How did Boise and maybe other MWC teams game the RPI system?

[volhawk50]

I just don't get the rpi at all. They say that Iowa doesn't get in because they scheduled too many "cupcakes and patsies" but yet they play in the Big Ten. Meanwhile Gonzaga plays 5 or 6 decent teams then play in a conference of not but "patsies and cupcake" but yet somehow that is better????? I think that the rpi is an unfair system that is programmed and swayed by biased individuals. If they want mid majors to look good, all they have to do is change the rpi to make them look better than they are.

Exactly. The Sun Belt got two teams in the tournament. The MF-ing Sun Belt. MTSU played like 22 games against the rest of the conference, not one of those games was against a top-100 team. Yet they got an RPI rank of 28 and an at-large bid. Sometimes the RPI looks like throwing together random numbers that don't add up.

 

[WVHawk]

Scott VanPelt talked about the MWC and working there RPI. He said they scheduled a ton of games (I don't know the number) against D-2 teams. Games against D-2 don't count in the RPI. So if you schedule small schools with a high RPI you get pentilized. But if you schedule against D-2 it doesn't affect your RPI. This is not a good systerm or metric.

 

[clicheusername3]

Lost in all of this butthurt, is the fact that no matter what metric you use, whether it be RPI, BPI, Kenpom, etc...someone will always find a way to game the system. Don't be mad at other schools for outsmarting us.

 

[DodgerHawki]

For your own sake dont comment if you haven't read the article.

The RPI just lost all credibility IMO. Hopefully someone like ESPN will expose the RPI.

The more I read the more I am convinced that the committee is fully aware of the flaws of this RPI system. I find it impossible to believe they could have been unaware of the information contained in this article. They use it because they wan't an excuse to take more mid majors vs teams like Iowa.

Of course the committee is aware of the flaws of the RPI. It serves its purpose, which is to provide cover for the committee can use to bolster the standing of mid-majors as at-large teams. KenPom, BPI and Sagarin all do a far better job of measuring how good a team is (they factor in your opponent as part of the formula). And I'm not just saying that due to the fact that Iowa ranked higher in those measures.
The standards that apply to mid-majors to make it as an at-large are less stringent than what applies to major conference teams. Only the power conference have to play a tough OOC schedule, win road games against good teams or play a lot of games against Top 100 teams (and win at least some of them).

 

[PCHawk]

Exactly. The Sun Belt got two teams in the tournament. The MF-ing Sun Belt. MTSU played like 22 games against the rest of the conference, not one of those games was against a top-100 team. Yet they got an RPI rank of 28 and an at-large bid. Sometimes the RPI looks likeu throwing together random numbers that don't add up.

But they played 3 teams against top 50 out of conference or some ****, giving them a grand total of 3 top 50 teams. All we played was 12 of those games.

 

[Klondike53226]

Lost in all of this butthurt, is the fact that no matter what metric you use, whether it be RPI, BPI, Kenpom, etc...someone will always find a way to game the system. Don't be mad at other schools for outsmarting us.

I agree with this sentiment. Middle Tennessee State offers two courses of discipline, Clown Studies and Welding, and despite this, they were able to expose and exploit the vulnerable areas of the ranking system. Meanwhile The University of Iowa, with their endowment upwards of $1 billion, was unable to do so.

 

[sioux34]

Getting a stronger strength of schedule by playing even weaker teams. That seems like a reasonable solution for picking teams for the tourney.

What a freaking scam.

Let me propose a solution to close this loophole in the RPI. Any NAIA DII or DIII game is included in the strength of schedule calc with a value of 350 for all those teams.

 

[PCHawk]

Lost in all of this butthurt, is the fact that no matter what metric you use, whether it be RPI, BPI, Kenpom, etc...someone will always find a way to game the system. Don't be mad at other schools for outsmarting us.

This might be true because I still haven't learned much about these rankings since they haven't screwed Iowa yet. I really doubt it is true though. The RPI has a huge flaw in it that makes it easy to manipulate. It doesn't appear these other ranking systems have a huge flaw like that.

 

[1hawkeye1]

Time for RPI to be retired. Supposedly it is not a big factor in selecting teams, but it appears that once again, it was.

 

[DodgerHawki]

Lost in all of this butthurt, is the fact that no matter what metric you use, whether it be RPI, BPI, Kenpom, etc...someone will always find a way to game the system. Don't be mad at other schools for outsmarting us.

