If its record alone isn’t enough, UCLA is banking on its
top-40 RPI as the trump card that could get it into the NCAA
Tournament next month.
Some tweaking of the Rating Percentage Index (RPI) formula,
however, will alter how the NCAA Tournament selection committee
views the Bruins’ tournament profile.
For the first time next month, the committee will use a
weighted-RPI system that rewards teams more for road victories and
penalizes them for home losses.
UCLA, which has only lost three home games this season and
finished conference play 5-4 away from Pauley Pavilion, could
benefit from those modifications.
“We wanted the RPI to appropriately reflect winning on the
road,” committee chairman Bob Bowlsby said. “I’m
sure some committee members will be using, for comparison’s
sake, other computations like Sagarin or whatever.”
The more strongly the selection committee emphasizes the RPI,
the more it would seem to benefit UCLA (14-9, 8-7).
The Pac-10 currently ranks No. 2 overall in the conference RPI
behind the Atlantic Coast Conference, and the Bruins check in at
No. 37 in the latest computer rankings for individual teams.
Yet, even though most tournament projections include the Bruins
in the field right now, UCLA coach Ben Howland knows his team needs
to win as many games as possible to guarantee themselves a spot on
Selection Sunday.
“It’s nice of them to have us in (the tournament)
right now, but we’re not in there,” he said.
“That doesn’t get decided for another three
weeks.”
RPI is a measure of a team’s strength of schedule based on
the performance of both the team in particular and its
opponents.
Though the Pac-10’s star shines brightly in the RPI, only
No. 8 Arizona and No. 13 Washington can feel secure about getting a
bid to the NCAA Tournament. UCLA can’t be certain that the
conference will send more than three teams.
While Howland feels confident that at least four or even five
teams from the Pac-10 will be selected, Bowlsby, who is in his
second year as committee chairman, warned that the RPI is not the
single most important factor in determining which teams will get an
at-large bid to the tournament.
“The RPI serves a role, but it’s not a predictive
tool,” Bowlsby said. “It’s not a sharp
instrument, it’s just a blunt object.
“We’ve got all kinds of other numerical measures we
can use. I don’t think we put as much emphasis on RPI as
everyone else does.”
UCLA has three regular-season games remaining after
tonight’s match-up with USC ““ a road game at Notre Dame
on Sunday and two home games next week against the Oregon
schools.
If the Bruins can avoid any slipups for the rest of the way,
they believe they should have a good chance at earning their first
NCAA Tournament bid since the 2001-2002 season.
“I’d have felt a lot better in third place if we had
taken care of business against Stanford, but we’re right
there,” senior Dijon Thompson said.
With reports from the Associated Press.