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ItsVictorOladipo 10 years, 4 months ago.
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- Posted on: Mon, 01/25/2016 - 3:16pm #62562
punchlinesParticipantThe new rankings came out today and I’m curious as to what other people think on the Big East (I apologize in advance for the length of this post).
I’ll start with Villanova (#6 AP, #6 ESPN, #1 RPI). Let’s look at their nonconference… Their first ‘challenging’ game was Saint Joe’s who is currently 16-3. Saint Joe’s best wins to date are Princeton, Temple, and Virginia Tech, so I think it is fair to even question Saint Joe’s status as a ‘challenge’ to Villanova. Vilanova then goes on to lose by double digits to Oklahoma and Virginia in their second and third ‘challenging’ nonconference games.
As for Villanova’s conference play, they easily handled Xavier, escaped with 5 point wins over G’Town and Butler, escpaed with a 1 point win over Seton Hall, and lost to Providence.
Why Villanova’s resume looks good: They have six wins against RPI top 50 teams [Xavier (6), St. Joe’s (34), Butler (43), Seton Hall 2x (45), and Stanford (47).]
Putting Villanova’s resume under the microscope: Looking at their quality wins to date, Xavier appears to be more of an outlier and as I breakdown Xavier’s resume later, we’ll see if they are properly rated in that 6-8 range based on which rating you prefer (AP, ESPN, RPI). With three losses to consensus top 25 teams in Oklahoma, Virginia, and Providence, it is tough to tell if Villanova really is the sixth best team in the country based on them beating up on teams in the lower half of the top 50. To me, Villanova is the equivalent of when a player is labeled as having a ‘high floor but low ceiling.’ Safe, but not sexy.
Next I will evaluate Xavier (#7 AP, #8 ESPN, #6 RPI). Xavier has wins over Michigan, Alabama, University of Souther California, Dayton, Butler, and Seton Hall. They have lost only to Villanova and Georgetown. Again, Xavier has beaten some good teams, but they haven’t beaten any great teams. In fact, Xavier does not have a win against a team currently ranked in the AP or ESPN top 25 if I’m not mistaken.
Why Xavier’s resume looks good: Similar to Villanova, their ranking is based on quantity of wins, rather than quality.
Putting Xavier’s resume under the microscope: Dayton is their highest ‘ranked’ win based on AP and ESPN polls and Dayton is techinically 26 if we extend the rankings to the ‘others receiving votes section.’ Is it fair to rank a team in the 6-8 range without them beating a single top 25 team? Furthermore, Villanova’s strongest claim to be ranked as high as they are is due to them beating Xavier. If Xavier is overrated, how does that effect your view on Villanova?
Just for brevity’s sake since this post is getting long, Providence (#10 AP, #10 ESPN, #25 RPI) has beaten Villanova, Arizona, and Butler twice. Providence lost to Michigan State, Seton Hall, and Marquette.
Why Providence’s resume looks good: Unlike Villanova and Xavier, Providence has two high quality wins in beating Villanova and Arizona.
Putting Providence’s resume under the microscope: Outside of Michigan State, Providence played mostly cupcakes in their non-conference schedule. Luckily for basketball fans, a Providence and Xavier matchup is slated for tomorrow night. Should Providence come out on top, I would argue that they are the cream of the crop in the Big East due to it being their third big win. At the moment though, it’s tough to deem them the best in the Big East because they lost to Seton Hall and Marquette, teams that elite teams should be able to handle.
If I had the time I’d breakdown the Big East as a whole, but I will choose to wrap up by examining Butler (#30 AP, #31 ESPN, #43 RPI). Butler has the 5th best overall record in the Big East, and has fallen to 8th in Big East play after a 2-5 start. Despite slipping and perhaps not being as worthy of examination as Creighton, Seton Hall, Georgetown, and/or Marquette, I think I have to examine Butler because they were ranked in the top 10 just a month ago.
Why Butler’s resume looks good: simply put, it doesn’t. They beat Purdue which is a quality win. But after that, their best wins are Temple, Cincy, and Tennessee.
Putting Butler’s resume under the microscope: Butler has lost to Miami, Providence (2x), Xavier, Villanova, and Creighton. Is it fair for a team with 1 quality win but 6 losses to be considered a top 30 team in the country when they are arguably not even top 5 in what is a weak conference in my opinion? Granted, their losses are legitimate losses, but top 30 teams should have at least a win here and there when you have that many opportunities against other quality opponents.
