UNLV, The RPI, and NCAA Tournament Seeding

The Rebels and the Buffalos can both give “Thanks”

- By Jason Taylor

Every year there’s a lot of talk about which teams deserved what seed in the NCAA Tournament.  This year, UNLV fans feared falling to the normally relegated dreaded 8 or 9 seed. 

The 8 and 9 play each other in the tournament, and the winner of this pair moves on to play the #1 seed (assuming of course the 1 seed wins their first game).

It is actually better to be a 12 or 13 seed in theory (vs. and 8 or 9), because the highest possible seed you would meet in your first 2 games is a “4”. 

An 11 or 13 is better as well, because the highest you would play in the same scenario is a “3”.  This is exemplified in the UNLV (6) vs. Colorado (11) game.

The tension for UNLV fans over seeding is rooted in a couple of worries… 1) UNLV hasn’t seemed to get a fair shake from the Tournament Committee in recent years, 2) We had a terrible conference road record, and 3) We didn’t make it into the MWC championship game.

UNLV’s strengths were in its RPI ranking and in the non-conference schedule/record.  The bottom line is, we had a good overall record combined with the fact we beat the #1 team in the nation at the time, and a current #1 seed, UNC… Thank goodness!

The Rebels finished the season with an RPI ranking of 19^th.  In theory, if the committee only used this mathematical computation to produce seeding, UNLV would have been a 5 seed (1-4 would be 1 seeds, 5-8 would be 2’s, etc).  So, it appears we were bumped out of the 5 spot, but were likely somewhat anchored by our non-conference record, and only slipped 1 seed. 

Colorado was somewhat the opposite.  They received an 11 seed even though their RPI is higher than any 11, 12, and 13th seeded teams except one, Montana (13 seed, RPI 74).  Mathematically, they should have been a 15 seed.  Their strength came from season-end, where they unexpectedly ran through the Pac 12 field to win their conference tournament. 

So, it’s apparent that the committee, contrary to popular opinion, does have subjective intelligence.  How much so, is certainly up for debate, which I’ll leave for you and the talk show.

Here, however, is information you can use in the discussion.  These are the tournament teams, placed in the order of seeding, with their respective RPI’s.  Have fun making your case, whatever it is!

	SEED	RPI			SEED	RPI			SEED	RPI
SYRACUSE	1	1		CINCINNATI	6	42		CALIFORNIA	12	37
KENTUCKY	1	2		GONZAGA	7	25		VCU	12	38
MICH ST	1	3		ST MARYS	7	28		S FLORIDA	12	52
N CAROLINA	1	4		FLORIDA	7	30		OHIO	13	47
DUKE	2	5		N DAME	7	39		NEW MEX ST	13	59
KANSAS	2	6		MEMPHIS	8	16		DAVIDSON	13	63
OHIO ST	2	7		CREIGHTON	8	24		MONTANA	13	74
MISSOURI	2	10		IOWA ST	8	33		IONA	14	40
BAYLOR	3	8		KANSAS ST	8	45		S DAKOTA ST	14	43
MARQUETTE	3	9		SO. MISS	9	21		BYU	14	46
FLORIDA ST	3	11		ST LOUIS	9	31		BELMONT	14	58
GRGETWN	3	15		CONN	9	32		ST BNVNTRE	14	72
LOUISVILLE	4	13		ALABAMA	9	36		LOYOLA MD	15	78
MICHIGAN	4	14		XAVIER	10	41		LEHIGH	15	91
INDIANA	4	17		PURDUE	10	48		DETROIT	15	125
WISCONSIN	4	23		VIRGINIAL	10	53		NORFOLK ST	15	128
WICHITA ST	5	12		W VIRGINIA	10	57		LNG ISLAND	16	80
TEMPLE	5	18		COLRDO ST	11	29		UNC ASHVLE	16	104
VANDERBILT	5	20		TEXAS	11	49		LAMAR	16	108
NEW MEX	5	26		NC STATE	11	49		VERMONT	16	135
UNLV	6	19		COLORADO	11	61		MISS VALLEY	16	144
MURRAY ST	6	22		LNG BCH ST	12	34		WESTERN KY	16	189
SAN DGO ST	6	26		HARVARD	12	35