With conference play beginning at the end of this week, the Rating Percentage Index rankings aren’t kind. Entering Christmas Eve, C-USA had slumped to 25th of 32 Division I teams, according to WarrenNolan.com.

That’s even further down from the 21st or thereabouts the league was pegged at a year ago. C-USA sits between the American East and Big South.


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Good grief, that's shameful. The friggin' belch sits at 13th right now.

http://warrennolan.com/basketball/2017/conferencerpi

Brandon Stith is only a Junior.

Troy Freeman and Erin Bacote have been hard to replace. Won't argue with that. But I'm shooting for a first round bye. Stith has been a non factor on offense compared to how he ended the season so we'll see.

Posted from mobile device. Hopefully it's coherent.

(12-26-2016 07:28 AM)GreenSteve Wrote:  With conference play beginning at the end of this week, the Rating Percentage Index rankings aren’t kind. Entering Christmas Eve, C-USA had slumped to 25th of 32 Division I teams, according to WarrenNolan.com.

That’s even further down from the 21st or thereabouts the league was pegged at a year ago. C-USA sits between the American East and Big South.


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We were hoping for the potential for a second bid but wow, not this year. Wonder what it would look like if the bottom 4 300+ schools were eliminated?

http://www.espn.com/mens-college-basketb...groupId/11

I wouldn't trust a rating system that has the Southland with its 28% ooc winning percentage 5 spots ahead of us.

I subscribe to Pomeroy and they have us at 18 and the Sun Belt at 15. The Sun Belt is above us because UTA is having a great year at 62. They only have 12 teams and their lowest is at 262 in ULM.

We have 14 teams and our bottom 2 UTEP and USM are sitting at 302 and 335 dragging us below the Belt. I've looked at a lot of ratings systems over the years and trust Pomeroy more than any.

18 isn't what we should aspire to but it's not as bad as OP is portraying in a system that has the Southland and its 28% 5 spots ahead of us.

(12-26-2016 10:26 AM)dahbeed Wrote:  I wouldn't trust a rating system that has the Southland with its 28% ooc winning percentage 5 spots ahead of us.

I subscribe to Pomeroy and they have us at 18 and the Sun Belt at 15. The Sun Belt is above us because UTA is having a great year at 62. They only have 12 teams and their lowest is at 262 in ULM.

We have 14 teams and our bottom 2 UTEP and USM are sitting at 302 and 335 dragging us below the Belt. I've looked at a lot of ratings systems over the years and trust Pomeroy more than any.

18 isn't what we should aspire to but it's not as bad as OP is portraying in a system that has the Southland and its 28% 5 spots ahead of us.

Nolan's formula mimics the NCAA. It is what it is.

With that said, that formula doesn't project. The formula doesn't begin to develop accuracy until conference plays begins because all of your games are against a now set opponents and opponents/opponents record. As I've stated before the conference rankings have a near one to one correlation to OOC win percentage by the end of the season.

On behalf of my school, I apologize.

Our starting PG hasn't played yet due to injury, so when/if he comes back, we shouldn't be quite as hapless as we've been thus far. We'll still be pretty darned bad, don't think otherwise, but we should by all means be noticeably better with him than without.

With the NCAA investigation/penalties now settled, Sadler is finally getting a snowball's chance to recruit anyone besides those with no other options. Who knows if he'll actually get us off the mat in the coming years, but at least he'll have a shot now.

(12-26-2016 10:26 AM)dahbeed Wrote:  I wouldn't trust a rating system that has the Southland with its 28% ooc winning percentage 5 spots ahead of us.

I subscribe to Pomeroy and they have us at 18 and the Sun Belt at 15. The Sun Belt is above us because UTA is having a great year at 62. They only have 12 teams and their lowest is at 262 in ULM.

We have 14 teams and our bottom 2 UTEP and USM are sitting at 302 and 335 dragging us below the Belt. I've looked at a lot of ratings systems over the years and trust Pomeroy more than any.

18 isn't what we should aspire to but it's not as bad as OP is portraying in a system that has the Southland and its 28% 5 spots ahead of us.

Agree that RPI isn't terribly accurate at this point in the season, but as another poster says, it's what the NCAA uses and in our case, it is what it is.

Our best RPI team, Middle, sits at 18 while the next best, ODU, sits at 104. Marshll comes in third at 117. The Southland's top 3 teams sport RPI's of 62, 81, and 109 and the belch's top 3 are 17, 41, and 63.

Yeah, this thing will even out quite a bit as conference play begins, but damn, we're in a very deep hole if we think this conference is anything but a one bid league again this year.

