Re: ACF Nationals -- quick results

> still internally consistent (except for the one softball mimicry 
> bonus), which is all one can ask for).  Whoever wrote the Adrian 
> Leverkuhn tossup, you are to be commended...one of the best tossups I 
> have ever heard...
> 

Glad you liked the Leverkuhn tossup, Nathan.  One I liked was the
Fortunato tossup, though I picked the wrong guy and made it one of my
many negs.

As for the tie with Iowa State, I considered head-to-head to be the
first tiebreaker (they beat us 165-155 in the RR), and I didn't think
it was right for them to have to face us again.  I suspect the odds
would have been in my favour in a 20-tossup rematch, but as far as I
was concerned, they won the higher spot fair & square.  I believe that
was the only other bracket-deciding tie, besides the Harvard/Vandy one.

The shifting of the B bracket when Michigan B left was not a good
idea.  In addition to messing up a possible Div II title match between
Arkansas and Princeton, it led to Arkansas getting clobbered
repeatedly in the playoffs instead of playing more competitive
matches.  As Chris Frankel noted, the bottom of the B bracket was
clearly not as strong as the bottom of the A bracket, but the
unexpected absence of Chip Thomas from the UNF team contributed to the
disparity.  Anyway, it would have been better to leave a bye for B6
instad of moving everyone up in the B bracket.

One last comment -- things could have been a bit better organized, at
least with respect to keeping teams informed of what was going on.  A
couple of teams didn't know the playoff format had been changed from
what was printed (which involved only the top 4 teams), and at least
one team nearly left.  Also, during the long gap between RR and
playoffs, more effort should have been made to keep teams apprised of
what was happening (Saurabh eventually typed it up on the projected
computer image, but that took a while).  Communication seemed to be a
general problem, one which also led to the moderately unequal brackets
and to the bad playoff format printed on the schedule.

--Raj Dhuwalia

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