3-1 playoff leads and Green

[Victor 10,667]

You might have heard about the '3-1 curse'. If you haven't, you just haven't gone into a playoff thread with @Green's team being up 3-1. Or down 3-1. Or just Green pointing out that there's a 3-1 curse.

 

The 3-1 curse talk kind of goes up and down depending on how recently a team's come back from a 3-1 deficit. Back at some point in the 30s, I did a little dive into the stats from S27 to that day, then updated it in the 40s, and now again. Please see results below:

 

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1lwIl-6TR2AERJuQIA-be8ourJIWxEs4RGLKKjL7ca2g/edit?usp=sharing

 

Why S27? That was the first instance of a high profile comeback after a 3-1 lead (although the team that won games 5 and 6 still lost the series) that really got people going. Now without the S1-S17 records, there's also little point going back another 10 seasons as there's nothing interesting there.

 

Anyway, Green is wrong. Less than a third of 3-1 leads has gone to Game 7 - and just about half of those was then won by the team making the comeback. The real issue here is that 3-1 comebacks seem to happen in spurts, like when every 3-1 lead from the S32 finals through S33 was overturned, meaning the public conscience becomes aware of the "curse". More recently, every 3-1 lead in S61 and S62 resulted in a Game 7, although only one was lost by the leading team. Fittingly, Green was involved in 3 of those series, including being on both sides of the Helsinki (Peter Quill) and Davos (Adam Warlock) series in S61.

 

Which brings us nicely to... why Green? Well, it appears the "3-1 curse" is actually the "Green curse". Nearly half of series involving Green and a 3-1 lead have gone to Game 7. Seven of them resulted in a successful comeback, which is nearly half of all successful 3-1 comebacks since S27! Green has also been on the wrong side of the some high profile comebacks, like the finals in S36 and S43, and Stockholm's shock loss to Davos in S55. So when you next hear someone talk of the 3-1 curse, it's not actually factual, it's just based in personal trauma.

[Beketov 8,792]

My question is whether or not anyone has ever successfully managed a reverse sweep which I believe the answer is no.

[Victor 10,667]

7 minutes ago, Beketov said:

My question is whether or not anyone has ever successfully managed a reverse sweep which I believe the answer is no.

To my knowledge, also no. I was informed someone forced a Game 7 in my absence in the 50s but no further - prior to that the only one I knew of was the S9 final where the index died or something and they had to sim on preseason mode.

 

It's happened in the VHLM I'm pretty sure though.

[Beketov 8,792]

2 minutes ago, Victor said:

I was informed someone forced a Game 7 in my absence in the 50s but no further

I don’t remember the exact season but it definitely happened. Was one of my seasons with Holik in Seattle. Went down 3-0 and pushed it to a game 7 but lost. Considering that would involve a 3-1 at some point it would show up in your spreadsheet so my guess is S53 but I don’t care enough to go check and don’t want to re-live that heartbreak.

[NotAVHLM-GM 1,858]

So I was cursed after all

[diamond_ace 3,106]

A third of all 3-1 series going to game 7 is still statistically high. If you assume both teams have a 50/50 chance of winning any game (which is generous for the team with the deficit) then half of the games would end in game 5, and a further half of the remaining half (so a quarter) would end in game 6. That leaves a quarter of the games to go to game 7, which again is without taking into account that the team with the 3-1 lead is likely better. Factor that in, and it should drop to somewhere around 20%. So 33% is still an abnormally high amount, just not quite to the level usually implied by the person who mentions the curse in a given series.

[Victor 10,667]

2 hours ago, diamond_ace said:

without taking into account that the team with the 3-1 lead is likely better. 

Tbf I think many of the comebacks are the result of the weaker team having the 3-1 lead.