I don't trust the a10 rpi numbers

[Orangemen]

I looked at the rpi breakdowns of St. Louis, VCU, gw, umass, st joes, and Richmond. Those teams are currently 16, 24, 30, 13, 33, and 54 respectively in the rpi.

Of that group, there are 4 OOC wins that could be considered impressive. VCU won at Virginia, gw beat creighton, and umass beat New Mexico and byu. I'll ignore for now the fact that nm is part of the mountain west, and as a result of their rpi gaming, has an inflated rpi.

For a conference everyone is talking about as being top 6 or 7 in America, that's a pretty weak resume. Essentially these teams are considered good because they all beat each other.

St. Louis best attribute is that they lost to wisky and Wichita (and Wichita's best attribute is that they beat St. Louis, hmmm).

I haven't really dug into the a10 rips to see how they game the system, they're certainly not using the mountain west method of replacing +200 rpi teams with d2 games, but I feel like they are doing something. I'd bet the a10 NCAA results come in somewhere close to the mountain wests last year.

 

[jncuse]

This is where I like something unbiased like KP to compare if the RPI's are out of line or reasonable. The RPI can work well for you some years or it can be gamed.. typically not the same with something like KP.

Per KP, the 7 contenders for spots as of now
22. VCU
25. St Louis
39. George Washington
44. UMass
56. St. Joes
65. Dayton
72. Richmond


Per RPI - 12,14,24,32,33,54,56

Average KP = 46
Average RPI = 32

That is a fairly significant difference. It would support your theory that the RPI for the A-10 is a little high.

However, you should note that the highest RPI's to miss the tourney are typically mid-major's.

I'm not sure if the A-10 is gaming the system. I believe it may have went the other way last year.

 

[jncuse]

Did the same thing for 2013 to see if there was as large a gap.

KP - 16, 20, 38,51, 58,65,77
RPI - 17,21,26,34,40,59,81

Avg KP = 46
Avg RPI = 40

Still a positive difference but not nearly as huge.

 

[jncuse]

But we also note that some mediocore major schools piggy back off their conference, and then get a shot to pull off more top 50 victories on their home court as well. Major schools have a pretty nice advantage when it comes to the bubble.

And those mediocore major's (seeds 8-12) have done nothing compared to the mid major schools in similar seeds.