{"id":25914,"date":"2003-09-28T13:11:05","date_gmt":"2003-09-28T18:11:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.uscho.com\/2003\/09\/28\/ncaa-committee-tweaks-rpi-again\/"},"modified":"2010-08-17T19:55:30","modified_gmt":"2010-08-18T00:55:30","slug":"ncaa-committee-tweaks-rpi-again","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.uscho.com\/2003\/09\/28\/ncaa-committee-tweaks-rpi-again\/","title":{"rendered":"NCAA Committee Tweaks RPI Again"},"content":{"rendered":"
The Division I men’s ice hockey committee has again tweaked its process for NCAA tournament selection, allowing for the alteration of the Ratings Percentage Index (RPI), a component of the comparison process used to determine the field.<\/p>\n
According to the committee, “if the points awarded in the RPI for a win in a postseason conference tournament game are less than the average regular-season RPI point value per game, then points awarded for the postseason conference tournament game will be deleted. The committee feels that an institution should not be penalized for a win by having its RPI decrease, especially since that institution has no control over who it plays in the conference tournament.”<\/p>\n
Details of the implementation were not announced.<\/p>\n
RPI is a formula that results in a winning percentage intended to factor in strength of schedule. The base definition of RPI for a team is comprised of that team’s winning percentage (25 percent), its opponent’s winning percentage (50 percent) and its opponent’s opponents winning percentage (25 percent).<\/p>\n
It is a common complaint that defeating a weak opponent can have the counter-intuitive effect of lowering your RPI. This new tweak is intended to address this deficiency in RPI.<\/p>\n
More sophisticated systems are not susceptible to this flaw, though the NCAA has been reluctant to switch to such a system.<\/p>\n
This move follows on the heels of last year’s controversial tweak<\/a>, which boosted a team’s RPI points for “good wins,” defined as wins over a top 15 RPI team, with more points being awarded for road wins than home wins. The exact point “boost” was never released, though it is defined internally by the NCAA.<\/p>\n