Gotta Love the RPI

Crazy, for the life of me I cannot figure out why they use this formula. They just changed it a few years ago, I wonder what it used to be.

25% - Your own win percentage (WP * .25)
50% - Your opponent win percentage (WP * .50)
25% - Your opponent opponents win percentage (WP * .25)
 
Back when the Hawks were number 1 in various computer models in football no one complained about the computers. Win those games against Nebraska and Virginia Tech and close out one of the other countless close losses and the relevance of those computers would have been nil. We still control our destiny. GO HAWKS.
 
ICHAWK said:
I actually like this as a fan of seeing the best basketball game possible.

I have zero interest in watching Iowa play 5 home games against Howard type teams while wining each game by 35. I would prefer to see my team play at Duke. This is good in that it stops teams from scheduling complete crap non conference games a little.

I am actually of the opinion that they should elminate at least 75 D1 basketball teams.
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I agree with you from the standpoint of a fan. I hate those "Howard" type games.

But at the same time, just from a common sense perspective, how can Team A be rewarded more for a blowout loss than Team B gets rewarded for a blowout win? It defies common sense.
 
I think the RPI is irrelevent period, that is the point. But, this is the number that everyone refers to. For instance, had we played North Carolina Central instead of South Carolina State, Bryant University instead of Coppin State, Northeastern instead of Howard, Vermont instead of Central Michigan, and Loyala of MD instead of Texas A&M CC, we wouldnt even be having these bubble discussions. Our RPI would be solid, along with everything else that is solid.

But how many people here would think that our W/L record or our schedule perception would be any different with the above changes?
 
ICHAWK said:
I actually like this as a fan of seeing the best basketball game possible.

I have zero interest in watching Iowa play 5 home games against Howard type teams while wining each game by 35. I would prefer to see my team play at Duke. This is good in that it stops teams from scheduling complete crap non conference games a little.

I am actually of the opinion that they should elminate at least 75 D1 basketball teams.
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The key to a high RPI is not playing Duke win or loose, it is beating 5 mid level bottom feeders (200-300 rpi) instead of trolling the very bottom (300+) like Iowa did this season. Do any of you really think this makes a whit of difference as to how good a team is come march? The mountain west has done a masterful job of gaming the system. They will get an undeserved number of teams into the big dance and they will more than likely all make early exits. Is that what fans really wants?
 
SpiderRico said:
I agree with you from the standpoint of a fan. I hate those "Howard" type games.

But at the same time, just from a common sense perspective, how can Team A be rewarded more for a blowout loss than Team B gets rewarded for a blowout win? It defies common sense.
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Maybe the people who developed the system were trying to help the small school teams. Large conference teams are helped simply by their conference schedule as the Big 10, Big 12, Pac 10, Big East should have a fair number of good teams so just playing a conference schedule will give the chance to play good teams at home and on the road.

Small schools only really get the pre-season to play any team of value. And large school teams will not do home and home with small conference schools. So maybe this system was added to RPI to at least give small schools some incentive to play a large school on the road because the large school will not play a home and home.

I think there are dumb things about the RPI but I understand some of the idea of it.
 
sioux34 said:
They will get an undeserved number of teams into the big dance and they will more than likely all make early exits. Is that what fans really wants?
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I think the consensus on this board is a first round NCAA loss is better than winning the NIT. We could hang an NCAA appearance banner and it would be awesome.
 
ssckelley said:
Crazy, for the life of me I cannot figure out why they use this formula. They just changed it a few years ago, I wonder what it used to be.

25% - Your own win percentage (WP * .25)
50% - Your opponent win percentage (WP * .50)
25% - Your opponent opponents win percentage (WP * .25)
Click to expand...

The change was in the weighting for the first 25%.

Your own winning percentage is weighted for home/road wins/losses, but has nothing to do with the quality of team played.

You can game the RPI by:
1. Win all home games.
2. Schedule winnable OOC roadies.
3. Play teams from 1-bid leagues that will contend in their conference.

The worst thing you can do for RPI is lose at home. That will kill you.
If you're scheduling an automatic win, you might as well make it a roadie to get the extra bonus.
 
okeefe4prez said:
I think the consensus on this board is a first round NCAA loss is better than winning the NIT. We could hang an NCAA appearance banner and it would be awesome.
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You misunderstood my question sir. Does the general basketball fan want to see a bunch of mediorce basketball teams from a crap conference forge their invitation to the big dance only to be shown the door by the bouncer shortly after arriving? I don't.
 
sioux34 said:
You misunderstood my question sir. Does the general basketball fan want to see a bunch of mediorce basketball teams from a crap conference forge their invitation to the big dance only to be shown the door by the bouncer shortly after arriving? I don't.
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Are you saying you don't want Iowa in?
 
