Refuse to Lose Although We Did Against Stanford at Madison Square Garden

The motto, "Refuse to Lose," came from our former basketball coach at UMass Amherst, John Calipari, who needs no introduction. He is now the coach of the University of Kentucky team, which will play against the University of Louisville, also located in Kentucky, in the Final Four NCAA championship this coming weekend in New Orleans. Even yesterday's New York Times had extensive coverage of his team and the upcoming game.

Yesterday, UMass Amherst played a semifinal game at the NIT basketball tournament against Stanford University in Madison Square Garden in NYC. I had two classes to cover so I could not make it to the game. However, since it was televised on national TV, I did watch the second half with my husband and even our daughter joined in after skating at the Mullins Center (this venue is also where our basketball team plays and trains).

The UMass basketball team members played their hearts out in NYC and although we lost, 74-64, to Stanford this was an outstanding season (and I was even getting updates on how the team was doing when I was in Gothenburg, Sweden for two weeks).

My daughter told me that our star point guard, Chaz Williams, who went to Iona Prep and is from Brooklyn, tweeted yesterday morning that he had not slept well and that concerned me but the spirit and stamina of this team makes us all at UMass very proud. The coach, Derek Kellogg, lives in our general neighborhood, and I salute what he, his staff, and his players have accomplished this season.

Hearing the UMass fans shouting, "Go, UMass!" throughout the game last night in Madison Square Garden and seeing so much maroon and white was terrific.

Tomorrow night the NIT matchup is between Minnesota and Washington at Madison Square Garden, so it will be interesting who ultimately wins the NIT basketball championship.

UMass Amherst on the Move -- from Administration to Basketball

I am back from Sweden less than 72 hours and today is certainly an exciting day for the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

Last evening, the official announcement came out that the 30th Chancellor of UMass Amherst has been approved by the Board of Trustees and it is a physicist, Dr. Kumble Subbaswamy, who was born in India and is presently the Provost at the University of Kentucky (and for all the basketball fans out there you know that Kentucky has made the Final Four in the NCAA championship).

According to The Boston Globe: During his first visit, he displayed erudition and wit, said Max Page, an architecture and history professor who leads PHENOM, a lobbying group for public higher education in Massachusetts.

“When he came to campus, he started his speech with this Thomas Jefferson quote: ‘Let us in education dream of an aristocracy of achievement arising out of a democracy of opportunity,’ ” Page said. “For me, anyone who leads with a Jefferson quote is going to have a leg up.”

As for basketball, Rick Pitino, the coach of the University of Louisville's basketball team, had been a basketball player at UMass Amherst and John Calipari, the coach of the University of Kentucky team, had been our basketball coach in the 1990s. Their teams are matched up in the Final Four game this Saturday. I had visited with Coach Cal when he was at the University of Memphis, since one of my former doctoral students at the Isenberg School of Management, Dr. Tina Wakolbinger, was an Assistant Professor there, and had invited me to speak. She is now a Full Professor at the Vienna University of Economics and Business.

But there is more exciting basketball news -- Tonight, UMass Amherst plays against Stanford University in Madison Square Garden in NYC in the NIT Final Four! Such a matchup happened back in 1991.

The Braess Paradox, Broadway, and Basketball

This blog post is being written as part of the monthly INFORMS blog challenge with the March challenge being "O.R. and Sports."

On March 15, 2011, after many discussions with a Public Broadcasting System (PBS) TV team about transportation, I ended up on Broadway in NYC for an interview and filming. A high level "script" had been prepared, which addressed not only a broad sweep of transportation and policies to alleviate congestion dating back to ancient times, but also more recent policies in Mayor Bloomberg's administration, including the removal of roads to traffic and the creation of pedestrian plazas as on Broadway from 47th Street to 42nd Street (see photos above). The script also included the meaning and importance of the Braess paradox, its relevance to the NYC transportation policies, and how this paradox continues to fascinate.

I was being interviewed and filmed for the PBS TV series: America Revealed, which will have segments on transportation, energy, and food, along with additional online video clips.

A few days before the video taping on Broadway, I was asked whether I could also comment on the relevance of the Braess paradox to basketball! Of course, it was March Madness time, and, although my interview will not be airing until next Fall, since this PBS production is an educational one, it is important to engage the audience, which is expected to include students from middle school, high school, and beyond, as well as the interested public, on related topics that might interest them.

To add to the excitement, at the lunch with the producer before the filming was to take place, I was told that my interviewer was Yul Kwon, the winner of the TV reality show, Survivor, in 2006. As I noted in an earlier post, he attributed his winning of the million dollar prize to his knowledge of game theory. He has degrees from Stanford and Yale, and was fantastic.

Now back to what the Braess paradox may have to do with the sport of basketball.

Recall that in the classical Braess paradox example, the addition of a new link to a transportation network, in the case of user-optimizing (selfish behavior), resulted in an increase in the travel time (cost) for all travelers in the network. Hence, in certain networks, the removal (or closure) of a road can actually improve travel time.