This is pathetic.

This is why our conference should get creative with in conference scheduling. The top 4 teams in RPI shouldn't be forced to play the bottom 4 teams and crush the RPI rating.

(12-26-2016 04:24 PM)FlyHawk98 Wrote:  This is why our conference should get creative with in conference scheduling. The top 4 teams in RPI shouldn't be forced to play the bottom 4 teams and crush the RPI rating.

Interesting proposal, but if we went that route, the schedules played by teams would be very different. As it stands right now, unless I'm mistaken, everyone plays everyone at least once to make it as even as possible.

Also, depending on which teams they'd play twice, your top tier teams might end up with one or two more losses on their record than they would otherwise if they played those bottom four. So that begs the question; what affects RPI more? Does going 4-0 (a likely scenario) against the bottom teams hurt RPI more than going 3-1 or 2-2 against the tougher opponents they'd otherwise play?

Personally, I think we should keep it as it is, and if we're really that concerned about the RPI effects of our top teams playing our weakest teams, we should instead make a concerted effort to schedule tougher OOC games. After all, at around 13 games or so, our OOC schedules account for almost half our games. It would seem there's a lot more room for improving RPI in those 13 or so games than there is in a mere 4 games played in conference. Just my opinion.

(12-26-2016 05:01 PM)Volkmar Wrote:  Also, depending on which teams they'd play twice, your top tier teams might end up with one or two more losses on their record than they would otherwise if they played those bottom four. So that begs the question; what affects RPI more? Does going 4-0 (a likely scenario) against the bottom teams hurt RPI more than going 3-1 or 2-2 against the tougher opponents they'd otherwise play?

Two of the top 4 playing each other keeps the RPI basically the same win or lose. A top 4 playing a bottom 4. say MTSU at 18 and USM at 335, even if MTSU was to win by 25 it would drag their RPI down at least 15-20 points. So yes top teams going 2-2 is a lot better than going 4-0 against the bottom teams.

(12-26-2016 10:21 PM)HerdZoned Wrote:  

(12-26-2016 05:01 PM)Volkmar Wrote:  Also, depending on which teams they'd play twice, your top tier teams might end up with one or two more losses on their record than they would otherwise if they played those bottom four. So that begs the question; what affects RPI more? Does going 4-0 (a likely scenario) against the bottom teams hurt RPI more than going 3-1 or 2-2 against the tougher opponents they'd otherwise play?

Two of the top 4 playing each other keeps the RPI basically the same win or lose. A top 4 playing a bottom 4. say MTSU at 18 and USM at 335, even if MTSU was to win by 25 it would drag their RPI down at least 15-20 points. So yes top teams going 2-2 is a lot better than going 4-0 against the bottom teams.

Here's the problem, though. The schedule has to be made before the season, and teams can always surprise you. They can end up being better or worse than you expected. So it would be very difficult to ensure the schedule works out like you're wanting it to.

(12-26-2016 10:40 PM)techdawg28 Wrote:  Here's the problem, though. The schedule has to be made before the season, and teams can always surprise you. They can end up being better or worse than you expected. So it would be very difficult to ensure the schedule works out like you're wanting it to.

I agree with this. There is no way to actually make sure you get it right. Add in injuries and those who are suppose to win become a toss up game. See UAB with Nick Norton now out.

(12-26-2016 10:50 PM)HerdZoned Wrote:  

(12-26-2016 10:40 PM)techdawg28 Wrote:  Here's the problem, though. The schedule has to be made before the season, and teams can always surprise you. They can end up being better or worse than you expected. So it would be very difficult to ensure the schedule works out like you're wanting it to.

I agree with this. There is no way to actually make sure you get it right. Add in injuries and those who are suppose to win become a toss up game. See UAB with Nick Norton now out.

My thoughts also, so keep it as is, and just schedule better opposition for the 13 or so OOC games. Just makes a lot more sense.

Always be the best you can be. Even if that is being the worst, always be the best at it.

No no no. Some of you guys have this all wrong IMHO.

The "fixing" of this problem starts with a conference president who recognizes that end-of-year RPI is critical to the chances that his league will get at least two NCAA bids. He then encourages both coaches and athletic directors to schedule games, prefereably home & home, with perennially strong RPI non conference foes.

And even if the conference president isn't active on this front, a smart coach and his AD can work together to improve an individual school's chances of making the big dance via RPI. It's done all the time at our level in baseball and can also be achieved in basketball.

That improved scheduling also means a non-conference schedule that recruits find attractive. One part feeds off the other. No, it's not easy, and it's not an overnight thing, but few things worth achieving in life come easily.