NET Rankings...

[pwong]

I don't spend as much time on the forum as others do, but were there credible people making this claim?

Because our metrics aren’t great and big wins are important (really not a ton of opportunities outside of @Tenn, Maryland on neutral, Duke and UNC @ home). 1/3 of the ACC currently qualifies as a Q3 win which doesnt really move the needle for NCAA tourney resumes overall while losing to Q3 teams hurts a lot more than wins benefit.

 

[jncuse]

I was sort of surprised to see our NET was 177. When going down the list and getting to 150, I turned around and went back to find us. I was expecting something around 130 as a guess, compared to our KP of 100, knowing that KP is a very similar margin based algorithm. But I also know KP has some early season guardrails that still uses your preseason ranking and discounts some one offs I believe. The NET is purely 2024/2025 margin data so one game anomalies really impact things.
.
So I decided to "math" the 177 to see if it makes sense. I calculated what a #177 team should beat an other team by. Used KP to help with that part.

Lemoyne # 283 - Expected win by the #177 team at home is 9 points
Colgate #270 - Expected win is 8 points,
Youngstown #305 - Expected win is 10 points
Texas - Expected loss is 11 points
Texas Tech - Expected loss is 13 points
Cornell - Expected win is 5 points

So based on our schedule the NET #177 team should have won our games this year by a total of 8 points total. We have won them by 6 points (note Youngstown St only is counted as a 1 point win). So the ranking unfortunately checks out.

 

[Blanko97]

I was sort of surprised to see our NET was 177. When going down the list and getting to 150, I turned around and went back to find us. I was expecting something around 130 as a guess, compared to our KP of 100, knowing that KP is a very similar margin based algorithm. But I also know KP has some early season guardrails that still uses your preseason ranking and discounts some one offs I believe. The NET is purely 2024/2025 margin data so one game anomalies really impact things.
.
So I decided to "math" the 177 to see if it makes sense. I calculated what a #177 team should beat an other team by. Used KP to help with that part.

Lemoyne # 283 - Expected win by the #177 team at home is 9 points
Colgate #270 - Expected win is 8 points,
Youngstown #305 - Expected win is 10 points
Texas - Expected loss is 11 points
Texas Tech - Expected loss is 13 points
Cornell - Expected win is 5 points

So based on our schedule the NET #177 team should have won our games this year by a total of 8 points total. We have won them by 6 points (note Youngstown St only is counted as a 1 point win). So the ranking unfortunately checks out.

Any idea what a win low single digit win over Tennessee does for the ranking? Like i cant imagine it jumps you much more than 20-30 spots even with them being #1 and on the road

 

[DomeHolmes]

Any idea what a win low single digit win over Tennessee does for the ranking? Like i cant imagine it jumps you much more than 20-30 spots even with them being #1 and on the road

Your right. If you read my previous post in this thread comparing us to Yukon, it is such a bad system. we would still behind # 39 5-3 Yukon with their 3 unranked losses, and no top 100 wins, even if we beat Texas and Tennessee! Blow out wins vs garbage teams is a HUGE flaw in NET.

 

[jncuse]

Any idea what a win low single digit win over Tennessee does for the ranking? Like i cant imagine it jumps you much more than 20-30 spots even with them being #1 and on the road

I'll attempt the Math (using KP efficiency to help) but there is some guesswork involved.

My guess, based on math below, is that a 1 point win would move us up to 129. As a side note if we keep the game within 5 in a loss, we would also be in the 130's since its all margin.

For NET purposes the #1 team at home is expected to win at home by 26 points over team #177 (based on the two teams pace of play and KP)

Let's say we won by 1 point.
We are currently at -1.3 over 6 games (so -8). So add 27 to would then be 19 over 7 games, or +2.7. That would jump us from #177 to #129.

It's also possible that this 27 should be multiplied by a factor of 1.4, because NET does some crap with road games. So its possible it could be closer to #115.

 

[jncuse]

Need to go like 14-6 in the ACC

A few weeks back I wasn't sure if it was 13-7, 14-6 or 15-5. But with the ACC continued to tank in week 3-4 of OOC, it just made it harder.

Unless we plan on beating Tennessee, which drastically changes thing, I'm throwing 13-7 out as a scenario of any real probability. Maybe things change, I would be surprised.

 

[jncuse]

The NET is far from end all be all, especially at the beginning of December. It's very simple, win games and keep winning.

In substance that is correct, Your individual NET will not get you in or out. We have seen teams in power conferences with NET's in high 20's/low 30's get out and teams in the 70's get in (rarely), Those exceptions occur because of win quality (Q1, Q2, bad losses). But there is a number that becomes almost disqualifying (80+).

