Today's post comes to you from goroshnik at salukitalk.com. Every Monday Goro does some great research and then gives a "rant" on the week's rankings. Here are some excerpts from today's edition in which our Salukis come in at #20.
I must admit, it'll be a little more difficult to put down a serious rant this week, due in large part to SIU's big emergence into the AP Top 25 Poll. Here's the happy poll list for ya
I was more than pleased to see a good four teams enter the Top 25 this week - that's the first time this year that as many as four teams have debuted in the same week. I'm also very pleased to see that those four new teams (SIU, USC, Kentucky, and Georgetown) were able to jump up quite a few places and take the #19-#22 spots.
With SIU's ranking, we've now got 5 non-BCS teams ranked at the same time, and a big congrats goes out to Butler for entering the Top 10. Should SIU and Butler continue to roll and remain ranked, their matchup in two weeks should garner much more national exposure, and that's always a good thing.
Even with SIU's breakthrough, I was still able to find my usual assortment of odds and ends to rant about. We've still got a few teams that are noticeably absent, along with a conference or two that's simply hogging too many votes.
BARRY'S BOYS ON THE SHORT END YET AGAIN
I knew I could still find an MVC team to rally around. Missouri State currently sits in third place in the #5 rated conference, but they failed to get a single vote tossed their way. The Bears have the unfortunate distinction this week of being the highest-rated RPI team to get shut out - they're at #31.
Missouri State and Arkansas are the only two top-40 RPI teams to have nary a vote. The Razorbacks aren't there because they're currently eighth overall in the SEC, at 3-5, and have lost 5 of their last 7 games. Missouri State's righted the ship a bit, with a three-game win streak, including the last two on the road. Now before you simply say that I'm arguing about this because of my MVC ties, let me toss a few teams your way that are under .500 in their conference, but still managed to grab votes this week.
NC STATE - ONE WEEK OVERSHADOWS AN ENTIRE YEAR
The Wolfpack had a terrific week, knocking off Virginia Tech on the road before taking down North Carolina at home. That's one tremendous week, but does it deserve to get these guys 15 votes? Before this week, NC State was 1-7 against the RPI top 100, near the bottom of the ACC at 1-5, and had no less than FIVE home losses this year! Oh, their RPI you say? How about #106. Wow, that's one ugly number.
One great week does not deserve to outshine an entire year's body of work. Some voters fall into this trap when they see a team get hot against a couple of ranked teams, and they fail to see the big picture. NC State can prove me wrong by winning a few road games this week and working on that triple-digit RPI ranking.
I should also mention that Maryland also sits at 3-5 in the ACC, in a tie for 8th along with NC State, yet they still were able to hold on to 9 votes. That makes NINE teams in the ACC this week grabbing votes, but not one single vote for Barry's Bunch. There's simply no way that the ACC's getting a ludricrous 9 teams into the Dance, so give this another week or two, and we can hope that the ACC mess can start to clear up.
The league, in a way, is a little screwed up itself regarding the Top 25, as neither Boston College or Virginia are ranked, despite leading the conference. That's what having Duke ranked so highly every year, deservedly or not, does to a league. Did you know that with Duke at #16, it's their worst ranking in seven years?
SPARTANS HEADING IN WRONG DIRECTION
If someone could do a little homework and find where Michigan State's vote came from this week, we could find out who still thinks the Spartans, currently sitting in 7th place in a mediocre Big Ten, are good enough to be considered a Top 25 team. After a game at Purdue this week, MSU gets to recover with a four-game home stand. At least they're done with Ohio State - that'll help ANY team recover.
IS THE PAC-10 REALLY THIS GOOD?
I agree that the Pac-10 is very good this year. I also agree that it'll very likely get 6 teams into the dance (sorry, Mr. Lavin... your suggestion of the Pac-10 getting 7 teams in won't happen, as Cal and Washington aren't tourney at-large material right now). I do wonder, though, if the Pac-10's really deserving of having all six of those teams ranked in the Top 25 at the same time... but there are definite cases for and against a team like Arizona (only 6-5, but #1 SOS).
I was hoping somewhat that the MVC could have turned out this way, with 5 or 6 teams pulling away from the rest of the pack. The big difference is that the MVC doesn't have two bottom-feeders like Arizona State and Oregon State to keel over and give all the other teams easy conference wins.
Tell me what's better - is a conference better for having 6 good teams and two awful ones, or is it better to have 2 teams pull away from a very tight group of 10 teams? It'll be a shame if the selection committee fails to grab a fourth MVC team just because it couldn't get more wins in conference, while it rewards six Pac-10 teams who get to pile up an extra four easy in-conference wins.
THE RPI CONNECTION'S HEATING UP
With SIU and Kentucky making the Top 25, for the first time this year, every team in the top 10 of the RPI is ranked. Here's more stuff to ponder:
14 of the top 15 teams in the RPI are ranked. (UNLV's blowout loss at BYU killed their solid chance this week).
Every team in the Top 25 is also in the RPI top 50. Vandy just made the cut, as they're sitting at #50 today.
38 of the top 40 RPI teams had votes this week - I mentioned this earlier in the post, but it bears repeating again.
For all this blather from some media outlets about the decreased significance of the RPI (Ken Pomeroy, why the RPI hate lately?), the Top 25 and RPI numbers are getting more similiar with each passing week. You'll still get teams well down the RPI pecking order popping up from time to time (NC State, Akron, #78 Winthrop, and #76 New Mexico State are your lowest four teams to get votes this week) - but more often than not, by the end of the year, the RPI numbers and the AP Polls will compare more favorably than the media bigwigs care to admit.
