Kentucky Wildcat Basketball: So what was the selection committee drinking, I mean thinking
By Paul Jordan
Apparently giving the selection committee a bottle of Makers BEFORE the seedings were announced was not a good idea
So here we are about some 30 hours since the NCAA selection committee announced their seedings and I have to admit that Kentucky’s 4th seed is still not sitting that well with me. So I decided to take a look at the numbers a bit and see if I could find something in the numbers that made this years tournament some basis instead of an unmitigated disaster.
As we all know, a major chunk of the NCAA seeding process is supposed to be based on the all entailing RPI index, which is supposed to take all the considerations (strength of schedule, good wins vs bad wins, conference ratings) into account and deliver an unbiased ranking of the teams. Sounds good. So let’s take a look at how realtime RPI ranked the teams and how they seeded:
Kansas – 1 seed in SW
Ohio State – 1 seed in E
San Diego State – 2 seed in W
Duke – 1 seed in W
BYU – 3 seed in SE
North Carolina – 2 seed in E
Kentucky – 4 seed in E
Florida – 2 seed in SE
Notre Dame – 2 seed in SW
Pittsburgh – 1 seed in SE
Texas – 4 seed in W
Purdue – 3 seed in SW
Georgetown – 6 seed in SW
UConn – 3 seed in W
Utah State – 12 seed in SE
Wisconsin – 4 seed in SE
So we can see that most of the RPI sweet 16 ended up within a seeding rank of where they should be with the exception of Kentucky (who fell two seeding spots) , Pitt (who moved up two seeding spots), Georgetown (who fell 2 seeding spots) and Utah State (who fell 8 seeding spots).
Two teams, Louisville and Syracuse benefited from the selection committee and moved into the top 16 seeds with a lower RPI ranking. To be honest, I have no problem with this because Louisville was 17th in the RPI and Syracuse was 18th. However, Louisville just moved up one seeding spot to a four seed in the East while Syracuse moved up two spots with a three spot in the SE. So Syracuse with a 18 RPI got a better seed than Kentucky with a seven seed.
OK, another aspect of all of this is the rankings and how the teams were ranked in the polls. Let’s take a look at those and see if we can get any further information on the committee’s decision. Since the committee supposedly looked at the conference tournaments and all of Sunday’s action, lets look at today’s AP Poll in which the numbers were calculated after all the weekend action. Granted, the committee did not use these polls, but you can assume a group of people could come up with the same ranking on their own:
Ohio State – 1
Kansas – 1
Duke -1
Pittsburgh – 1
Notre Dame -2
San Diego State -2
North Carolina -2
Texas -4
UConn -3
BYU -3
Kentucky -4
Syracuse – 3
Purdue – 3
Louisville -4
Florida -2
Wisconsin -4
Wow. The polls were actually a bit more accurate than the RPI which indicates that this decision may have relied on human motive rather than the numbers. Texas suffered a loss of two seedings based on the poll, Kentucky a loss of one. Both Florida and Purdue were the only teams to move up. Florida moved up two seeding spots and Purdue one. Based on this, the human motive was to give Florida Texas’s spot and Purdue Kentucky’s spot.
Now what about the two other teams that had a good RPI but a bad NCAA seed? One of them, Georgetown, was ranked 26th in the AP poll, which would give them a seven seed based on the numbers. They ended up with a six, so they actually moved up a spot in this equation. Utah State was ranked 19th, which should have been a 5th seed, They lost 7 seeding positions based on this analysis.
So far, only Kentucky and Utah State are the only two teams to receive a lower seeding than both their RPI rank and their poll position. Hrmmmm so what could be behind this decision? Let’s look at the conference tournaments. This may be an indicator and let’s look at how the polls ranked the teams and see their conference tournament results:
Ohio State – 1 – Won conference tournament
Kansas – 1 – Won conference tournament
Duke -1 – Won conference tournament
Pittsburgh – 1 – (0-1) conference tournament
Notre Dame -2 – (1-1) semifinals conference tournament
San Diego State -2 – won conference tournament
North Carolina -2 – (2-1) second conference tournament
Texas -4 – (2-1) second conference tournament
UConn -3 – won conference tournament
BYU -3 – (2-1) – second conference tournament
Kentucky -4 – won conference tournament
Syracuse – 3 – (1-1) semifinal conference tournament
Purdue – 3 – (0-1) – conference tournament
Louisville -4 – (2-1) -second conference tournament
Florida -2 – (2-1) – second conference tournament
Wisconsin -4 – (0-1) – conference tournament
Just a couple of anomalies stand out looking at the conference tournaments. Most teams that won a game or two received about the same seed as expected in the AP poll. Even Pitt, who lost in the first round of their tournament kept their seeding, but they were the fourth ranked team going in. Texas seemingly was punished for finishing second in their tournament, bit let’s remember their seeding was in tune with their RPI. Even Wisconsin kept their four seed despite their impressive 33 point game in their conference tournament.
Kentucky and Utah State, despite winning their conference tournaments are still the only teams to suffer a seedings drop in all three categories so far … so what gives?
Finally, let’s look at strength of schedule. Utah State had a robust 120 SOS ranking and in addition were 0-2 against fellow sweet 16 teams BYU and Georgetown, so that explains that rating. What about Kentucky?
The Wildcats had a SOS rating of 8. Kentucky also has a 4-3 record against the teams in the Top 16 seedings and as fate would have it, had losses of two points apiece to UNC, UConn, and Florida. What about the wins? Kentucky beat Louisville by 15, Notre Dame by 14, and Florida by 8 and 16. So what gives? I have no explaination for it.
Serious, selection committee … what in the hell were you drinking?
By the way, its still not too late to join the Wildcat Blue Nation Tournament Challenge.
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