Lunardi's B1G rankings make no sense to me! Help me SS!

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Otis

Otis

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Lunardi has 10 B1G team in his field of 68 and here is how they are ranked:

1. Michigan State - 1 seed, 9-1 conf, 18-3 overall
2. Michigan - 2, 8-1, 19-1
3. Maryland - 4, 7-3, 16-5
4. Wisconsin - 5, 6-3, 14-6
4. Purdue - 5, 7-2, 14-6
6. Iowa - 6, 5-5, 16-5
7. Nebraska - 8, 3-6, 13-7
8. Indiana - 9, 3-6, 12-8
9. Ohio State - 10, 3-5, 15-5
10 GOPHERS - 11 (play-in game), 5-4, 15-5

Clearly, MSU and Michigan are in a class by themselves, the rest of his rankings confound me for the following reasons:


1. Conference record seems to get you a top 5 or better seed if you at above .500 with one glaring exception.

2. Three of these teams have winning records against ranked teams. Of these three, two are MSU and Michigan at the top. The third team with a winning record against ranked teams does not appear till a play-in game. WTF?

3. Gophers are ranked below 3 teams we have lost to: #2 Michigan, #3 Maryland and #9 Ohio State, which makes sense. However, the Gophers are also ranked below three Top 25 teams (at the time) which the Gophers have beat, #4 Wisconsin, #6 Iowa and #7 Nebraska.

4. How in hell is Indiana even included in this list, let alone not the last team in?

NET? Sagarin? Cause it sure as heck isn't eye test!
 

Otis said:
Lunardi has 10 B1G team in his field of 68 and here is how they are ranked:

1. Michigan State - 1 seed, 9-1 conf, 18-3 overall
2. Michigan - 2, 8-1, 19-1
3. Maryland - 4, 7-3, 16-5
4. Wisconsin - 5, 6-3, 14-6
4. Purdue - 5, 7-2, 14-6
6. Iowa - 6, 5-5, 16-5
7. Nebraska - 8, 3-6, 13-7
8. Indiana - 9, 3-6, 12-8
9. Ohio State - 10, 3-5, 15-5
10 GOPHERS - 11 (play-in game), 5-4, 15-5

Clearly, MSU and Michigan are in a class by themselves, the rest of his rankings confound me for the following reasons:


1. Conference record seems to get you a top 5 or better seed if you at above .500 with one glaring exception.

2. Three of these teams have winning records against ranked teams. Of these three, two are MSU and Michigan at the top. The third team with a winning record against ranked teams does not appear till a play-in game. WTF?

3. Gophers are ranked below 3 teams we have lost to: #2 Michigan, #3 Maryland and #9 Ohio State, which makes sense. However, the Gophers are also ranked below three Top 25 teams (at the time) which the Gophers have beat, #4 Wisconsin, #6 Iowa and #7 Nebraska.

4. How in hell is Indiana even included in this list, let alone not the last team in?

NET? Sagarin? Cause it sure as heck isn't eye test!
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See my B1G Strength of Wins rankings in another thread. Gophers have much more solid resume than Indiana and Nebraska. Important Gophers win those 2 games down the road. Stay ahead of the curve. Winning in Lincoln never easy for Gophers, but Huskers without Copeland makes that task less daunting.

I think Nebraska far & away has the weakest resume of the Big Ten teams fighting for at-large bids. Indiana would be next weakest, but the Hoosiers have 3 non-conference wins that are keeping them squarely in the mix (Marquette, Louisville, Butler). Hoosiers have done nothing in conference play. Best Big Ten win is @ Penn State?
 
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They can't seem to get any love nationally. The ESPN Matchup Predictor only has them favored to win 2 games for the rest of the season (home against Illinois and Indiana...not even at Rutgers).
 

jonasty said:
They can't seem to get any love nationally. The ESPN Matchup Predictor only has them favored to win 2 games for the rest of the season (home against Illinois and Indiana...not even at Rutgers).
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My guess is the beatdowns against Illinois, BC and now Ohio St with their slide is having a big effect on BPI and NET.
 

Think we have a better chance beating Michigan at home than we do Nebraska on the road. Just gotta chalk up two L's every year when going to Champaign and Lincoln.

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Nebraska being where they are confuses me. They really haven't even beat many good teams and their record as it stands is bad. If it were me, they would be OUT of the NIT as of now. Their best win is what, Indiana? Other than that, they have beat up on bad teams and lost to everyone else. This makes no sense.
 

mnhoopboy said:
Think we have a better chance beating Michigan at home than we do Nebraska on the road. Just gotta chalk up two L's every year when going to Champaign and Lincoln.

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Funny, I was just thinking, "Would we have a better chance of beating Michigan playing at Crisler Arena a second time?"
 

Not that it will change dramatically, but for what it's worth Lunardi's rankings don't include this weekend's games yet.
 

Indiana will not make the tournament. Nebraska will not either

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Go Gophs said:
Nebraska being where they are confuses me. They really haven't even beat many good teams and their record as it stands is bad. If it were me, they would be OUT of the NIT as of now. Their best win is what, Indiana? Other than that, they have beat up on bad teams and lost to everyone else. This makes no sense.
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This shows weakness in the beloved new rating systems. Efficiency is NOT the most important factor. Beating good teams is. We have beat more good teams than Nebraska AND have a better record AND have a much better conference record. Efficiency is good for coaches to asses their team’s play and work on things. It is NOT the best evaluation of ones body of work. Screw the NET. Sorry, all you advanced stats geeks for dissing your pet algorithm.