The bigger problem though is that NET's of our ACC conference mates are really bad in general. So that will limit Q2's, much less Q1's... and it will be hard to avoid a few bad losses. And that is what we will need to overcome our individual NET.

 

[dollarbill44]

#177.

At least we're ahead of Miami and Va Tech.

So, First Four out, at the moment.

 

[Blanko97]

I'll attempt the Math (using KP efficiency to help) but there is some guesswork involved.

My guess, based on math below, is that a 1 point win would move us up to 129. As a side note if we keep the game within 5 in a loss, we would also be in the 130's since its all margin.

For NET purposes the #1 team at home is expected to win at home by 26 points over team #177 (based on the two teams pace of play and KP)

Let's say we won by 1 point.
We are currently at -1.3 over 6 games (so -8). So add 27 to would then be 19 over 7 games, or +2.7. That would jump us from #177 to #129.

It's also possible that this 27 should be multiplied by a factor of 1.4, because NET does some crap with road games. So its possible it could be closer to #115.

thats crazy

 

[jncuse]

No one is saying not to watch or support the team. But pretending that reality isn't reality is what got us into this mess in the first place.

The ACC is screwed, combined with our own program's situation, we are in dire straits.

Again, support the team - of course. Pretend we're in a good spot to even make the tournament? Sorry, I won't play pretend.

I know some people won't want to (which is 100% fine), but if you want to cheer on the team to a more plausible goal its to try to get to the NIT.

If our team actually had the bodies and no ****show in the locker room come March 2025 (as compared to March 2024), such that we would accept a NIT, it would actually be some form of progress over last year.

Again not what we wanted, but its a target.

 

[Sbucketball]

I know some people won't want to (which is 100% fine), but if you want to cheer on the team to a more plausible goal its to try to get to the NIT.

If our team actually had the bodies and no ****show in the locker room come March 2025, such that we would accept a NIT, it would actually be some form of progress over last year.

Again not what we wanted, but its a target.

2 starters are graduating, 1 starter is planning on going pro, and the other 2 starters have another year of eligibility but a lot of people think this is it for them. I'd be surprised if Red wants to play in the NIT. Seems like a dying tournament and no reason to do it for experience in this era. Maybe he'd play for other reasons. But IMO NIT isn't progress and I think very few would view it as progress.

 

[jncuse]

I just don’t think people fully comprehend the amount of money that exists around the football factory programs. It’s unreal the old and new money alike that surrounds these schools. To have a chancellor that might not be helping our cause (as some posters have alluded) in what isn’t a fair fight to begin with I’m sure hurts even more. That said I don’t know how you can catch up chasing down the programs swimming in money pools or those willing to run in the negative and sacrifice one major sport for another.

Its certainly become an era that is tilted towards making it easier for the SEC teams, and to a degree the B10. We have had eras in the past that were more tilted towards schools like us, but those are past.

That will probably not come again, or a success period like 2009-2014. That being said making the tournament 2 out of 3 times, should still be a reasonable long term goal for this program. A number of teams at our revenue levels (i'm guessing) are still doing "well enough:,

 

[jncuse]

A team #40 in NET would be expected to beat Cornell, Colgate, Lemoyne, and Youngstown by a total of about 90 points. We won by a total of 15 points (only get 1 for an OT win).

I don't like that margin dominates the NET, but we had the same opportunity as everybody else and didn't do it.

 

[orangenauburn]

What does beating Georgetown do for a resume?

Nothing unless it's by 40+ points

 

[DoctahLexus]

Is there any type of boost for almost beating teams like Texas and Texas Tech? Seems like almost losing to a bad team destroys you but almost beating a good one does nothing. Also did those two teams see a significant drop for only beating team 177 in the NET by 4 and 5 points?

NET is stupid. Margin of victory being factored in on this level is stupid. I would think that even if it was helping us out. Cant wait until they phase it out.

 

[M2MPrinciples]

It also doesn't help that Le Moyne, Colgate and Youngstown have been so bad. If we can't pound those teams like we should, our buy games should be against teams in the 150-225 range in Torvik/KenPom, not 240th and worse.

I know the portal makes it tough to forecast how good teams will be, but get another Ivy, or a decent CAA team or one of the northern A10 schools. What do we gain by playing Le Moyne and Colgate? If it saves money, fine, but it doesn't help the tournament chances.

 

[jncuse]

Tournament selection is very much a "Who did you play, Who did you beat" analysis as someone earlier mentioned, over your Individual NET. Its generally a correct sentiment. Which is why seeds not directly related to NET, and teams like St. john's missed with a 32 NET last year. That being said I still think once your NET gets in the 80's, it will likely get you ignored.

Here is an example from last year, from two teams in the same conference.
Team A is certainly a bit better resume wise, but not much. Team A got a 9 seed (maybe a few lines too high), and Team B I'm sure didn't even get mentioned the whole week by the committee. And that is because Team B had a NET of 97.

