How to really pick your bracket? Pete Tiernan knows

Peter Tiernan is a name most college basketball fans probably don’t know. But if you don’t… Peter Tiernan is a name most college basketball fans probably don’t know. But if you don’t recognize his name, you better get to know him.

Tiernan, who spent four of his formative years living in nearby Mt. Lebanon, is revolutionizing the study of the NCAA Tournament and how people should be making their all-important bracket picks.

He’s developed a statistical road map that outlines the keys to progress in the NCAA Tournament. It’s called Bracket Science.

“The focus of Bracket Science is to examine the conditions that lead to advancement in the NCAA Tournament,” Tiernan explained.

College basketball “experts” say guard play, balanced scoring and team momentum are the chief requirements to make a deep run in the NCAA Tournament.

“If I listened to all the tournament pundits, I would’ve concluded that strong guard play is a key to advancement,” Tiernan said. “The statistics tell the opposite story.”

In fact, it’s the big guys who make the difference. And all the stress over stringing together a few wins before entering the tournament is unnecessary.

“To make a deep run in the tournament, you need to have a solid frontcourt,” Tiernan said. “[As far as momentum goes], winning more games in your last 10 pre-tournament tilts doesn’t confer any advantage.”

According to his website, BracketScience.com, Tiernan arrives at these conclusions with the use of Performance Against Seed Expectations – a statistical gauntlet designed to produce the average number of wins a team attains above or below its seed position would dictate that it should achieve. It is calculated by tallying the positive or negative differences between actual and expected wins at each seed position.

“My work with the newly devised PASE continually uncovers information that debunks conventional wisdom,” Tiernan said.

In other words, PASE shows how a team should perform based on pre-tournament statistics. If, for example, a team is a No. 2 seed, it should theoretically make the Elite Eight. PASE helps decipher if that team will over- or under-perform as that specific seed.

But who is this advertising and marketing executive, and why is his work creating ripples within the college basketball world?

Tiernan is not only the creator of Bracket Science, he is an ESPN Insider, freelance writer, lecturer and marketing director at a software company whose writing appears in numerous college basketball publications each year. With PASE, his new toy, Tiernan is garnering larger audiences this year.

How has Bracket Science gained all its momentum?

With the help of Jeff Smeenge from the ActiveFan Sports Network, Tiernan studied multiple factors in trying to generate the indicators of success or failure in the NCAA Tournament and could very well change the way people pick their brackets.

And in the multi-million-dollar market that is March Madness, every advantage helps in an office bracket pool.

According to Tiernan, the duo looked at conference affiliation, coaching experience, star power, team makeup, scoring averages, pre-tournament momentum, bench play, scoring balance, playing location and more. This, says Tiernan, allowed the study to take a more historically sound approach, avoiding the trap of studying specific matchups.

From there, the fan can make an educated guess on which teams satisfy the requirements for success.

“If I could distill advice down to a few guidelines, I’d say to work backwards,” Tiernan said. “Identify who you think is going to be the champion, or at least your Final Four, then start backfilling.”

According to Tiernan, despite George Mason’s miraculous run to the Final Four as a No. 11 seed, and other historic examples, stick to seeds no higher than No. 4 when deciphering the Final Four.

“You’re going to miss some picks,” Tiernan said. “But the odds are too strong to bet against otherwise.”

When the bracket was released Sunday night, millions of college basketball fans searched for a way to make their picks. After years of weathering by the so-called experts on television, the myths have built in hoops fans’ minds.

But, according to Tiernan, all the statistical evidence in the world couldn’t accurately capture the potential of life’s bounces.

“Performance in the tournament is as much about tendencies and statistics as it is matchups,” Tiernan said. “And, for lack of a better term, dumb luck.”