It's not difficult, both your record and your SOS matter. The record matters less so, because without SOS there's no context. Theoretically, you could be the tenth best team in the country, but be 0-9 because you played the 9 teams better than you. Likewise you could go 30-0 and be the 317th best team in the country, if you happen to only play the teams ranked 318-347.

It's a little early still for some of the various rankings to really shed much light, but the point remains. I wouldn't put that much stock in real time rpi having EMU at 171 vs. 148 for Bucknell (that is to say that Bucknell is significantly better) but it probably tells me that they're about on par with one another. Saying that only the record matters would be like giving out a test to a group of students, and some of the tests are advanced calculus, while others are addition and subtraction, then stating that whoever got the best score is the smartest kid.