Catfished

Yesterday Timothy Burke and Jack Dickey from Deadspin published an amazing piece of journalism, "Manti Te’o’s Dead Girlfriend, The Most Heartbreaking And Inspirational Story Of The College Football Season, Is A Hoax"

It is an absolute must-read.

I found a few tweets from people who have known for at least the last month that Lenny Kekua was a fake.

As Deadspin reported, they point to Ronaiah Tuiasosop as the person behind the fake account. They also joke with each other about being involved in the hoax.

However they seem to believe that Manti was being misled, and was not in on the scam. 

SRS playoff hockey predictions

The Simple Ranking System isn't a statistic that I came up with. It's a stat that those interested in sports analytics have respected it for a handful of years now. However, last year while preparing myself for my NHL playoff picks I stumbled across just how accurate the statistic was in predicting winners of playoff match-ups.

It had correctly predicted 50 of the last 60 play-off match-ups over the last 4 postseasons, including calling 15 of the 24 seeding upsets.

Over the 2011 postseason it posted similar, if slightly down, numbers - going 11-4. It's big miss was the Cinderella Tampa Bay Lightning who advanced to the Eastern Conference Finals despite having a lower SRS rating than their first and second round opponents (Penguins and Capitals, respectively).

The eventual conference champion Bruins and Canuck both possessed the highest SRS score in their conferences. However the Canucks, who had a higher score (.87 to .56) lost the Cup Final to the Bruins.

Since it performs so well at predicting series winners, and since it was such a popular post last postseason, I ran through this years postseason from first round to Cup winner.

Eastern Conference

FIRST ROUND

New York Rangers (.46) defeat Ottawa Senators (.09)

Boston Bruins (.75) defeat Washington Capitals (-.13)

New Jersey Devils (.23) defeat Florida Panthers (-.33)

Pittsburgh Penguins (.71) defeat Philadelphia Flyers (.39)

SECOND ROUND

New York Rangers (.46) defeat New Jersey Devils (.23)

Boston Bruins (.75) defeat Pittsburgh Penguins (.71)

THIRD ROUND

Boston Bruins (.75) over New York Rangers (.46)

Western Conference

FIRST ROUND

Vancouver Canucks (.57) over Los Angeles Kings (.19)

St. Louis Blues (.54) defeat San Jose Sharks (.22)

Phoenix Coyotes (.16) defeat Chicago Blackhawks (.14)

Detroit Red Wings (.55) defeat Nashville Predators (.34)

SECOND ROUND

Vancouver Canucks (.57) defeat Detroit Red Wings (.55)

St. Louis Blues (.54) defeat Phoenix Coyotes (.16)

THIRD ROUND

Vancouver Canucks (.57) defeat St. Louis Blues (.54)

Stanley Cup

Boston Bruins (.75) defeat Vancouver Canucks (.57)

The Cup Final probably look familiar, a re-match of last years Final, but the match-up between the leagues two highest SRS scores comes in the second round of the Eastern Conference when the Penguins face the Bruins. The Bruins have the slightly better score, but the Penguins were without Sidney Crosby for half the second.

All SRS scores come from the always great Hockey-Reference.com

Missing: Jaromir Jagr

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NHL Realignment

NHL realignment talk is in the air. With the Thrashers move to Winnipeg it gives the league the opportunity to make a few changes that have been sitting in their "To-do" box for quite some time.

According to Craig Custance the new alignment would cut the divisions down from three per conference to two. And apparently Detroit, Columbus, and Nashville would be interested in moving to the East.

With all of this in mind, and coming to the conclusion that Nashville is stuck in the West for now, we imagine what the league could look like in year or so. That is if there is still a team in Phoenix.

Eastern Conference

• Division I

• Boston Bruins
• Buffalo Sabres
• Montreal Canadiens
• New Jersey Devils
• New York Islanders
• New York Rangers
• Ottawa Senators
• Toronto Maple Leafs

• Division II

• Carolina Hurricanes
• Columbus Blue Jackets
• Detroit Red Wings
• Florida Panthers
• Pittsburgh Penguins
• Philadelphia Flyers
• Tampa Bay Lightning
• Washington Capitals

Western Conference

• Division III

• Chicago Blackhawks
• Colorado Avalanche
• Dallas Stars
• Minnesota Wild
• Nashville Predators
• St. Louis Blues
• Winnipeg Jets

• Division IV

• Anaheim Ducks
• Calgary Flames
• Edmonton Oilers
• Los Angeles Kings
• Phoenix Coyotes
• San Jose Sharks
• Vancouver Cancuks

Update: The National Post also gave the new alignment a go, coming up with a different Eastern Conference divisional breakdown

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Your First Round Results

Everything is going to be okay. I have a large bowl of ice cream in front of me. I'll have something on the end of the Penguins season sometime tomorrow. But for now, here are the your first round, and what a hell of a round it was, results.