If I am calculating this right Iowa will go up .0027 in RPI based on its own winning percentage going up (their win % goes from 64% to 66%). It will drop slightly since you add a loss to Northwesterns record, and they have played them 3 times (I still cannot wrap my mind around that). Overall Iowa could end up ~70 after tonight, if they win. Even though our own win % only accounts for 25% of the RPI it still moves the most after each win or loss.
 
I know this isn't a popular arguement around here but I really think the committee would be looking at us differently if we weren't looking to get the 8th invite from the big 10. I just think its a lot easier to dismiss us then it would be if we were the 6th invite. If we win 2 and don't get in that will be the sole reason for it. Will will probably have the best resume from the big 10 to ever get left out.
 
hawkeyeguy85 said:
The change was in the weighting for the first 25%.

Your own winning percentage is weighted for home/road wins/losses, but has nothing to do with the quality of team played.

You can game the RPI by:
1. Win all home games.
2. Schedule winnable OOC roadies.
3. Play teams from 1-bid leagues that will contend in their conference.

The worst thing you can do for RPI is lose at home. That will kill you.
If you're scheduling an automatic win, you might as well make it a roadie to get the extra bonus.
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Wiki must have the formula wrong then, I see nothing about home/away having any impact on the RPI. The formula looks pretty darn simple.
 
sioux34 said:
You misunderstood my question sir. Does the general basketball fan want to see a bunch of mediorce basketball teams from a crap conference forge their invitation to the big dance only to be shown the door by the bouncer shortly after arriving? I don't.
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You, sir, are not a "general" basketball fan. You are a 1%er. You have watched this horrific Iowa program through thick and thin. What it all comes down to is ratings to justify the ginormous contract CBS has to air these games. People (and when I say people I mean idiots) want to see little old VCU go toe to toe with big bad UCLA and catch them on a bad shooting day and knock them out of the tournament on some fluke shot. So the selection committee has responded by letting more and more crap teams into the tournament to generate more Cinderella stories. No one wants to see Iowa knock out UCLA or vice versa, it doesn't sell, so we are moving toward a tournament flooded with so called "mid majors" in the hopes of generating more upsets and more buzz. You, sir, want a decent tournament where Duke or Kentucky or whoever really has to go toe to toe with pretty good teams to win it all, but Joe Prole is too dumb to want that. Joe Prole wants to puff his chest up because he "called" the 12-5 mid-major no one has ever heard of upset. Ain't as exciting if that 12 seed is a traditionally decent program like Iowa or Purdue.
 
ssckelley said:
If I am calculating this right Iowa will go up .0027 in RPI based on its own winning percentage going up (their win % goes from 64% to 66%). It will drop slightly since you add a loss to Northwesterns record, and they have played them 3 times (I still cannot wrap my mind around that). Overall Iowa could end up ~70 after tonight, if they win. Even though our own win % only accounts for 25% of the RPI it still moves the most after each win or loss.
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I've got the W-L changing by .0039, which would be enough to lift them to 69 by itself. NW poor record will likely wipe out most of that however. Probably only a couple spots up.

SSC, you have to weight Iowa's W-L to figure it correctly

Home wins = 0.6 wins
Home losses = 1.4 losses
Neutral wins = 1 win
Neutral loss = 1 loss
Road win = 1.4 wins
Road loss equals = 0.6 losses

As far as RPI is concerned, Iowa is 14.4-8.6 right now.
 
ssckelley said:
If I am calculating this right Iowa will go up .0027 in RPI based on its own winning percentage going up (their win % goes from 64% to 66%). It will drop slightly since you add a loss to Northwesterns record, and they have played them 3 times (I still cannot wrap my mind around that). Overall Iowa could end up ~70 after tonight, if they win. Even though our own win % only accounts for 25% of the RPI it still moves the most after each win or loss.
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They exclude the game we play from calculating our opponent's WP.

I'm not sure if it effects opponent's opponent's WP which would have some tiny effect due to unbalanced scheduling. (I would doubt it even though it would only take an entry level programer about an afternoon to set up.)
 
PCHawk said:
I know this isn't a popular arguement around here but I really think the committee would be looking at us differently if we weren't looking to get the 8th invite from the big 10. I just think its a lot easier to dismiss us then it would be if we were the 6th invite. If we win 2 and don't get in that will be the sole reason for it. Will will probably have the best resume from the big 10 to ever get left out.
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Well I don't know why you think that when the committee has said over and over again that the number of selections from a certain conference has no impact.
 
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