RPI is just a very simple equation, so lets look at Conference RPI ... first off, unless the FAQ is wrong, WIS uses 1,2 and 0.8 and not 1.4 and 0.6 for away and home games. Here is what the FAQ says:
"The RPI (Rating Percentage Index) is a measure of strength of schedule and how a team does against that schedule. It does not consider margin of victory. It is used by the WCAA as one of their factors in deciding which teams to invite to the National Tournament and where to seed them.
The basic formula is 25% team winning percentage (WP), 50% opponents' average winning percentage (OWP), and 25% opponents' opponents' average winning percentage (OOWP). When calculating winning percentage (WP), the RPI weights a road win as 1.2 x a normal win, a home loss as 1.2 x a normal loss, a road loss as 0.8 x a normal loss and a home win as 0.8 x a normal win - neutral site games are not adjusted (weighted at 1.0)"
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I will use a 28 game schedule.
There are 12 teams in a conference .. and each team will play 16 conference games .. the winning percentage of the conference will always be .500 .. so, the number of games played (in conference) for all teams is: 16 x 12 = 192 and therefore the conference record is 96 W - 96 L. Then in the CT, there will be 6 wins and 6 losses. That means every season, every conference will finish with a 102 - 102 record.
Lets say the conference goes 120-0 out of conference (scheduling crappy SIMs). That makes the absolute best conference record (not including NT or PIT), 222 - 102 and that means that the best winning percentage of any conference is:
Best (Win all OOC):
222 / (222+102) = 0.6852
Worst (Win 50% OOC):
162/(222+102) = 0.500
The problem is that 75% of RPI is made up from your opponents record and your opponents opponents records.
For the sake of argument, I will take the 150 through 159 teams (10 teams for 10 games) and say that every team in the conference scheduled teams of that caliber for all 10 OOC games, I will use Naismith as the example .. the records for 150 to 160 are:
11-16
14-13
14-13
11-17
11-16
11-16
16-12
11-17
14-14
12-16
_____
124-150 = 124 / (124+150) = 0.4526 (for light schedule)
Now lets do the best 10 teams (teams 1-10)and get their Percentage:
26-1
21-6
23-4
26-1
19-8
26-1
25-2
21-6
23-4
25-2
____
235-35 = 235 / (235+35) = 0.8703
For these calculations, lets assume that the opponents opponents are .500 for each group ..
so, lets figure out how much conference games are worth compared to non-conference .. 204 games (102-102) / 12 = 17 games and there are 10 non conference games.
So for Opponents we would take 10/27*(OOC Win%) + 17/27*(Conf Win%) or :
120 OOC Wins, played teams 150 to 159:
(10/27)*0.4526 + (17/27)*0.6852 =
0.1676 + 0.4314 = 0.599 %
and for worse case 0 OOC wins, top 10 teams:
(10/27)*0.8703 + (17/27)*.500 =
0.3223 + 0.3148 = 0.637 %
Now this makes the overall math do this:
0.685*0.25 + 0.599*0.50 + .500*0.25 = 0.596
or
0.500*0.25 + 0.637*0.50 + 0.500*0.25 = 0.567
So, the bottom line is that going 120 - 0 against terrible teams is not significantly different than going 60-60 against good teams. And neither seems to work better is better than the top 2 - 3 conferences right now.