Collectively, these four teams’ best non-conference wins are Arizona, Purdue, and Dayton. That is a pretty poor showing against the non-conference for what was considered the four best teams in the Big East at the start of the season. Now when these teams play their conference games against each other, and one team has to win and one team has to lose, people will be duped into thinking these are top 10 teams going at it. I feel it is difficult to justify that given their current resumes. Ever since the new Big East started, I feel this conference has seen its teams be vastly overrated. My only hypothesis is that the people voting in the polls are giving unwarranted weight to the name of the conference based on its past makeup rather than its current makeup which is really a conference of upper tier mid-majors + Villanova.
0 - Posted on: Mon, 01/25/2016 - 4:07pm #1038884
ChewyParticipantput this man on the march madness bracket committee.
0 - Posted on: Mon, 01/25/2016 - 4:07pm #1038748
ChewyParticipantput this man on the march madness bracket committee.
0 - Posted on: Tue, 01/26/2016 - 7:18am #1038974
Dazzling Dunks and Basketball BloopersParticipantVery good points. Hard to argue with much of what you said here. Villanova and Xavier are both solid teams but if you put them in the big 12 or acc its likely they wouldn’t be ranked nearly as high.
I really miss the old big east conference. There was just something about the conference tournament that made it unlike any other in college sports. From the rivalries, to the excitement of msg, to all the classic games and upsets over the years, it was just special. As a college basketball fan I just hate the fact that it will never be the same again.
0 - Posted on: Tue, 01/26/2016 - 7:18am #1038837
Dazzling Dunks and Basketball BloopersParticipantVery good points. Hard to argue with much of what you said here. Villanova and Xavier are both solid teams but if you put them in the big 12 or acc its likely they wouldn’t be ranked nearly as high.
I really miss the old big east conference. There was just something about the conference tournament that made it unlike any other in college sports. From the rivalries, to the excitement of msg, to all the classic games and upsets over the years, it was just special. As a college basketball fan I just hate the fact that it will never be the same again.
0 - Posted on: Tue, 01/26/2016 - 8:01am #1038849
BothTeamsPlayedHardParticipantYou can play this game with a lot of conferences. If not for the Duke name, all the experts would have them NIT-bound. They are 1-4 against the RPI Top 50, 4-4 in conference, and 3-2 on the road. Seton Hall is 2-4 against the RPI Top 50, 3-4 in conference, and 3-3 on the road. They are similar, and the experts have Seton Hall going to the NIT at the moment.
UNC is 5-1 against the Top RPI 50, 1-1 against the RPI Top 25, 7-0 in conference, and 3-2 on the road. Providence is 4-2 against the RPI Top 50, 1-1 against the RPI Top 25, 5-2 in conference, and 5-0 on the road. It is similar.
Villanova is 7-3 against the RPI Top 50, but it is especially impressive given that only three of their ten games against top 50 opponents were at home. Virginia did beat them at their place. Hats off. They are 1-4 on the road, and that win was to a down Ohio State team. Both teams should be ranked highly for now, but I would check back after @Wake, @ Louisville, and @ Pitt over the next couple weeks.
Xavier is 5-1 agianst the RPI Top 50, 5-2 in conference, and 4-1 on the road. Iowa is 4th in the AP and is 7-3 against the RPI Top 50, 7-0 in conference, and 4-1 on the road. It is a similar resume with Xavier having smoked Dayton and Iowa losing to them. By the way, Dayton isn’t bad and should be in the polls. They could do real damage depending on their draw, especially now that Pierre is back.
Butler needs some quality wins. Temple, Cincy, and Tennessee are not resume builders at this point, but it has taken time for the perception to catch up to the results.
0- Posted on: Tue, 01/26/2016 - 2:03pm #1038903
punchlinesParticipantI don’t know all the details that go into the AP and ESPN polls, but I will say there are major flaws in the RPI rankings. This is a serious issue I have, especially since the selection committees put a great deal of emphasis on RPI.
