I know it will never happen, but I think a case should be made.

RPI, as many of you know, is a simple formula:

RPI = (WP * 0.25) + (OWP * 0.50) + (OOWP * 0.25)

The WP factor is weighted to favor road wins and minimize road losses (obviously also disfavoring home wins and home losses).

This makes perfect sense (although the numbers are probably to high and and argument can be made that the numerical quantification of the home/road distinction is flawed). BUT, it doesn't make sense in HD D3, where HCA is virtually meaningless. There is really no advantage in HD, so why is RPI still weighted (or at least so heavily)?

The end result is that it's easy to manipulate RPI by winning a bunch of easy road games. In D1, with HCA a much bigger factor, it's a much bigger risk to schedule these road games. But at D3, weighting RPI makes little sense.

Thoughts?

I personally think the real life formula needs to be adjusted...especially the weighting. Instead of going 1.4 and 0.6, I would go either 1.25 and 0.75 or 1.2 and 0.8 because the current format is way too drastic...it skews teams win percentages too much because a road win is worth more than 2 times a road loss, and vice versa for home games.

With that said, I don't mind them using the actual real formula for all divisions in this game. In a game of this stature, you can't have different rules for different divisions.

Quote: Originally Posted By colonels19 on 3/22/2010
With that said, I don't mind them using the actual real formula for all divisions in this game. In a game of this stature, you can't have different rules for different divisions.

Except that they arbitrarily apply an HCA limit to lower divisions. In real life, it's possible (and likely given the condition of some D3 gyms) that HCA is a larger factor at lower divisions. So, weighting D3 RPI is fine in real life, because the HCA is real. Here, it's not, so the RPI should also be adjusted accordingly, right?

I wouldn't mind seeing WIS eliminate the weights entirely at all 3 divisions...it would eliminate the current "gaming" of the RPI as is, by scheduling 10 Away non-cons every year. I don't like the weights at all, real life or HD.

I don't find the D3 HCA limit unrealistic at all.

For example, I coach my home town school (AMC) in Allen D3. I've been in the AMC gym. It might hold 300 people.

Forgetting the size of the gym for a minute, even if the whole student body showed up for the game, along with every single person who lives in town, we're still only talking probably half the people that show up to your average big time D1 game.

Quote: Originally Posted By srunstro on 3/22/2010
I don't find the D3 HCA limit unrealistic at all.

For example, I coach my home town school (AMC) in Allen D3. I've been in the AMC gym. It might hold 300 people.

Forgetting the size of the gym for a minute, even if the whole student body showed up for the game, along with every single person who lives in town, we're still only talking probably half the people that show up to your average big time D1 game.

Do you really think that atmosphere is where HCA really comes into play, or familiarity with the facility?

I'll bet if a study was done, whereby one team's crowd was transported to a neutral gym, the team without the crowd advantage would win more often on the neutral floor than the other team's floor.

Practicing where you play is the biggest reason for HCA in college, in my opinion and experience - knowing the bounces, the flexibility of the rim, etc.

My point is, there are certainly places in D3 that would amount to HD's version on an "A" in HCA, but that doesn't exist in HD. Even Bs don't really exist in HD D3.

Also a really small gym thats packed can be pretty loud as well. Its not like these school have gigantic arenas with nobody there.

In RL, time zone matters as well. In all sports teams from pacific time zone perform worse, all else constant, playing in eastern time zone.