We are currently tied with Georgia and Auburn for 4th place, the last double bye seed.’
If we end up all 3 tied we would win the tiebreaker and receive the 4th seed.
We’ve all 3 played each other;
Vandy 3, GA 0
Auburn 2, Vandy 1
Georgia 3, Auburn 0.
Combine that (the 1st tiebreaker) and it’s:
Vandy 4-2
GA 3-3
Auburn 2-4
Vandy gets 4 seed, Georgia 5, and Auburn 6.
However, if it’s a 2-way tie between us and one of them:
We’d be 4, Georgia 5
Auburn would be 4, Vandy 5.
Now, to make things even more interesting, if there is a 4 or 5-way tie involving us, we would win the tie-breaker because
it would come down to cumulative winning percentage of all your conference opponents.
That’s also true for a 3-way tie with any teams not named Auburn.
[It would come down to this because, among the top teams in the conference vying to 2nd,3rd, and 4th place, there is no situation where all of the teams would have played each other. For example, we didn’t play Texas or LSU. Everybody else played 1 of them. The same is true for any of the top teams if you look at their schedules.]
We would have the best cumulative winning percentage because we did not play South Carolina or Missouri, the two worst teams. Every other team played at least 1 of them.
So our record would HAVE to be better than the involved tied teams because SC and MO have terrible records, far worse than even the 14th place team. For added measure, we also did not play the 13th worst team. However it goes, we win.
Bottom line, if we are in involved in a 3-4-5-6-7 way tie for 2nd, 3rd, or 4th, we would win every time.
It would, in the end, make not playing SC or MO a positive thing for us.
All we have to do is avoid a 2-way tie with Auburn for 2nd, 3rd, or 4th.
[It’s also true if we tie just Arkansas but that’s almost impossible without a 3rd team being involved [LSU, GA, AUB] and, once again, we’d win the tie-breaker as explained above. Plus, a tie with Arkansas would be for 2nd or 3rd, most likely, so we’d still be the 3 or 4 seed anyways.]
It’s also still possible for us to finish 2nd or 3rd by ourself.
2nd — we sweep UK, UT sweeps AR, LSU only wins 1 at SC, GA and AUB go 2-1 or 1-2. But all that’s not likely; but it is possible.
3rd — Arkansas takes 2nd, LSU goes 2-1 at SC, we sweep UK, GA and AUB both go 2-1 of 1-2. That’s very possible.
So, in both cases we’d have to sweep UK or it’s a no-go.
But, if we go 2-1 against UK, we could still finish 3rd if LSU, GA, AUB all go 1-2 and UT sweep Arkansas. But that’s not all likely to happen.
Now we’ve come full circle and we’re back to finishing in a 2-way tie for 4th with GA, or a 3-way tie for 4th with any 3 teams, and we get the coveted 4th seed.
If we end up all 3 tied we would win the tiebreaker and receive the 4th seed.
We’ve all 3 played each other;
Vandy 3, GA 0
Auburn 2, Vandy 1
Georgia 3, Auburn 0.
Combine that (the 1st tiebreaker) and it’s:
Vandy 4-2
GA 3-3
Auburn 2-4
Vandy gets 4 seed, Georgia 5, and Auburn 6.
However, if it’s a 2-way tie between us and one of them:
We’d be 4, Georgia 5
Auburn would be 4, Vandy 5.
Now, to make things even more interesting, if there is a 4 or 5-way tie involving us, we would win the tie-breaker because
it would come down to cumulative winning percentage of all your conference opponents.
That’s also true for a 3-way tie with any teams not named Auburn.
[It would come down to this because, among the top teams in the conference vying to 2nd,3rd, and 4th place, there is no situation where all of the teams would have played each other. For example, we didn’t play Texas or LSU. Everybody else played 1 of them. The same is true for any of the top teams if you look at their schedules.]
We would have the best cumulative winning percentage because we did not play South Carolina or Missouri, the two worst teams. Every other team played at least 1 of them.
So our record would HAVE to be better than the involved tied teams because SC and MO have terrible records, far worse than even the 14th place team. For added measure, we also did not play the 13th worst team. However it goes, we win.
Bottom line, if we are in involved in a 3-4-5-6-7 way tie for 2nd, 3rd, or 4th, we would win every time.
It would, in the end, make not playing SC or MO a positive thing for us.
All we have to do is avoid a 2-way tie with Auburn for 2nd, 3rd, or 4th.
[It’s also true if we tie just Arkansas but that’s almost impossible without a 3rd team being involved [LSU, GA, AUB] and, once again, we’d win the tie-breaker as explained above. Plus, a tie with Arkansas would be for 2nd or 3rd, most likely, so we’d still be the 3 or 4 seed anyways.]
It’s also still possible for us to finish 2nd or 3rd by ourself.
2nd — we sweep UK, UT sweeps AR, LSU only wins 1 at SC, GA and AUB go 2-1 or 1-2. But all that’s not likely; but it is possible.
3rd — Arkansas takes 2nd, LSU goes 2-1 at SC, we sweep UK, GA and AUB both go 2-1 of 1-2. That’s very possible.
So, in both cases we’d have to sweep UK or it’s a no-go.
But, if we go 2-1 against UK, we could still finish 3rd if LSU, GA, AUB all go 1-2 and UT sweep Arkansas. But that’s not all likely to happen.
Now we’ve come full circle and we’re back to finishing in a 2-way tie for 4th with GA, or a 3-way tie for 4th with any 3 teams, and we get the coveted 4th seed.
