Committee relies too much on RPI

So now we know. All that palaver about how we media types overstate the importance of the RPI has been exposed as bunk. Now we see beyond a reasonable doubt that the RPI matters. A lot. And it never has been more clear that the purpose of the RPI is to screw the little guys. Those are the two undeniable lessons of Selection Sunday 2002.

The RPI is the reason Bowling Green and Butler were shut out while Boston College and St. John's got in. The RPI is why Gonzaga got a No. 6 seed, behind Illinois, Kentucky, Miami and (good gawd!) Georgia. If you doubt how much the RPI matters, consider that Jerry Palm , the whiz behind oft-cited Web site CollegeRPI.com, deciphered all those numbers and correctly predicted all 34 at-large teams before the brackets were announced.

The RPI has many flaws, not least of which is the impression that it is a mathematically objective tool. Nothing about the selection process is objective. If the tournament committee members could admit to that obvious truth, they would feel liberated to form their opinions of each team by, you know ... watching the games. Nobody who saw Gonzaga play this season could possibly think the Zags are not one of the 20 best teams in the country.

The reason the RPI is so unfair is that it places a disproportionate weight on a team's schedule. A team's own record counts just 25 percent toward its RPI. Its opponents' records count 50 percent and its opponents' opponents' records count 25 percent. That means who you play counts for three-fourths of your rating. Yet there's no accounting for where you play, which is silly considering that in college hoops the home team wins about two-thirds of the time. If we're going to be mathematical about it, a road win should count for more. But it doesn't.

It's simply misleading to argue, as the committee is wont to do, that all schedules are created equal. Mid-major teams start out at a disadvantage because their RPI goes down during the conference season even if they're winning games. That's why Butler can tally 25 W's (a record for a team denied an at-large bid) and still be ranked 77 in the RPI. No major-college coach in his right mind is going to play schools like Bowling Green, Butler and Gonzaga on his own home floor because that would mean risking a "bad loss" that ticks off fans and damages his club's RPI. Gonzaga went 5-3 against teams in the tournament and only one of those games was played at home, yet the Zags still got the shaft. Bowling Green and Butler went a combined 48-13 and were willing to take on all comers, yet both teams got left out.

Boston College, by contrast, played exactly one road game during its preconference schedule (a win at Michigan). The Eagles lost to Duke at home in January, a "good loss" if ever there was one. Then the Eagles went 8-8 in the highly mediocre Big East. St. John's at least had some good wins in the conference, but the Johnnies still went 9-7 -- and when they were fighting for their bubble lives last week they lost by 20 to Notre Dame in the Big East tournament semifinals. Yet St. John's was ranked 40th in the RPI, BC 42nd. And both schools are in the tournament.

Committee chairman Lee Fowler , the N.C. State athletic director, said Sunday night that Gonzaga was given a 6 seed partly because 12 of its wins came against teams ranked 200 or lower in the RPI. Fine. So I'm sure Fowler will make sure his own basketball team will play at Gonzaga next season, or at least at Butler and Bowling Green. Think Herb Sendek would go for that? How about the six teams in the field from the Big 12, whose conference commissioner is also on the selectin committee? Will Missouri, for example, have the guts to play at one of those places next year?

(A quick aside, by the way, for Fowler and the rest of the committee: There are hundreds of journalists halfway around the world risking their lives to report on a war. You're telling me we can't get one pool reporter in the committee's conference room as it picks the brackets? Not only that, we have to watch Fowler tell us on CBS that he can't talk specifically about any team's placement. If he's not going to shed any light on why the committee did what it did, what's the point of having him on the show?)

It's way too pie-in-the-sky to imagine the RPI is going to be scuttled in the near future. The powers-that-be keep saying they're going to tweak it, but that hasn't happened yet. So as long as we're stuck with this system, let's at least be honest about it. The RPI is not objective, it hurts the mid-majors and it matters. A lot.

Sports Illustrated staff writer Seth Davis covers college basketball for the magazine and is a regular contributor to CNNSI.com.

 

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