Team A / Team B
Record: 19-14 / 19-14
SOS: 14 / 23
Conference Record: 10-10 / 10-10
Q1: 4-10 / 3-9
Q1 in Numbers : (Home #13, Neutral #15, Home #28, Neutral #31) / Home 21, Home 24, Away 49
Q2: 6-5 / 6-4
Bad Losses : 0/1
NET - 24 vs 97

 

[phil77]

Look you guys can complain about NET all you want but the committee has shown and said many times that NET ranking matters. It isn't the end all be all but it is high on their list of things they look at.

You guys can hold on to that magical mark of 20 wins as some measure of greatness. However, in the eyes of the committee, 20 wins mean nothing. It is all about that matrics now.

In the scale of tournament or bust the magic number of 20 wins means very little.

We have 4 big games left, those 4 games and no bad losses is all that matters now. We need to probably win 3 out of 4 to have a solid path to the tournament. Outside chance 2 out of 4 puts us on the bubble. Again that means we have to win a lot of games in the ACC because those conference games will only hurt our NET ratings if they are losses they will not carry much weight as wins.

Outside shot one of those bottom ACC teams wins enough games that they rise in the rankings and could help but more likely they all beat up on each other.

 

[jncuse]

It also doesn't help that Le Moyne, Colgate and Youngstown have been so bad. If we can't pound those teams like we should, our buy games should be against teams in the 150-225 range in Torvik/KenPom, not 240th and worse.

I know the portal makes it tough to forecast how good teams will be, but get another Ivy, or a decent CAA team or one of the northern A10 schools. What do we gain by playing Le Moyne and Colgate? If it saves money, fine, but it doesn't help the tournament chances.

A few points for consideration.

#1) You would still be expected to beat up those 150-240 schools under NET by a decent amount, which I have seen nothing to suggest we could.
I have tracked P5 teams margins vs expected quadrants (using KP). I bolded the bracket that is the closest to your suggestion Here is the average margin in these games
Q3 (76-160) = 13.4points.
Q4Top (161-260) = 19.9 points
Q4Bottom (261-364) = 27.6 points

#2) I think your point is based on us being good enough to win, but not good at the margin game. Do you think we win all 4 games if we play teams between 150-240 this year? That's a pretty big assumption. On the bright side, we haven't been good but on the bright side we haven't loss either.

#3) Looking at schedules this year and last year vs the end of the RPI era, it certainly seems power conference schools are targeting the 261-365 group much more than ever. A higher % of those games are booked now than the RPI Era. (and that is due to the formulaic differences) I think the general notion is that teams can control the narrative margin wise much easier in a Bottom level Q4 game vs a Q3 game or a better Q4 team.

 

[upperdeck]

The Net rewards teams who play as style that leads to bigger scores.

Pressing teams or teams with lots of steals easy baskets tend to play larger margin type wins. Deeper teams often get bigger wins as well. The Net does not reward teams for how the actual game is played.

Team A leads Team B by 20 at the half. Both teams realize its over and thus sub liberally and the game ends up 15 pt win

Team C leads Team B by 20 at the half and is much deeper and subs and continues to press against Team B which subs just like team A game and loses by 35.

The Net says Team C is much better than Team A.

You can have the same quality players 1-7 but one team has 8-12 much better. Sure they are a deeper team but h2h the 1-7 players more often decide the game and Net has no to quantify deeper teams which is often what leads to bigger margins.

 

[jncuse]

Nothing, just can’t lose to them. ( And our ranking is stupid).

BTW UConn is #39!!!! With 3 losses to unranked teams, one a blow out!!!

By wins and close losses, our resume is just as good if not better than theirs. And we are #177. It's just stupid. Had we beat Texas, we’d STILL be behind them because of score differential.

Margin of victory vs bad teams is how to game the NET. That’s what has Yukon at #39. That is what the Mountain West did last year and their conference stunk. Before that the Missouri Valley used to get 4 garbage teams in because they figured out RPI before the committee scrapped that metric.

get 3 quad 1 wins, don’t lose any non conference except Tenn, go 13-7 ACC we are probably in. Not a huge task. But not easy either.

“who did you play, who did you beat” is still the top metric.

There is a number of things I agree with this post (we both agree with the NET issues and the cupcake impact), a few I don't.

The biggest point of disagreement I have is the assumption you make about a 13-7 record in the ACC being enough. Our biggest obstacle isn't Individual NET which theoretically can always be overcome by the quality of your record and quality of wins, especially since we thankfully avoided those bad losses -- the biggest obstacle is that our conference mates really stink NET wise (and that won't change drastically before conference play). And that will limit our quality wins opportunities and make it harder to miss those Q3 bombs along the way -- and that more than anything is what we need.

