Posted by kmasonbx1 on 10/24/2013 10:57:00 AM (view original):
It's been mentioned but I want to reiterate now that the Projection Report decides seeding RPI just isn't a very big factor, so the hit to RPI doesn't really matter anymore. This would not have been a bad idea under the old system where RPI was about 80% of the determinant of your NT seeding. Now the RPI of your opponents is the most crucial aspect because you are looking for quality wins.
So if you play in a tough conference you can just schedule 10 sims at home get the extra money and still have it not impact your seeding too much because you'll have enough top 50/100 opponents in conference play.
I pulled one example, Knight D2:
Projection Report Ranking has a
98.5% Correlation (R-value) with RPI Ranking. Obviously Correlation doesn't prove causation, and these are both pulling from the same datasets, but the odds that RPI has a "small" effect on projection report is very slim. Just because we anecdotally know of cases where RPI and Projection vary by 50 doesn't mean that much.
As a side note, the reason small schools with no shot at national tournament contention, schedule big schools is for a financial boost. Maybe this could be re-designed as a balancing force for low-D1 teams.