25% of the RPI ranking is based off a team’s winning percentage, with greater emphasis placed on road wins. Simply put, if you are a good team that consistently plays teams worse than you, then you will have a major advantage over teams in conferences who have to play tougher competition. Additionally, the RPI multiplies road wins and home losses by 1.4, while multiplying home wins and road losses by 0.6. This may sound good on paper, but let’s take Oklahoma for an example. They beat Villanova at home and Kansas State on the road (Kansas State is a bottom feeder in the Big 12 this year). Why should the Kansas State game be weighted more heavily than the Villanova win? Obviously the strong resume-building win over Villanova will be accounted for elsewhere in the equation, but there is no reason to blindly declare all road wins as more valuable than home wins.
50% of the RPI ranking is based off the average of a team’s opponent’s winning percentage. Take the Villanova example I used above. Beating St. Joe’s looks really good since they are 16-3. But are we about to equate beating St. Joe’s with beating Louisville, Pitt, Dayton, Miami, West Virginia, Iowa, and Northern Illinois (all 16-3). Saint Joe’s is good, but when your best wins are over Princeton and Temple, I don’t think their 16-3 is as good as most of the teams I just listed. Obviously there are multiple teams factored into the equation, but this just is a micro look into how college basketball records can be deceptive. A team could easily accumulate a bunch of ‘padded’ wins where they beat teams with deceptive and inflated records like Saint Joe’s. Giving this 50% of the ranking is ridiculous, considering there isn’t much parity relative from one conference to the next.
The final 25% of the RPI ranking is based off the average opponents’ opponents’ winning percentage. I’ve never understood when people say Team A beat Team B, and Team B beat Team C, so therefore Team A must be better than Team C. That’s essentially what is happening here in a roundabout way. It doesn’t account for matchups, teams getting hot, teams getting cold, injuries, suspensions, or any number of other variables. Not to mention, it fails to account for quality of wins similar to the previous two factors that go into the RPI.
The RPI values quantity of wins over quality of wins. It’s a crucial factor in deciding seeding, and can even be a bubble burster. I’d hate to be a team whose bubble is burst due to a flawed ranking system that generalizes and simplifies the college basketball game to a matter of beating as many teams with good records as possible. If there’s one thing to take away, it’s that a good record is not indicitative of a good team. This is mainly due to the disparity between conferences. Take Grand Canyon, the cream of the crop in the WAC, for example. They are 18-2 compared to Louisville’s 16-3 record. Louisville beat Grand Canyon 111-63. I rest my case.
0 - Posted on: Tue, 01/26/2016 - 2:03pm #1039040
punchlinesParticipantI don’t know all the details that go into the AP and ESPN polls, but I will say there are major flaws in the RPI rankings. This is a serious issue I have, especially since the selection committees put a great deal of emphasis on RPI.
25% of the RPI ranking is based off a team’s winning percentage, with greater emphasis placed on road wins. Simply put, if you are a good team that consistently plays teams worse than you, then you will have a major advantage over teams in conferences who have to play tougher competition. Additionally, the RPI multiplies road wins and home losses by 1.4, while multiplying home wins and road losses by 0.6. This may sound good on paper, but let’s take Oklahoma for an example. They beat Villanova at home and Kansas State on the road (Kansas State is a bottom feeder in the Big 12 this year). Why should the Kansas State game be weighted more heavily than the Villanova win? Obviously the strong resume-building win over Villanova will be accounted for elsewhere in the equation, but there is no reason to blindly declare all road wins as more valuable than home wins.
50% of the RPI ranking is based off the average of a team’s opponent’s winning percentage. Take the Villanova example I used above. Beating St. Joe’s looks really good since they are 16-3. But are we about to equate beating St. Joe’s with beating Louisville, Pitt, Dayton, Miami, West Virginia, Iowa, and Northern Illinois (all 16-3). Saint Joe’s is good, but when your best wins are over Princeton and Temple, I don’t think their 16-3 is as good as most of the teams I just listed. Obviously there are multiple teams factored into the equation, but this just is a micro look into how college basketball records can be deceptive. A team could easily accumulate a bunch of ‘padded’ wins where they beat teams with deceptive and inflated records like Saint Joe’s. Giving this 50% of the ranking is ridiculous, considering there isn’t much parity relative from one conference to the next.
The final 25% of the RPI ranking is based off the average opponents’ opponents’ winning percentage. I’ve never understood when people say Team A beat Team B, and Team B beat Team C, so therefore Team A must be better than Team C. That’s essentially what is happening here in a roundabout way. It doesn’t account for matchups, teams getting hot, teams getting cold, injuries, suspensions, or any number of other variables. Not to mention, it fails to account for quality of wins similar to the previous two factors that go into the RPI.