I certainly agree with most of your points about the NET
1) In my other tracking thread, I noted that about 50% of team's games across all conferences are Q4 games. So when a team or conference as a whole is measured for OOC play, half the possessions are against garbage teams. So it's very important they dominate those games.
Which is the reality, but its also very flawed.

Last year I proposed NET being calculated as half the current NET way / and half the RPI. I think it help some of the BS, because the flaws of each sort of hedge each other.

2) UConn's NET is boosted by high margin victories (its 5 wins are by an average of 41 points). Its certainly not the 39th best team-- it has a meaningless tournament resume as now. Same as us basically - with nothing good, and nothing that bad. I I'm sure that 41 point margin will help there season ending NET a fair but, but they will need to get quality just like us, and like us its not going to be that easy in the BE. Its way down like the ACC.

In terms of disagreement
1) I'll disagree on the MWC gaming the system via Q4 margin. That's not how they did it - its a little more complex for them. The B12 on the other hand...The B12 they have found a way to pound teams better than their peers in 2023 and 2024, and its certainly taking advantage of the bottom level Q4 teams.

2) I'm not sure I disagree with us that much at #177. We were in battles with some really bad teams. As a team, we are mediocre, that sometimes don't have the ability to really game anything.

 

[Eric15]

There's just something about the term "NET Ranking" that is like nails on a chalkboard to me. It's like listening to Gilbert Gottfried sing.

(probably simply because I mentally associate it with us sucking)

 

[jncuse]

The Net rewards teams who play as style that leads to bigger scores.

Pressing teams or teams with lots of steals easy baskets tend to play larger margin type wins. Deeper teams often get bigger wins as well. The Net does not reward teams for how the actual game is played.

Team A leads Team B by 20 at the half. Both teams realize its over and thus sub liberally and the game ends up 15 pt win

Team C leads Team B by 20 at the half and is much deeper and subs and continues to press against Team B which subs just like team A game and loses by 35.

The Net says Team C is much better than Team A.

You can have the same quality players 1-7 but one team has 8-12 much better. Sure they are a deeper team but h2h the 1-7 players more often decide the game and Net has no to quantify deeper teams which is often what leads to bigger margins.

If you want to argue that the NET encourages beating up bad teams which some teams are better suited to do that is fine. The B12 seems to be particularly good at this. It's certainly a flaw of NET, especially since about 50% of OOC possessions are against Q4 teams.

But its literally impossible to argue that the NET has been biased to Syracuse in anyway this year in terms of the margin game. We haven't had the choice as to whether we should run up the score or not against anybody. Instead we have been fighting for our lives.

 

[M2MPrinciples]

A few points for consideration.

#1) You would still be expected to beat up those 150-240 schools under NET by a decent amount, which I have seen nothing to suggest we could.
I have tracked P5 teams margins vs expected quadrants (using KP). I bolded the bracket that is the closest to your suggestion Here is the average margin in these games
Q3 (76-160) = 13.4points.
Q4Top (161-260) = 19.9 points
Q4Bottom (261-364) = 27.6 points

#2) I think your point is based on us being good enough to win, but not good at the margin game. Do you think we win all 4 games if we play teams between 150-240 this year? That's a pretty big assumption. On the bright side, we haven't been good but on the bright side we haven't loss either.

#3) Looking at schedules this year and last year vs the end of the RPI era, it certainly seems power conference schools are targeting the 261-365 group much more than ever. A higher % of those games are booked now than the RPI Era. (and that is due to the formulaic differences) I think the general notion is that teams can control the narrative margin wise much easier in a Bottom level Q4 game vs a Q3 game or a better Q4 team.

Good points. We probably lose one of those 150-240 games, perhaps two.

Re: #3, I would guess that the consolidation of the other conferences has a lot to do with the scheduling trends; You can load up your non-con with the true dregs of CBB and "rig the NET" IF your conference is very strong. It's a less viable strategy when your conference is as mediocre as the ACC has been since 2020.

 

[upperdeck]

If you want to argue that the NET encourages beating up bad teams which some teams are better suited to do that is fine. The B12 seems to be particularly good at this. It's certainly a flaw of NET, especially since about 50% of OOC possessions are against Q4 teams.

But its literally impossible to argue that the NET has been biased to Syracuse in anyway this year in terms of the margin game. We haven't had the choice as to whether we should run up the score or not against anybody. Instead we have been fighting for our lives.

I agree we have done nothing to show much. But I also don't know that not beating bad teams in games 1-3 really means much to how you might be by year end. Playing Texas and TT tough meant more but no reward their either.

I mean if we beat those bad teams by 40 and still lost to the 2 good teams in decent games does that make us any better a team?