I will agree that someone will always be disappointed, but there is no "gaming of the system" with BPI, Pomeroy or Sagarin. The aforementioned rankings view losing in double OT to Wisconsin as being a better performance than winning by 2 at UW-Green Bay. Or see that beating Minnesota at home by 21 points is a better performance than winning by 3 on the road at Arkansas-Little Rock.

No one is mad at other schools (at least they shouldn't be). Non-conference scheduling needs to be taken very seriously, way more seriously than Iowa has in the past. And I'm not talking about just loading up with a slate of Duke, Kentucky, UCLA in the non-con. I mean by targeting a schedule that lessens (as much as possible) any games against teams 250+ in the RPI. It means scheduling road games in the non-con against crappy teams solely for the potential RPI boost from getting a road win.

 

[PCHawk]

It's easy for a team like middle Tennessee state to schedule a tougher non conference because they get to play such easy teams in their conference. It seems like the RPI says its better to play 30 games between 100-200 in the RPI then it is to play 10 top 50, 10 50-100, 5 200-250, and 5 300+. The 2nd team plays 20 teams better then any the 1st team plays but the bottom 5 are way worse. To me the 2nd schedule is twice the challenge.

 

[ameshawkeye]

They either need to assign a value to all non-D1 schools like another person said, or better yet, ignore all games below 200 or 250 in the RPI.

 

[ssckelley]

Getting a stronger strength of schedule by playing even weaker teams. That seems like a reasonable solution for picking teams for the tourney.

What a freaking scam.

Let me propose a solution to close this loophole in the RPI. Any NAIA DII or DIII game is included in the strength of schedule calc with a value of 350 for all those teams.

But it isn't the RPI rank that impacts your RPI score, it is their win/loss percentage along with their opponents win/loss percentage. So it would be impossible to come up with a reasonable calculation to figure in DII, DIII, or NAIA schools. About the only thing I can come up with is not count the win in the weighted average but count their win percentage against D1 schools (essentially they all would be 0-1 minimum). But something like that would not be enough to keep it from happening.

 

[9YRPLAN]

how exactly do you game KenPom? do you plan to intentionally lose close games?

 

[sportstalent]

Minnesota"s SOS has nothing to do with playing teams like Duke and Memphis. They have a good SOS because where the bottom teams on their schedule ended up RPI wise.

Actually it does because the RPI takes their SOS into consideration as well and since those two teams won about 60 games it only helps. When your opponents win games it helps and Duke/Memphis are good RPI teams because they won a lot of games.

 

[PCHawk]

how exactly do you game KenPom? do you plan to intentionally lose close games?

Actually that did kinda look like our plan this year.

 

[blubberhawk]

The mid-majors have figured out all they need to do is schedule some Power Six schools good or not and manipulate the SOS garbage.

Iowa needs to stop scheduling the worst of the worst D1 teams. Of course, had they beat some better teams in conference it wouldn't have mattered anyway. Scheduling some better non-conference teams though, would not put them in a position to have to knock off more teams than they would ever hope to.

Next year, it may be a different story anyway as Iowa should be a lock from Day one, but what a better schedule gets them is a higher seed.

Look at how Minnesota played down the stretch and their SOS was very high, they played Duke and Memphis, that is it. Iowa has to get one or two more teams that are on roughly the same level as ISU. Also, playing away from Carver a few games before conference isn't a bad thing either, so a home and home series against someone would work. Just stop with the awful, awful teams like TAMUCC, they have always been awful.

Yup..
And the great thing is, you don't even have to win those games against the good teams. (se Oklahoma and ISU schedules) Both played 3 decent teams in their pre-conference schedules and both lost all 3, but there they are in the NCAA tourney.

So Fran, get your butt out there and schedule Duke, Gonzaga and Butler. Play'em all on the road. Probably lose'em all but finish 9-9 in your league and your in.

 

[PCHawk]

Actually it does because the RPI takes their SOS into consideration as well and since those two teams won about 60 games it only helps. When your opponents win games it helps and Duke/Memphis are good RPI teams because they won a lot of games.

I didn't literally mean it doesn't help at all. You would be better off scheduling 4 150 RPI teams then duke Memphis and 2 300+ teams.

 

[ssckelley]

Or schedule the teams that are playing Duke & Gonzaga, 25% of the RPI score is the opponents opponents win percentage.

 

[pmchawk]

Getting a stronger strength of schedule by playing even weaker teams. That seems like a reasonable solution for picking teams for the tourney.

What a freaking scam.

Let me propose a solution to close this loophole in the RPI. Any NAIA DII or DIII game is included in the strength of schedule calc with a value of 350 for all those teams.

It would be great if someone went in and added this to the formula to see how much everything changes.