How do you determine the placement of a team in the standings when two teams have identical records?

Answer 1

I presume you mean the standing within the conference, as opposed to the "ranking", which is determined by a vote of coaches, writers, or the staff of some magazine. Conference standing is, of course, primarily determined by wins and losses in conference games (non-conference games do not matter). Obviously, two teams can easily have identical records, and thus be "tied" in the standings. During the regular season, it doesn't matter which team is higher in the standings. No one says this team is ahead of that team - they are simply tied, period. If you looked at the standings as printed in a newspaper or on a website, they would most likely list the tied teams in alphabetical order. Once the regular season is over, then it becomes important to break the tie. The conference tournament will begin just a few days after the regular season, and the conference officials need to figure out how to seed the field. So, if two teams are tied at the end of the regular season, the officials will look at the head-to-head matchup of these two teams (assuming they played each other, which is usually true). In College Football, each team schedules 3 games with each of the other teams in its conference. (Note, because the SEC and ACC have 12 teams, and play only 30 conference games, they will miss out on playing one of the other teams each year. ) However, if the two tied teams did not face each other on the field, or if they did, but it resulted in a series tie (either the third game was rained out or one of the games ended in a tie, which happens quite a bit in College Baseball, due to travel considerations), then the officials have to look at something else. This "something else" is usually a series of other tie-breakers, the inclusion and order of which varies from conference to conference. But some of the things they look at are: 1) within-division records (if the conference is split into divisions); 2) non-conference records; 3) records against common opponents (either 3a) in total, or 3b) one common opponent at a time, beginning with the team with the highest conference standing and proceeding through all teams until the tie is broken); 4) Total runs scored in head-to-head competition. Also, keep in mind that a "tie" in the standings is based on the number of wins minus the number of losses. Tied games are not included in this measure, nor, obviously, are games that were rained out. It is therefore possible for two teams to have "tied" conference records, but have a different number of decided games. For example, a 20-10 conference record is identical to a 19-9 record (two games rained out), as well as to a 18-8-4 record (four games tied). Three teams with these respective records would all be "tied" in the standings. But they have different "winning percentages" - .666, .679, and .692, respectively. So, winning percentage might be one of the things that officials could look at. Ironically, if the tied teams all have more wins than losses, then it is the team with the fewest number of wins that has the highest winning percentage (although maybe it's not so ironic, because that team will also have the fewest number of losses). In 2009 SEC Baseball race, both LSU and Ole Miss finished the regular season with identical 20-10 conference records. The two teams were declared "co-champions" of the conference. So, at least in that respect, no tie-breaker was needed. However, conference officials needed to know how to seed the SEC tournament, and who to pair with whom. So for that purpose, a tie-breaker was employed. LSU and Ole Miss had faced each other in a 3-game series during the season, with LSU winning 2 of the 3 games. Therefore, LSU got the #1 seed in the SEC tournament. By rule, the #1 and #2 seeds must be in different divisions (but Ole Miss and LSU are in the same division). So Florida, the leader in the SEC Eastern Division standings (but a game behind LSU and Ole Miss), got the #2 seed, while Ole Miss was relegated to #3. The seedings in the tournament are considered important because the higher seed you are, the lower seeded team you will have to play in the first round (#1 plays #8, #2 v #7, #3 v #6, #4 v #5), which, supposedly, makes it easier to advance (if you're one of the top 4). However, it didn't exactly work out that way this year, as all four of the top seeds lost to the four bottom seeds in the first round. LSU struggled back from the loser's bracket of the double-elimination tournament to win the tournament championship, but Florida and Ole Miss had a combined 1-4 record before being eliminated (the one win was by Florida, against Ole Miss). Meanwhile Vanderbilt, who barely made the tournament, as the #8 seed, breezed through the winners bracket undefeated, until their rematch with LSU in the championship game.