/cdn.vox-cdn.com/photo_images/738020/GYI0060594327.jpg)
Are you like me? Are you 6'1", named "Matt," and on your emergency pair of underwear with bananas on them because you haven't done laundry in a week-and-a-half due to a protracted case of "Oh, well. Screw it!"?
Yes? Good. Then we're, like, super pals and stuff. We also share a common problem: How do you balance your college lacrosse addiction with monitoring college basketball pandemonium that directly impacts whether you win hundreds of dollars in a "totally legal in a very illegal gambling kind of way" tournament pool? Luckily, I can probably help mitigate this problem.
A few years ago, I came up with the "Fun Factor." The genesis was simple: My girlfriend at the time wanted to do something (I forget what; it probably involved me paying far too much money for it, though, and just nodding my head that I was having a good time); I wanted to sit around all day, watching college lacrosse's first round of the NCAA Tournament. So, I cut a deal: I get to watch two games and then we can do whatever the hell it was that we ended up doing that involved me barely being involved. (Shockingly, we broke up not long after that.)
The result was the formulation of the "Fun Factor": Games that were relatively competitive and featuring teams that liked offense and running. It isn't a method to determine the best games, but rather games I like to watch. Some of them are blowouts, which still can be fun, but many are actually pretty solid in the overall. With this Saturday featuring 26 lacrosse games going toe-to-toe with the NCAA's bag o' money (Student-athletes!), it's time again to break out the formula to pick my spots and maximize my enjoyment.
Immediately below are the "Fun Factor" rankings for tomorrow's game. You'd be an idiot to utilize it as canonical law -- use your head, dummy -- but if you're looking for a little extra information to balance your hoops-lacrosse interests, you could do worse that this. (I think.)
RANK | AWAY | A.F.F. | HOME | H.F.F. | G.F.F. |
1. | Yale | 6.3819 | Cornell | 7.4124 | 6.8972 |
2. | Villanova | 6.0300 | Maryland | 7.0913 | 6.5606 |
3. | Air Force | 5.7271 | Loyola | 6.3187 | 6.0229 |
4. | Lafayette | 3.8558 | Bucknell | 7.3562 | 5.6060 |
5. | Massachusetts | 7.8283 | Penn State | 2.4036 | 5.1159 |
6. | Syracuse | 4.3238 | Johns Hopkins | 5.4902 | 4.9070 |
7. | Fairfield | 2.7245 | Colgate | 6.9131 | 4.8188 |
8. | Virginia | 7.5890 | Ohio State | 1.4648 | 4.5269 |
9. | Bellarmine | 5.7652 | Michigan | 3.0222 | 4.3937 |
10. | Army | 4.4793 | Lehigh | 3.9471 | 4.2132 |
11. | Quinnipiac | 0.2641 | Hartford | 7.5458 | 3.9050 |
12. | Pennsylvania | 2.8235 | Princeton | 4.9243 | 3.8739 |
13. | Delaware | 4.9806 | Hofstra | 2.3733 | 3.6770 |
14. | Robert Morris | 4.7133 | Hobart | 1.7439 | 3.2286 |
15. | Georgetown | 4.9846 | Providence | 0.8787 | 2.9317 |
16. | Towson | 3.5813 | Stony Brook | 2.1997 | 2.8905 |
17. | Siena | 4.9234 | VMI | 0.0199 | 2.4716 |
18. | St. John's | 3.8494 | Rutgers | 0.9868 | 2.4181 |
19. | Jacksonville | 3.2874 | Marist | 1.2450 | 2.2662 |
20. | Bryant | 3.7302 | Albany | 0.6631 | 2.1967 |
21. | Holy Cross | 1.6832 | Navy | 2.2181 | 1.9506 |
22. | Sacred Heart | 2.2579 | Vermont | 1.6341 | 1.9460 |
23. | Brown | 1.0323 | Harvard | 2.8587 | 1.9455 |
24. | Drexel | 1.9821 | Mount St. Mary's | 1.3770 | 1.6796 |
25. | Detroit | 1.5751 | Canisius | 0.9455 | 1.2603 |
26. | Binghamton | 2.3351 | Manhattan | 0.1481 | 1.2416 |
More after the jump.
If I only had to pick three games to follow this weekend, they'd probably be:
- Villanova at Maryland: I pick this not for silly things like how Villanova's Will Casertano and Jack Rice are sweet science, or that Maryland's Niko Amato is an ox, or that the Terrapins are stealthily a national title contender. Nope. I pick this one because Villanova hasn't beaten a school that isn't located in Pennsylvania this year and I'm pretty sure that trend is rock solid.
- Massachusetts at Penn State: The Nittany Lions are probably going to drive the pace of this thing into the ground, but you have massive heads wounds without medical insurance if you think that not watching Will Manny trying to embarrass Austin Kaut isn't pure sexiness.
- Syracuse at Johns Hopkins: Yeah, no doink, turdburger.
How are you balancing basketball gambling and lacrosse watching this weekend? Any other suggestions for the weekend's best?