A meaningful college basketball computer rating system must include several factors to evaluate teams. The obvious flaw of the RPI is that it rates teams based only on W/L records and schedule strengths. An accurate rating system cannot be accomplished based on traditional statistical methods alone. One has to have an excellent knowledge of the intricacies of college basketball. My system uses 21 factors including scoring margins, results against Top 50 teams, home losses and road wins to name a few. This system contains no subjective input. All 347 teams are rated. Only Division I results are counted. New entries from Division II to Division I are Independents Seattle University, Southern Illinois-Edwardsville, Bryant, Houston Baptist, North Dakota and South Dakota. Current Division I teams changing conferences are Presbyterian from Independent to the Big South Conference, Gardner-Webb from the Atlantic Sun conference to the Big South Conference and Samford from the Ohio Valley Conference to the Southern Conference. The ratings are updated every day beginning December 2nd of the 2008-2009 season. Only at that point is there enough data for meaningful ratings. Results from the previous season are not used. Commentary and Top-35 predictions will begin October 2, 2008. To view my Computer Ratings, click the link below. The best way to find this website is to type "jimlynch29" at the Yahoo or Google search engines or click on the "Lynch" link at Kenneth Massey's Comparitive NCAA Basketball Ratings (beginning 12/11/2008).

In addition to team ratings, this system can be used to predict game margins. For example, Indiana (rating of 64.0) plays at Iowa (rating of 65.3). My average home court advantage is 4 points so add 4.0 to Iowa's rating which becomes 69.3. Subtract Iowa's rating (69.3) from Indiana's rating (64.0) and Iowa has a margin of 5.5 points (round off to the nearest 0.5 point) over Indiana.

To update team ratings, I use the The Sports Network for daily game scores. This is just a simple list of all the college basketball scores. It is quick to get into and is unencumbered by details of the complicated and time consuming sites such as ESPN, CBS Sports, etc. For complete records of all game results and conference standings, I use the Yahoo! Sports site. Again, this site is quick to access, uncomplicated and accurate.

There are many good college basketball rating systems today. How does my system stand up? The best way to evaluate a system is to compare predictions to the Vegas lines. Last season (2007-2008) my system was 55% vs 1,776 Vegas spreads. An average of America's Lines site and The Sports Network (odds) areused for the Vegas spreads. My lines are rounded off to the nearest 0.5 point. Pushed games (Vegas line and the final scoring margin are identical), of course, are not counted. Spreads of teams with recent key injuries are not calculated either. To determine my spread, simply subtract the two teams' ratings and add 4 points to the home team. My record vs Vegas is listed in my Commentary section each time the site is updated.

Sports gambling is emphatically not recommended and visitors to this site are responsible for their own actions.

 

NCAAA TOURNAMENT SELECTION:

The committee did a good job in team selections and parings. Possibly the only question marks were the selection of Arizona and leaving out San Diego St, but there are rational points for both teams. Any one of about 8 - 10 teams could win it all. To me, there is no one dominant team this year.

 

Key Scores and Schedules

NCAA TOURNAMENT:

 

4/4/09

Michigan St 82 vs Connecticut 73 (Izzo won this game for the Spartans - they were tougher and won the game on the boards and played great defense)

Villanova 69 vs North Carolina 83 (a predictable outcome)

 

NCAA Championship

4/6/09

Michigan St 72 vs North Carolina 89 (too much firepower for the Spartans)

 

 

The Big East

I mentioned earlier in the season that I was irritated by all the media comments on how great the Big East was and all the crap about players out of New York City were the toughest in the nation. I said then that the final judgment will be how they do in the NCAA Tournament. They got two teams in the Final Four which is pretty good but none of them reached the Championship game. Louisville and Connecticut were completely outplayed by Michigan St. The Big East is a very good conference - third best by my system (well they should be, there are 16 member teams); but this conference is not by any means the dominant conference in the country as the stupid media would have us believe.

 

My Record vs Vegas (2008-2009):

 

4/6/09 0-1 (0%)

NCAA Tournament 37-63 (59%)

Season Total: 1666-2889 (58%)

 

 

My Current Conference Performances (Final -regular season):

 

Conference	Teams	Current Rating	Nonconference Schedule	Record vs Nonconference Top 50	Comments
ACC	12	22.60	12.44	12-13	always the best
BIG TEN	11	20.44	15.44	13-17	no great teams but a lot of very good teams
BIG 12	12	21.23	10.52	17-12	continues to be tough
BIG EAST	16	19.64	10.67	17-21	petrified of scheduling quality teams
PAC TEN	10	21.03	18.08	9-14	tough schedule
SEC	12	17.01	9.65	8-25	this conference is really down
MOUNTAIN WEST	9	16.07	15.02	4-14	there are four decent teams in this conference

 

 

My Best Coaches:

1) Coach K (Duke) Always recruits class, smart kids that fit into his system.

2) Billy Donovan (Florida)

3) Rick Barnes (Texas)

4) Billy Gillespie (Kentucky) Wait and see, the Wildcats will be a powerhouse.

5) Bob Huggins (West Virginia) Not the most popular coach, but this guy can coach and recruit.

6) Bill Self (Kansas) Great recruiter and strategist.

7) Tom Izzo (Michigan St)

8) Mark Few (Gonzaga) Major teams hate to play the Zags.

9) Sean Miller (Xavier) This young coach always fields tough teams.

10) Bob McKillop (Davidson) The Wildcats were just two points away from being a 2008 Final Four team.

11) Fran McCaffery (Siena) The Saints crushed Vanderbilt in the Tournament then gave Villanova a good game.

12) Jay Wright (Villanova) Not a great recruiter but gets a lot from his players.

13) John Beilein (Michigan) Turned West Viginia into a successful program and is doing the same at Michigan.

14) Al Skinner (Boston College)

15) Brad Stevens (Butler) took over for Todd Lickliter but the Bulldogs haven't missed a step.

16) John Calipari (Memphis) The Tigers always seem to be in the Top15.

17) Bill Carmody (Northwestern) Imagine what the Wildcats would do with top talent.

18) Jamie Dixon (Pittsburgh) Always has tough, physical teams; doesn't always get top talent.

19) Rick Pitino (Louisville)

 

NBA Rosters - Players Native to Most Populous States - another favorite saying by college basketball announcers is: there are so many great players coming out of New York. The only way to determine state output of quality players is to refer to current NBA rosters for players native to the most populous states. Key players are ones who have at least 13 pts/game and/or at least 7 rebs/game. Refer to the table below:

 

State	Population	TotalPlayers	Key Players	Total Players/ Million	Key Players/ Million
California	36.6 million	50	10	1.37	0.27
Texas	23.9 million	27	6	1.13	0.25
New York	19.3 million	24	5	1.24	0.26
Illinois	12.8 million	29	9	2.27	0.70
Florida	18.2 million	15	4	0.82	0.22

 

Obviously, Ilinois is the hotbead of quality high school basketball players. I have never ever heard this fact mentioned.

October, 2009 (Ratings, Scores and Commentary)

 

 

Read analyses by college basketball expert Mike DeCourcy of the Sporting News.

Click the important links to review sites such as Kenneth Massey's computer ratings. See his comparisons of other ratings including Sagarin, etc. For a good review of Mid-Major teams, see Meyer's site.

Any comments? I look forward to your responses. My e-mail address is jimlynch@lakeland.ws

 

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©Jim Lynch, 2006
Last revised: April 07, 2009.