In the basketball world, according to Bill Simmons of ESPN, there is the Ewing Theory. According to Simmons: The theory was created in the mid-'90s by Dave Cirilli, a friend of his who was convinced that Patrick Ewing's teams (both at Georgetown and with New York) inexplicably played better when Ewing was either injured or missing extended stretches because of foul trouble. Simmons has a primer, Ewings Theory 101, which lists examples in basketball history where the removal of a top player (paradoxically) results in a better outcome for the basketball team.

Brian Skinner, a physicist at the University of Minnesota, wrote an article, "The Price of Anarchy in Basketball" in which he developed an analogy, through a model, between certain basketball plays and the Braess paradox, in order to further explore the Ewing Theory. You may find the preprint of the article here. You can also read a discussion of the specific play(s) on Skinner's blog.

How nice to be able to talk about game theory, the Braess paradox, and the relevance to even basketball, on Broadway, and to also get a chance to promote O.R.! The original Braess article was written in German, and, due to popular demand, Professor Braess, Dr. Tina Wakolbinger (who was then my doctoral student at the Isenberg School), and I did a translation of it to English, which was published in the INFORMS journal, Transportation Science in 2005!

Below is a photo of Professor Dietrich Braess with Tina and me in the Supernetworks Lab at the Isenberg School with the translation.

Professor Dietrich Braess visited us in April 2006 and also spoke in our Speaker Series.

Coincidentally, Tina, after receiving her PhD at UMass Amherst, joined the faculty of the University of Memphis, and when I gave talks there, I had the pleasure of meeting also with Coach John Calipari (Coach "Cal" had been the men's basketball coach at UMass Amherst in the 1990s and we have mutual friends). He is now Kentucky's men's basketball coach and his team, along with UCONN's, VCU's and Butler's have made it to the 2011 Men's Basketball NCAA Final Four!

Note the photo below with Coach Cal in his Memphis office back in the Fall of 2008 where he had a lot of UMass Amherst memorabilia. In fact, one of his daughters graduated from UMass and another one is still a student here.


As for Dr. Tina Wakolbinger, she will be joining the faculty of the Vienna University of Economics and Business as a Full Professor on May 15, 2011, and she received her PhD in 2007!

It will certainly be interesting to see who wins the 2011 NCAA basketball championship (both men's and women's)!

Brazil vs. North Korea and Celtics vs. Lakers

********Update to the first story*************

Brazil beat North Korea 2-1 in the World Cup today, which is probably a score that few would have predicted. The announcer stated that the red garbed "North Korean" fans in the stands were actually paid Chinese "actors."

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**********And to the second********************

The Celtics lost to the Lakers last night and will play against them tomorrow, Thursday, June 17, 2010 in LA.


Professors are very "active" individuals with their teaching, research, and service.

Every once in a while, though, there comes a day, when just being a spectator, and the associated anticipation, bring special delights.

I have been following the World Cup, beginning with the first matches while I was in Argentina and since returning to Amherst, MA (where even high schoolers missing school to watch the World Cup games at restaurants made the front page of the local newspaper, much to the chagrin of their parents, I am sure. Plus, I was told that little work has been done in the local high school since the TVs are on to the World Cup games).

Today, will be a fascinating game between Brazil, the top-ranked team at the World Cup, and North Korea, the polar and very mysterious opposite, at 2:30PM ET. The excitement is palpable in Massachusetts and beyond and, in addition, tonight is the Celtics vs. Lakers basketball game in Los Angeles, with fans in eager anticipation. If the Celtics win tonight, they will have won this year's NBA championship.

So today, besides reviewing proposals and academic articles, and trying to catch some time to do some research, it will not be all "work" but also some spectating for the pure joy of sport!

As a faculty member at the Isenberg School at UMass Amherst, I am privileged to be part of a school that also houses one of the top Sports Management departments in the US, so, of course, any sports-related discussions are "work-related."

Congrats to the Underdogs, Butler University, on Making the NCAA Final Two!

**** An update to this post *****

Last night, Butler University's men's basketball team was beaten by Duke University's team at a score of 61-59. Congratulations to both these fantastic teams! You made this year's N.C.A.A. men's basketball tournament extra special.

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Congratulations to the Butler University men's basketball team for winning their Final Four matchup game yesterday against Michigan State with a score of 52-50! This is the first time in decades that a 5th seeded team has reached the final game, which will be played against Duke University tomorrow night. Duke beat West Virginia last night.

The mascot of the Butler University team is a bulldog and, last night, if you watched the game, you couldn't miss him, dressed up in his dark blue and white Butler coat. He seemed to be enjoying the game and subsequent victory in Indianapolis as much as all the Butler University fans with the game taking place in their home city.

I like it when an "underdog" achieves what was made possible through dreams, a lot of hard work, and a terrific young coach, Brad Stevens, who made his players believe that they would reach this final game.