The RPI values quantity of wins over quality of wins. It’s a crucial factor in deciding seeding, and can even be a bubble burster. I’d hate to be a team whose bubble is burst due to a flawed ranking system that generalizes and simplifies the college basketball game to a matter of beating as many teams with good records as possible. If there’s one thing to take away, it’s that a good record is not indicitative of a good team. This is mainly due to the disparity between conferences. Take Grand Canyon, the cream of the crop in the WAC, for example. They are 18-2 compared to Louisville’s 16-3 record. Louisville beat Grand Canyon 111-63. I rest my case.
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- Posted on: Tue, 01/26/2016 - 8:01am #1038985
BothTeamsPlayedHardParticipantYou can play this game with a lot of conferences. If not for the Duke name, all the experts would have them NIT-bound. They are 1-4 against the RPI Top 50, 4-4 in conference, and 3-2 on the road. Seton Hall is 2-4 against the RPI Top 50, 3-4 in conference, and 3-3 on the road. They are similar, and the experts have Seton Hall going to the NIT at the moment.
UNC is 5-1 against the Top RPI 50, 1-1 against the RPI Top 25, 7-0 in conference, and 3-2 on the road. Providence is 4-2 against the RPI Top 50, 1-1 against the RPI Top 25, 5-2 in conference, and 5-0 on the road. It is similar.
Villanova is 7-3 against the RPI Top 50, but it is especially impressive given that only three of their ten games against top 50 opponents were at home. Virginia did beat them at their place. Hats off. They are 1-4 on the road, and that win was to a down Ohio State team. Both teams should be ranked highly for now, but I would check back after @Wake, @ Louisville, and @ Pitt over the next couple weeks.
Xavier is 5-1 agianst the RPI Top 50, 5-2 in conference, and 4-1 on the road. Iowa is 4th in the AP and is 7-3 against the RPI Top 50, 7-0 in conference, and 4-1 on the road. It is a similar resume with Xavier having smoked Dayton and Iowa losing to them. By the way, Dayton isn’t bad and should be in the polls. They could do real damage depending on their draw, especially now that Pierre is back.
Butler needs some quality wins. Temple, Cincy, and Tennessee are not resume builders at this point, but it has taken time for the perception to catch up to the results.
0 - Posted on: Tue, 01/26/2016 - 6:39pm #1039126
Mad MaxParticipantI think with every Big East team, and why their top teams like Nova lose early in the tourney despite being good teams that are smart and fundamental, they lack elite size, length and athletticism. They’re never going to just over match a team from a physical standpoint, which makes them satiable to upsets in the tourney if they’re not playing/shooting well.
I think there are some good teams in the conference, but nobody from that conference really scares me and nobody really looks like a title or final four contender, but as we’ve seen anyone can make a run so you never know.
0 - Posted on: Tue, 01/26/2016 - 6:39pm #1038992
Mad MaxParticipantI think with every Big East team, and why their top teams like Nova lose early in the tourney despite being good teams that are smart and fundamental, they lack elite size, length and athletticism. They’re never going to just over match a team from a physical standpoint, which makes them satiable to upsets in the tourney if they’re not playing/shooting well.
I think there are some good teams in the conference, but nobody from that conference really scares me and nobody really looks like a title or final four contender, but as we’ve seen anyone can make a run so you never know.
0 - Posted on: Tue, 01/26/2016 - 6:41pm #1039130
Dale WorthingtonParticipantpunchlines, I’d recommend you check out KenPom.com. Mr. Pomeroy crafts the most objective ranking metric on the planet in my opinion, not to mention he goes 351 deep!
0 - Posted on: Tue, 01/26/2016 - 6:41pm #1038996
Dale WorthingtonParticipantpunchlines, I’d recommend you check out KenPom.com. Mr. Pomeroy crafts the most objective ranking metric on the planet in my opinion, not to mention he goes 351 deep!
0 - Posted on: Tue, 01/26/2016 - 6:46pm #1039134
ItsVictorOladipoParticipantBy the way punchlines, welcome to this board. Always nice to see some well thought out posts that spark discussion.
0 - Posted on: Tue, 01/26/2016 - 6:46pm #1039000
ItsVictorOladipoParticipantBy the way punchlines, welcome to this board. Always nice to see some well thought out posts that spark discussion.
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