More RPI news

Virginia and UNC played to a tie in their ACC tournament match today.

Counts as 1/2 win, 1/2 loss for each team.

UNC moves on in the tournament as a result of the shootout (4-2)

Good things keep happening!

Thanks for the update, Geez. It's so nice to come to this forum and find out new info several times a day from different members who seem to focus on certain things. It makes the info for people like me, (kinda slow), more complete and well-rounded. I am gaining so much knowlege from everyone. It's great!

Woo Hoo!!

Pen State, near the top in the RPI, was tied by Ohio State in the Big10 tournament. Then Ohio State wins in the shootout! Penn State is done for the regular season.
OSU will meet Purdue for the Big 10 championship.

Also, Oregon got a tie with Stanford, another team near the top of the rankings and RPI.

Less important, Texas and Oklahoma State tied, with Texas moving on in the shootout.
Texas and Texas A&M will play in the Big12 Championship game.

That number 1 seed is starting to look better and better.

In the "unadjusted" RPI I now have us at #6, ahead of Stanford -- Thank you, Ducks -- and just behind Texas A&M. It looks like UCLA, North Carolina, and Penn State will finish ahead of us in the RPI no matter what. But, we could sneak into, or come very close to, #4 if we win tomorrow night and Texas beats or ties A&M and Wazoo beats USC. It's getting really interesting.

Even if we don't make it to #4, what we want is for it to be close enough that the Tournament Committee gets to the secondary criteria and looks at the last 8 games.

I saw us with only a very small chance for one of the #1 seeds only last week, but now it's starting to look like it might be possible. Hook 'em Horns, Bite 'em Cougars, and Chew on 'em Beavers!

Plus, let's all root for Florida State over North Carolina, Cal State Fullerton over Cal Poly, and Purdue over Ohio State, all of which wins would help our RPI.

I couldn't help myself so, notwithstanding that it takes a bunch of work, I ran the adjusted RPI through yesterday's (Friday's) games. Remember, I'm not sure I have the right adjustment formula, but I'm very close (after corrections, I had the top 50 right after last weekend's games, except for four spots (below the top 20) where I had two teams in reverse order.

There's bad news and good news.

The bad news: With the adjustments, right now we're at #8, with Stanford having jumped back ahead of us and with Georgia ahead of us too.

The good news: If we win tonight, we will be back ahead of Georgia and just barely behind A&M and Stanford and possibly within reach of USC. So last night's basic message still stands: Hook 'em Horns (Texas v. A&M), Chew 'em Beavers (v. Stanford), and Bite 'em Cougs (WSU v. USC). Just on principle, and also for the Pilots' benefit, let's root for Florida State over UNC, too.

By the way, Texas won its first two games in the Big 12 Tournament and will play A&M in the finals tomorrow. Pretty good, right? Not according to the RPI. Texas won both games in shootouts. Its RPI position dropped from 20 to 26.

Way to go Pilots! Great win tonight.

So, I was wrong about where we would be if the Pilots won! I've just entered all today's data and my computer says that right now, we're at #5. (Remember, as I always say, I'm not sure I have the bonus point adjustments right, but am very close.) We're barely ahead of TAMU, Stanford, Georgia, and Tennessee. And, just barely behind USC. It looks like North Carolina, UCLA, and Penn State are locks for being in the top four no matter what. But after that, it's really close.

So, who are we for? The Longhorns, the Beavs, and the Cougs. And, let's add the Seminoles and the Gators. Tennessee is done with its games, so no one to root for there.

And, here's more info about the RPI: San Diego beat San Francisco. Great for the Torreros, right? Well, not exactly. San Diego has dropped from #10 to #15 in the RPI! Why? Because San Francisco's record is so poor, its effect on the second element of San Diego's RPI (strength of schedule) far outweighed San Diego's improvement to an already outstanding won-loss-tie record.

And, another RPI feature: The best thing for the Pilots tonight, other than their win, was that Arizona State dropped from #40 in the RPI to #41! Why? Because the cut off for the highest bonus points for wins over teams is at team #40. So, the bonuses for Pac 10 teams that beat Arizona State (i.e., UCLA, USC, and Stanford) dropped substantially because of the inner workings of the RPI even though Arizona State played its last game yesterday.

Go figure!

I'm trying to position things so that I can put out my version of a final "regular season" RPI either late tomorrow night or before noon on Monday, so those of you who are interested can have fun with it before the NCAA announces the Tournament bracket and where the opening round games will be played. I'm sure we'll all be watching the final games tomorrow!

GO PILOTS!

Texas is now up 2-0 in the 56th minute!

Arghh!

Texas took out it's scorers to bunker up, and A&M scored in the 65th minute.

Now the Texas scorers are back in.

Texas wins!! 2-1 they were getting blasted at the end, but held on.

Another one bites the dust!

West Virginia and Notre Dame tied 1-1

WVA wins the shootout 5-3

Not sure how that affects us, but I'm sure UPSoccerFanatic will be able to sort it out tonight.

USC loses 2-1 to WSU. I like our chances!

The Washington State win gives them the 5th best record in the Pac 10.

Last year, that was good enough for a bid, and I think the conference RPI is better this year.

I hope UPSoccerFanatic is madly crunching numbers....

Fanatic, we are waiting for your magic.