Rock can clinch a 2011 National Lacrosse League Playoff spot tonight

With a victory last night over Philadelphia, the Rock have lowered their magic number to guarantee a playoff spot to one. Be sure to check out the highlight videos with the TSN story, since two of the goals made the Sportscentre Highlight of the Night reel. The NLL version should have a video posted of the highlights in their story soon. If you want to watch repeats of any game this season go to Livestream.


But back to the playoff clinching scenarios. As I blogged previously, a Philadelphia loss tonight to Calgary would guarantee the Rock can finish no worse than 9&7 and that Philadelphia can finish no better than 9&7. The Rock own the head-to-head tiebreaker, and I've run through all the possible three-way tie scenarios and there is no way the Rock can finish behind Philadelphia in any of those either. My cursory glance at four- and five-way ties suggests that there is no way the Rock can finish behind Philadelphia in any tiebreaker situation (I could be wrong). So a Philadelphia loss tonight, or any other game this season, or one more Rock win this season and the Rock guarantee a playoff spot.

The next thing to look at is home field advantage, clinching the East and finishing first overall.

Again, as I mentioned in my previous post, the Rock's magic number to finish ahead of Rochester was four and is now down to three. Three Rock wins, or three Rochester losses, or any combination of wins and losses that adds up to three, and the Rock guarantee that they finish no worse than tied with Rochester. The Rock own the head-to-head tiebreaker, and would finish ahead of Rochester in all two- and three-way scenarios. I haven't run through all the four- and five-way ties, but I can't see any possibility of Rochester advancing ahead of the Rock.

The magic number to finish ahead of Buffalo is down to three, assuming one of those comes by beating Buffalo. The magic number is five if the Rock lose the game against the Goondits.

The magic number to finish ahead of Boston is down to four ... or five. In my quest to figure out all the possible three-way tie situations I actually went through and tabulated what would happen if Boston and Toronto had identical divisional records, and then I figured out what their resulting common opponents records could be. My earlier calculations still look good. Toronto's magic number (versus Boston) in divisional games is 2, and out-of-division games is an additional 2. The Washington games become pivotal if the Rock don't reach the divisional magic number.

The only way I could see Toronto in danger of not making the playoffs in a three-way tie situation at this point is if Philadelphia and Rochester end up tied at 10&6, and Toronto, Buffalo and Boston end up tied at 9&7. There's really only one way that I can see for this to happen (Philadelphia wins out the season, Rochester's only losses are to Philadelphia, Buffalo loses three to Rochester and one to Boston, and Boston wins their three out-of-division games). The Rock still make the playoffs, however, so even this worst-case scenario isn't as bad as others.
Let me walk through order of finish so that you see where I'm coming from.

1. Philadelphia (10&6 overall) based on their 2&1 record over Rochester.
2. Rochester (10&6) by virtue of losing the head-to-head tiebreaker.
3. Buffalo (9&7) has the advantage in head-to-head record (4&2) against both Toronto (2&3) and Boston (2&3).
4. Toronto (9&7) has a divisional record of 7&4, but Boston would be 4&7 (they are 1&1 head-to-head, and divisional records is the second tiebreaker).
5. Boston (9&7) by virtue of losing the tiebreakers.

I probably could have figured it out faster with the divisional magic number relative to Boston, but this was more straightforward.

So there you have it. I can't actually construct a three-way tie that knocks the Rock out of the playoffs. Don't be fooled though, there are certainly three-way tie scenarios involving the Rock, Boston and Buffalo where the Rock finish third of the three, but these scenarios happen at 10&6 or better, which would have to come at the expense of either Rochester or Philadelphia ... so the Rock would make the playoffs, but possibly not have home field advantage.

And the Rock could be knocked out of the playoffs if they are involved in a head-to-head tie for fourth place against Buffalo or Boston ... but these seem unlikely. It's more probable that they finished tied for first or second with one of these two teams.

A Philadelphia loss tonight allows the Rock to clinch, or looking at it from the control their own destiny point of view: one more win by the Rock and they clinch a playoff spot. The Rock's next opportunity to put up a victory is March 25th in Calgary. So right now, Calgary has two opportunities to prevent Toronto from clinching a playoff berth. I'm sure they've got more important things to worry about (like folding mid-season) than screwing over the Centre of the Universe.