At some point with little explanation I added the list of current Pac-12 teams as a pre-canned “virtual” conference defined in mcc_schedule.py. Of course, the Pac-12 is an actual conference (for another year or two) so it’s a misnomer to run it in virtualconf.py but this allows some fun with the Monte Carlo simulators. Here’s… Continue reading On the possibility of an extra game
First results of 2022
For Stanford it’s already over: USC 41 at Stanford 28 on Sep 10, 2022 Fresno State at USC on Sep 17, 2022 San José State at Fresno State on Oct 14, 2022 San Diego State at Fresno State on Oct 28, 2022 Stanford at UCLA on Oct 28, 2022 California at USC on Nov 04,… Continue reading First results of 2022
Is anybody any good?
After Week One it’s still hard to say. Stanford couldn’t contain an FCS team for the first half. San Jose State needed the last few minutes to beat their FCS team. San Diego State lost as home favorites. So maybe not those guys. But somebody’s got to win this thing. Let’s take a look at… Continue reading Is anybody any good?
2022 preview
I’ve already run the 2022 schedule once so I won’t go through it all again but I need an excuse to show Midjourney’s interpretation of an Aztec triumph: This is the “stock” predictor: Monte Carlo [Elo Predictor] Simulation: UCLA 4978 [49%] Fresno State 2688 [26%] California 855 [8%] San Diego State 780 [7%] USC 596… Continue reading 2022 preview
The 1940s
You can have the SMU team that never left Texas, we’ve got an all-timer California season in 1943 Del Monte Pre-Flight. They never left California and ended up ranked number #8 nationwide. Their one loss was at Pacific in Stockton, who were ranked #10 at the time. Pacific finished the year ranked 19. They crushed… Continue reading The 1940s
Illustrating 2021
I bought a subscription to one of the new hyped AI illustration engines, MidJourney. Let’s deliver Fresno State their 2021 MCC trophy as promised. Here are some queries that didn’t really work: “a giant golden championship trophy cup in Fresno, California surrounded by bulldogs”“Fresno State University campus seen from above with a giant golden cup… Continue reading Illustrating 2021
regression in the wild
The new regression tests actually caught a failure. Today I got an email notification from github: This is the daily scheduled run on actual data that we documented earlier in response to a silent fail in the data store. Clicking through into the github actions dash we see that it had been working until the… Continue reading regression in the wild
Realignment
I was not expecting breaking college football news today but that’s what we all got: USC and UCLA are leaving the Pac-12 for the Big 10. You can find all the takes and coverage elsewhere. (Here is Wilner’s aftermath column.) What does it mean for the Mythical California Cup? As Wilner says, “The California Four,… Continue reading Realignment
David Stern part 5: portrait of a honcho
They said the New York accent would never play nationally but they sure were wrong. The voice is a huge part of the allure. He’s New York City through and through, born in the city, school in the city, all that crap. Lots of stories about his dad and his dad’s business. The neighborhood! The… Continue reading David Stern part 5: portrait of a honcho
David Stern part 4: The DelCo files and the plane ticket scandal
Somewhere at the intersection of Pac-12 sports and David Stern is this particular forgotten 2013 scandal: Ed Rush forced to resign after bounty comments. Ed Rush was the head of basketball officiating for the Pac-12. Before a game he told a group of officials that he was putting a bounty out to reward whomever would… Continue reading David Stern part 4: The DelCo files and the plane ticket scandal