Veazey Blog Entry on RPI

[Maroon Eagle]

<font face="georgia,palatino" size="2">
Excellent post by Veazey:

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<font face="georgia,palatino" size="2"><font face="georgia,palatino" size="2">Like, why the high bar for success this year? First off, consider the relative weakness of the Southeastern Conference. As of 8 o'clock last night, when I crunched the numbers for this Blog entry, the SEC was seventh in realtimerpi.com's conference rankings. Seventh. Behind the Mountain West, which slipped into the sixth spot in recent days by a fraction.</font></font></p>

<font face="georgia,palatino" size="2"><font face="georgia,palatino" size="2">How far back is the SEC from the rest of its BCS conference neighbors? Consider this: The statistical difference between the SEC's RPI at No. 7 and the Pac-10's RPI at No. 5 is the same as the difference from No. 7 to No. 12. Simply put, it's a huge numerical gap.</font></font></p>

<font face="georgia,palatino" size="2"><font face="georgia,palatino" size="2">This directly translates into the opportunities Mississippi State will get in the coming two months to notch wins over high RPI teams to help move that ugly No. 184 RPI to a more agreeable level. And it's got a long way to go, too - last year's highest RPI team to gain an at-large berth was Oregon, at 61.</font><font face="georgia,palatino" size="2"> </font></font></p>

<font face="georgia,palatino" size="2"><font face="georgia,palatino" size="2">SEC teams in the RPI as of Sunday night, per realtimerpi.com:
</font><font face="georgia,palatino" size="2">20: Tennessee
</font><font face="georgia,palatino" size="2">44: Florida
</font><font face="georgia,palatino" size="2">66: Arkansas
</font><font face="georgia,palatino" size="2">74: Kentucky
</font><font face="georgia,palatino" size="2">76: Vanderbilt
</font><font face="georgia,palatino" size="2">84: Ole Miss
</font><font face="georgia,palatino" size="2">100: Auburn
</font><font face="georgia,palatino" size="2">106: South Carolina
</font><font face="georgia,palatino" size="2">118: LSU
</font><font face="georgia,palatino" size="2">183: Mississippi State
</font><font face="georgia,palatino" size="2">198: Alabama
</font><font face="georgia,palatino" size="2">214: Georgia </font></font></p>

<font face="georgia,palatino" size="2"><font face="georgia,palatino" size="2">Those are the RPIs of the teams State will get a chance to beat this year. Something worth pointing out here, too: Of the five highest-ranked RPI teams as of Sunday night, four are in the East. That means State will only get a chance to beat them once, not twice, as it would its Western Division opponents.</font></font></p>

<font face="georgia,palatino" size="2"><font face="georgia,palatino" size="2">Can things change? Absolutely. Do I expect these SEC teams' RPIs to rise? Sure. Dramatically? No.</font></font></p>

<font face="georgia,palatino" size="2"><font face="georgia,palatino" size="2">With some flux expected, this still looks to be the hand State is dealt the rest of the way.</font></font></p>

 

[maroonmania]

second toughest opponent we have the rest of the way besides TN. Real time does have Florida one spot higher but College RPI actually has Florida 22 spots below Western KY. Pretty pathetic that in a year where the entire SEC is down we still show up 3rd from the bottom in the SEC RPI rankings. A win tonight would be a big help to our RPI before the conference season starts.

 

[Hanmudog]

This team is not going to the NCAA tournament nor were they expected to. They need to just keep improving and getting better but this team is too young has no leadership to do anything this year.

 

[maroonmania]

I'm just trying to see a way for this team to get into the NIT. Whatever outside NCAA hopes were left certainly died in OT agaist San Diego. Making the NIT is not nearly as easy as it use to be because now teams are picked based on merit (RPI included) and not just by who has a break even record that might be able to sell some tickets at their gym.