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The Gophers fly in the face of efficiency! They refuse to be identified by any stat.
 



Otis said:
The Gophers fly in the face of efficiency! They refuse to be identified by any stat.
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This might not be good, it might not be bad, but your comment made me laugh.
 


It's a bit ridiculous. Indiana and Nebraska can just keep losing game after game and it doesn't seem to matter.
 




I think a lot of it is that Lunardi doesn't update until Tuesday. FWIW, here are my B1G rankings using my bracketology model (which usually tends to be pretty close to Lunardi's)...
1. Mich St
2. Michigan
3. Purdue
4. Maryland
5. Wisconsin
6. Iowa
7. Ohio St
8. Gophers
9. Nebraska
10. Indiana
No other B1G teams really that close to the bubble after the Hoosiers.

Nebraska is largely propped up by their strong computer numbers at this point. They are in the top 25 of NET, Pomeroy, Sagarin, and BPI. Both Pauga and ESPN Strength of Record have them outside the top 40.

I have Nebraska as one of my last 4 in (again, mainly due to their computer numbers), and Indiana among the first four out. I'd probably give Indiana a better chance to make the tournament though, since Nebraska lost Copeland. Neither of them are in very good shape though.
 

bizzle22 said:
I think a lot of it is that Lunardi doesn't update until Tuesday. FWIW, here are my B1G rankings using my bracketology model (which usually tends to be pretty close to Lunardi's)...
1. Mich St
2. Michigan
3. Purdue
4. Maryland
5. Wisconsin
6. Iowa
7. Ohio St
8. Gophers
9. Nebraska
10. Indiana
No other B1G teams really that close to the bubble after the Hoosiers.

Nebraska is largely propped up by their strong computer numbers at this point. They are in the top 25 of NET, Pomeroy, Sagarin, and BPI. Both Pauga and ESPN Strength of Record have them outside the top 40.

I have Nebraska as one of my last 4 in (again, mainly due to their computer numbers), and Indiana among the first four out. I'd probably give Indiana a better chance to make the tournament though, since Nebraska lost Copeland. Neither of them are in very good shape though.
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And looks like they(Nebraska) are 66 in the RPI would would generally put them squarely on the bubble, or just out. If you go ahead and look at the RPI vs. the new NET rankings, the RPI seems to do a better job of identifying who the best teams are IMO.
 

Go Gophs said:
And looks like they(Nebraska) are 66 in the RPI would would generally put them squarely on the bubble, or just out. If you go ahead and look at the RPI vs. the new NET rankings, the RPI seems to do a better job of identifying who the best teams are IMO.
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They all have outliers. That's why it's a good thing that the NCAA includes six different ranking systems on the team sheets.

RPI has a lot of flaws. I don't pay much attention to it any more because it isn't one of the selection criteria.

I want to see a whole season of data before I make any judgments about the NET rankings, but I like pretty much every ranking system better than RPI. There is a reason they got rid of it.
 


Holy Man said:
I still prefer winning ugly.
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Have to include losing ugly too ! We have those. That is the thing about playing poorly, you lose to bad teams in a landslide. The OE and DE numbers are not new geek tools. Great coaches have used them for a generation or more and they fine tune it even more to know who plays well with who in the line up and against who. This is done so you can see a starter with a lower eff rating may have played all his minutes against starters and the 7th man played 60% of his minutes against reserves.
 


bleedsmaroonandgold said:
Efficiently or not, it doesn't seem to matter at all that they actually lost the games.
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It does matter that they lost because they were less efficient to two very inefficient teams. This gets so complicated most people do not understand the OE and DE numbers and the difficulty of finding and seeding 68 teams. Remember, it has never been about inviting the best 68 teams, this is a attempt to come closer to doing that. This has been about selling as much cinderella as possible. The reality is only four teams win 4 games to get to the final 4. You win two 4 team tournaments and your in. This will reward more power conference teams that beat good teams spots. I actually love a 24 team tourney with 8 byes. Hell you had to win your conference to get in, season long excellence rewarded. Or if you were the ACC tourney winner you got in. Hell winning that is more of a grind than getting to the elite 8 ! Gophers have nothing to worry about if they win games, 6 of them and hopefully a few against really good teams.
 

howeda7 said:
It's a bit ridiculous. Indiana and Nebraska can just keep losing game after game and it doesn't seem to matter.
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Another BINGO! NET is proving to be a joke.


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bizzle22 said:
They all have outliers. That's why it's a good thing that the NCAA includes six different ranking systems on the team sheets.

RPI has a lot of flaws. I don't pay much attention to it any more because it isn't one of the selection criteria.

I want to see a whole season of data before I make any judgments about the NET rankings, but I like pretty much every ranking system better than RPI. There is a reason they got rid of it.
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Finally someone with a reasonable response. I want to see a full season sample size before jumping to conclusions. I can't believe how many people are up and arms on this topic. (and yes looking at the NET posts, people are freaking out...not that much hyperbole)
 

pharmacygopher said:
Finally someone with a reasonable response. I want to see a full season sample size before jumping to conclusions. I can't believe how many people are up and arms on this topic. (and yes looking at the NET posts, people are freaking out...not that much hyperbole)
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Based upon the results thus far (that’s all we have), there is good reason to freak out. If you used solely the NET today to select teams, there would be some very unjust selections. Simple as that, and a fact. Not sure why that is hard to understand. Of course, in statistics more data is better than less, so some of the clearly flawed features of the NET will be minimized, but will still be there.


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