The President of Butler University is Dr. Bobby Fong, who is the first-born child of Chinese immigrants. He did not learn how to speak English until he was in kindergarten (this was my situation as well, since my family immigrated from Canada, and only Ukrainian was spoken in our home except when my parents did not want the children to understand what they were saying, they would revert to speaking in German). Bobby Fong went on to major in English at Harvard and then received his PhD from UCLA, also in English. Dr. Fong has been the President of Butler University since 2001. The New York Times had a wonderful feature article on Dr. Bobby Fong, which also related how he learned math from baseball statistics and learned about the US by reading about baseball.

Kudos to Butler University, a liberal arts university, with fewer than 5,000 students! I wish their men's basketball team, its students, and its President all the very best! They demonstrate what is special about sports, good sportsmanship, and the terrific possibilities!

From the NCAA Tournament to Pediatric Vaccines

Today we were treated to a brilliant talk by a star operations researcher, Dr. Sheldon Jacobson, of the Computer Science Department at the University of Illinois at Urbana. Professor Jacobson's talk was in our Spring 2010 Speaker Series in Operations Research / Management Sciences.

His presentation, An Analysis of Pediatric Vaccine Pricing and Stockpiling Issues, was simply outstanding! He recently returned from a trip that took him to Australia and Japan to investigate different vaccine issues in those countries. He discussed how integer programming can be used in the pricing of vaccines with real-world data and how he used stochastic programming to formulate and answer questions regarding the stockpiling of vaccines. He informed the audience of the challenges that vaccine manufacturers are faced with. He told the students to be willing to do "work for free" because sometimes great opportunities arise from doing research that helps others (as he had experienced with a pharmaceutical company and CDC project).

Today, as well, Dr. Jacobson was one of nine experts whose commentary appeared in The New York Times "Room for Debate" on the theme, How to Improve the N.C.A.A. Tournament! It was very cool to see Dr. Jacobson on the same short list as the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame member, Rebecca Lobo Rishin, and the former Temple University men's basketball coach, John Chaney, among other sports experts! Actually, they are lucky to be on the same short list as Professor Jacobson!

Now you might be thinking how can someone be an expert on healthcare topics such as vaccine production, stockpiling, and pricing, coupled with the analysis of sports tournament outcomes?! Dr. Jacobson is also an expert on aviation security and was a Guggenheim Fellow in 2003. His degrees are in mathematics and operations research (with a PhD in the latter from Cornell University). Having critical analytical skills, a strong math background, and the ability to develop creative and insightful mathematical models, with important policy implications, can lead you to study and address numerous important problems.

Dr. Jacobson is a Renaissance man and we are so grateful that he took the time out of his extremely busy professional schedule to come and speak at the Isenberg School of Management at UMass Amherst.

We also thank Barry List of INFORMS and its Speaker Program for co-sponsoring Dr. Jacobson's wonderful talk today!

Coach Cal on Social Networking and Kentucky vs. Cornell in the NCAA Sweet Sixteen

I may live in Amherst, but, as an academic, I certainly "get around." Last year, I gave invited talks at various universities and colleges in the US as well as in Europe.

Given the big NCAA basketball game tonight (Yes, I am speaking about Kentucky vs. Cornell) I could not help but reflect on some of the favorite venues that I spoke at last year that have a connection to the Kentucky vs. Cornell basketball game tonight.

I gave two talks at the University of Memphis in October 2008 and was hosted by Dean Rajiv Grover there and my former doctoral student, Professor Tina Wakolbinger, of the Fogelman College of Business and Economics. Of course, while at the U. of Memphis, I also had to visit Coach Cal (John Calipari) and the photo above was taken in his office. You may notice a lot of UMass Amherst memorabilia. He had been our men's basketball coach earlier in his career and has many friends here. His older daughter even graduated from UMass Amherst. Coach Cal was his usual charismatic and incredibly friendly self and I enjoyed talking with him and reminiscing.

Of course, as the whole world knows, Coach Cal is now the coach of the University of Kentucky men's basketball team, which is playing tonight against Cornell. The New York Times had a terrific article on Coach Cal and his use of social networking media to get the news out to his fans around the globe.

On April 1, 2009, I gave a talk at Cornell University and was hosted by my colleague, Professor Kieran Donaghy, and I had a superb time. I was joined by another former doctoral student of mine, Professor June Dong, who drove from SUNY Oswego and who is a Professor at the School of Business there, along with her husband. It is very sweet that an Ivy League university has made the Sweet Sixteen again (last time this happened was in 1979 with UPENN).

The Kentucky vs. Cornell game tonight will be a very interesting basketball game! Indeed, this is the hot topic in our neighborhood.

**** an update on this story **** Kentucky ended up beating Cornell with a score of 62-45 and proceeds now to the Elite 8. Interestingly, Syracuse got beaten by Butler. Kentucky will be matched against West Virgina in a game to take place over the weekend.