The case for Oakland women

[NoVaJack]

Are we taking too much for granted in not thinking Oakland's women will get an at large bid? The case for them is decent - not compelling, but decent.

For:
- They have a 65 RPI in at least one service, (RealTime)
- Only 13 teams have more wins than their 25.
- They have a quality win over the Jacks.
- Their RPI is higher than the top team's RPI in 12 other conferences. (Southland 148, Big West 82, WAC 102, Ivy 128, Ohio Valley 113, Mid East 101, Big South 81, Solutheast 168, Conference USA 83, Patriot 69, and Southern 95).


Against:
- No other quality wins other than the home win over the Jacks.
- Losses to number 68 Marquette, 49 Georgia and 30 Purdue. Had they won one of those they would definitely be a bigger bubble team.
- Bad loss was to Southern Utah in December. Had they not lost that, they'd have tied for the Summit regular season and would be 26-5.
- Given that so many ALs will have lower RPIs, teams with better RPIs and most likely from higher-rated conferences will get the benefit of the doubt.


Still think it's possible.... and it would be great for the Summitt.

[zooropa]

Re: The case for Oakland women

Oakland's not even close...... While a given committee member might nominate them for consideration, I doubt that any committee member would include them on their preliminary pick sheet (each committee member picks 33 at larges--no play-in on the women's side--and a host of other schools worth 'considering')

Under any kind of scrutiny, all Oakland really has to offer is their domination of the Summit League. Apart from that, their non-conf wins were against such schools as South Carolina-Upstate, St. Bonaventure, and Texas-San Antonio.

[Jacks-02]

Re: The case for Oakland women

Oakland will do well in the WNIT, but I'd put their chances at an NCAA bid at less than 1%. They didn't play a tough enough out of conference schedule and close losses to decent teams don't count in getting you in.

Their team is similar to ours of two seasons ago, but with less signature wins. We were 25-5 in regular season with losses to Baylor, Arkansas St., Missouri, Marquette, and Western Kentucky. We also had wins over Middle Tennessee, USC, Virginia, Kansas, Southern Illinois, Colorado, Alabama, and Minnesota.

Oakland's losses are to Georgia, Purdue, Marquette, SDSU twice, and (the bad one) Southern Utah. Other than their win over SDSU, there just isn't another eye-popping win over a ranked, major, or solid mid-major on the schedule.

They are making progress, and I give them kudos for scheduling some tougher teams, but they didn't get it done to get an at large. I do expect them to make noise in the WNIT though, especially if they can get the school to put up a solid bid and get a home game.

[jackmd]

Re: The case for Oakland women

No chance, their record in conference will gain them nothing. There out of conference wins will gain them nothing. There competitive losses to schools from BCS conference will gain them nothing.

The auto-bid to the WNIT was made for a team like Oakland. They should be happy and take it. They have a good team and might have fared will in the NCAA but they don't deserve a bid based on the resume/facts.

[filbert]

Re: The case for Oakland women

I think at-large teams need to have RPI at least in the 40's before they'd get a strong look.

I also think Oakland is probably as strong as your average 40 RPI team, but playing in the Summit absolutely CLOBBERS the RPI of good teams in the conference (SDSU and Oakland).

Oakland is probably good enough to warrant an NCAA bid but won't because of the relative weakness of the other conference teams. I hope they go out and stomp some people in the WNIT.

[zooropa]

Re: The case for Oakland women

I also think Oakland is probably as strong as your average 40 RPI team

I disagree with that statement entirely.

Why?

Because if the Summit 'clobbers' the RPI of a school like Oakland, that would imply that SDSU is underrated at its #22 spot on the Sagarin ratings.

IMO they are not significantly underrated at #22. I think SDSU would be seriously challenged by any team with an RPI higher than 15 or so.

[Hammersmith]

Re: The case for Oakland women

I disagree with that statement entirely.

Why?

Because if the Summit 'clobbers' the RPI of a school like Oakland, that would imply that SDSU is underrated at its #22 spot on the Sagarin ratings.

IMO they are not significantly underrated at #22. I think SDSU would be seriously challenged by any team with an RPI higher than 15 or so.

You do understand that RPI and Sagarin are two very different metrics and use entirely different methodologies, right? RPI is a strength of schedule indicator. Sagarin is a mathematical predictor that takes into account many other factors besides SOS. The NCAA selection committee uses RPI, it does not use Sagarin or any of the other computer rankings. You can't compare them the way you just did.

FYI, SDSU's official RPI the morning of the Summit championship was 30; Oakland's was 70.

[zooropa]

Re: The case for Oakland women

You do understand that RPI and Sagarin are two very different metrics and use entirely different methodologies, right?

They are not 'very different metrics', nor do they use 'entirely different methodologies'

Both systems recursively examine opponent winning percentages with the key difference being the fact that Sagarin also factors margin of victory. While you may argue that the inclusion of other factors is 'significant' I argue that it does not produce significantly different results, and therefore cannot be considered significant in any meaningful sense. In fact, the average difference between the NCAA RPI and Sagarin over the top 40 NCAA RPI MBB teams is -2.55, and the median is 0.

The median rank of the top 40 NCAA RPI under the Sagarin system is 20.5 and it is 20.5 in the NCAA's RPI as well (obviously). Of the top 40 teams on the NCAA RPI, only 4 fall outside the Sagarin top 40.

The average rank of the top 40 NCAA RPI is 20.5 (obviously), it is 23.5 for the same teams under the Sagarin scoring system.

IMO, there should be about a 10% margin of error (+/- 5%) around any given team's Sagarin score (what is labeled as 'Rating' on the Sagarin tables)

Now, SDSU is presently at 22 in the Sagarin rating and 31 (prior to beating Oakland) in the NCAAs:

A 5% margin of error puts SDSU's Sagarin score of 88.49 down to 84.07, which stretches up to #38 in the Sagarin ratings, definitely embracing the #30 spot occupied by SDSU in the NCAA's RPI (FWIW, I prefer Sagarin). If one assumes a 5% margin of error on the NCAA side from SDSU's spot at #30 takes SDSU down to #14 and up to #50...

(Why the top 40? That's where the pool of at-larges sits.) (Why +/- 5%? To account for the numerous factors that simply cannot be accounted for by the ratings systems, and as a predictor of 'upsets' that shouldn't really be considered upsets--Any team in the Sagarin system from c. #38 on up to #22 should be able to beat SDSU without it being considered an upset, and IMO, any team SDSU beats from #22 to #10 (Ohio State) should not be considered an upset, accounting for home court, of course. One could probably create a 'bell curve' of win/loss potential around any given Sagarin score, but I'm not willing to put -that- much effort into it)

Superiority of Sagrin? Sagrin's ranking system has UConn at the top of the women's rankings by an amount that is more than 5% higher than the #2 team which 'seems' right. The NCAA system which puts Oklahoma ahead of UConn 'seems' wrong.

[zooropa]

Re: The case for Oakland women

Having said all that, I should probably acknowledge that I misspoke by mentioning the Jacks' #22 Sagarin rating in response to a statement about Oakland's NCAA RPI.

[NoVaJack]

Re: The case for Oakland women

Point is, play the most challenging non-summit schedule you can. Believe Summit women have a more compelling case for an NCAA at-large than Bison men had the Bison not won the tournament, based on RPI and strength of schedule.