Against ranked teams basketball- Week 16

[SWC75]

It occurred to me that with a new basketball season beginning I could do an “Against Ranked Teams” post for this sport, too. The margins of victory are similar to football. The formula is to first give each team that plays a ranked team from 1-25 points based on the ranking (I’ll use the writer’s poll) of their opponent. This chart shows you how many points they’d get for playing each team ranked at a certain level , (the ranking is first, the points, second):

1-25, 2-24, 3-23, 4-22, 5-21, 6-20, 7-19, 8-18, 9-17, 10-16, 11-15, 12-14, 13-13, 14-12, 15-11, 16-10, 17-9, 18-8, 19-7, 20-6, 21-5, 22-4, 23-3, 24-2, 25-1

I’ll call those “schedule points”. Then you look at the point differential in the game and apply it to the schedule points. If a team loses to the #1 ranked team by 10 points. They’d wind up with 15 points: 25 schedule points minus the ten points they lost by. If a team beats the #10 team by 5 points, they’d get 21 points: 16 schedule points plus the 5 points they won by. If a team lost to the #20 team by 6 points, they’d get nothing. The margin of defeat would cancel out their schedule points. If a team lost to the #25 team by 3 points, they get a zero. You can’t have negative points. You just failed in an attempt to get positive points.

I’ll figure the points based on games over the past week every Sunday and post them, along with cumulative season standings, just as I have done for football. As I said on that post, this is less a way of ranking than it is simply something you might want to look at in ranking them – or selecting them for a tournament. I recognize that rankings will change over the course of the season. I’m making the assumption that teams are worthy of the ranking they have at the time another team plays them. That may not always be true but a subsequent ranking may just reflect how good or bad a team has become since the game in question: they may have been as good as their ranking at the time.

WEEK SIXTEEN
Brigham Young beat #1 Gonzaga 79-71 = 33 points
Butler beat #2 Villanova 74-66 = 32 points
North Carolina beat #7 Louisville 74-63 = 30 points
UCLA beat #4 Arizona 77-72 = 27 points
Michigan beat #14 Purdue 82-70 = 24 points
Kentucky beat #13 Florida 76-66 = 23 points
U of Miami beat #10 Duke 55-50 = 21 points
Iowa State beat #9 Baylor 72-69 = 20 points
Ohio State beat #16 Wisconsin 83-73 = 20 points
Syracuse beat #10 Duke 78-75 = 19 points
Stanford lost to #6 Oregon 73-75 = 18 points
California lost to #6 Oregon 65-68 = 17 points
Arizona lost to #5 UCLA 72-77 = 16 points
Minnesota beat #24 Maryland 89-75 = 16 points
Iowa beat #24 Maryland 83-69 = 14 points
U of Miami beat #18 Virginia 54-48 = 14 points
Wisconsin beat #23 Maryland 71-60 = 14 points
Texas lost to #3 Kansas 67-77 = 13 points
Texas Christian lost to #12 West Virginia 60-61 = 13 points
Oklahoma lost to #9 Baylor 54-60 = 11 points
Arizona State lost to #5 UCLA 75-87 = 9 points
Southern California lost to #4 Arizona 77-90 = 9 points
Creighton lost to #2 Villanova 63-79 = 8 points
Penn State lost to #14 Purdue 70-74 = 8 points
Louisville lost to #8 North Carolina 63-74 = 7 points
Clemson lost to #19 Florida State 74-76 = 5 points
Florida lost to #11 Kentucky 66-76 = 5 points
Missouri lost to #11 Kentucky 62-72 = 5 points
Providence beat #23 Creighton 68-66 = 5 points
Maryland lost to #11 Wisconsin 60-71 = 4 points
Texas Christian lost to #3 Kansas68-87 = 3 points
Connecticut lost to #17 Southern Methodist 61-69 = 2 points

Comments: North Carolina is now within 2 points of Baylor and is probably the bets team in the country right now. Creighton and Iowa State joined the 100 point club.

Cumulative Totals

(I’ve decided to expand my Top 25 to a Top 68 plus any t ie at the end, (not that a team’s record vs. ranked teams will be the only criteria), to list them in pods of 4 rather than 5 and to put the teams we have played or will play in bold.)

Baylor 157 points
North Carolina 155 points
Butler 146 points
Kansas 142 points

Kentucky 136 points
West Virginia 136 points
Louisville 126 points
Virginia 126 points

Florida State 116 points
Duke 115 points
Villanova 108 points
Iowa State 107 points

Kansas State 106 points
Creighton 105 points
Oregon 104 points
Texas Tech 101 points

Georgetown 92 points
Notre Dame 91 points
Georgia Tech 87 points
Miami (Florida) 86 points

Indiana 84 points
Syracuse 84 points
Arizona 83 points
UCLA 81 points

Marquette 75 points
Gonzaga 68 points
Purdue 67 points
Virginia Tech 66 points

Florida 65 points
Oklahoma State 63 points
Utah 60 points
Colorado 59 points

Oklahoma 57 points
Michigan 56 points
Ohio State 56 points
California (Berkley) 54 points

South Carolina 54 points
Southern California 50 points
Providence 51 points
Tennessee 50 points

Texas Christian 50 points
Texas 49 points
Brigham Young 48 points
Nebraska 48 points

Minnesota 47 points
Pittsburgh 47 points
DePaul 45 points
Iowa 43 points

North Carolina State 42 points
Clemson 38 points
St. John’s 38 points
Seton Hall 38 points

Penn State 36 points
Wisconsin 36 points
Stanford 35 points
Xavier 35 points

Wake Forest 34 points
Georgia 32 points
Michigan State 29 points
Texas-Arlington 28 points

Fort Wayne 26 points
Northwestern 26 points
Southern Methodist 26 points
Mississippi 23 points

Mississippi State 23 points
Vanderbilt 23 points
Arizona State 22 points
Rhode Island 22 points