield only “played up” once, too: they lost to East Brunswick (9-12) by nine in the second game of the season.
On the balance, Woodbridge lost by more but to a better team.
Verdict: This one may be too close to call, as there’s no overwhelming stat or result in favor of one or the other. We’re going to give the slight edge to Woodbridge here. Both head-to-head games were tight and within a few points of each other, overall records are similar, and neither beat their Red Division crossover opponent. But, Woodbridge had the “better” division loss.
GMC Blue Division: Spotswood vs. Timothy Christian
This one appears even closer than the White Division race.
Both teams finished 12-1 in the division. They also split their regular season meetings, with Timothy Christian winning 78-70 on January 3rd, while Spotswood won the rematch at home, 84-76 in overtime last Friday night. Though the Chargers’ win took overtime, the margins are the same: each beat the other by eight points.
No edge there, necessarily.
And since their only division losses came to each other, there’s no “better” loss like there was with Woodbridge and South Plainfield.
On overall record, Spotswood is 15-5 (.750 win percentage), while Timothy Christian is 12-6 (.667 win percentage).
How did they do in crossovers?
Spotswood played “up” to the Red Division, but took a 68-51 loss at Monroe (14-5) on January 22nd. Timothy Christian took on two White Division teams, but lost both: to North Plainfield (6-13) 59-58 in the finale of the Butch Kowal Tournament over the holidays, and to South Plainfield (15-6) back on Monday, 74-69.
Verdict: With all of those crossovers “playing up” being losses, again nothing sticks out, there are no other division losses to compare for better or worse, and each team beat the other by the same margin head-to-head. But based on overall wins, and the Chargers having the more recent win, we think Spotswood will have the slight edge.
Follow us tomorrow at @cjsportsradio as Mike Pavlichko will have live updates from the GMC seeding meeting, which begins with the girls’ tournament at 9 am and the boys to follow.
One last metric…
If you want to take the Born Power Index to examine these teams, keep in mind that it favors teams that win by higher margins. It’s not accounted for by the GMC, of course, so it wouldn’t necessarily encourage blowouts.
In the White, South Plainfield is rated 54.8, while it’s a 50.7 rating for the Barrons.
In the Blue, Spotswood is rated a 57.5, and it’s a 48.8 for Timothy Christian.
Note: The Born Power Index was website says its ratings were updated on February 1st, but it’s unclear if it includes games played on that day, or was updated earlier based on Thursday’s games.