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John is a contributor to Basketball Prospectus, co-author of BBP's 2008-09 season guide, and formerly the founder of Big Ten Wonk blog.

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John is Basketball State's west coast correspondent.

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Wendy has covered the ACC and SEC for Basketball Times for 17 years.
Strategic Scheduling
by Michael Litos
Last updated: Dec 29, 2008


No matter how loudly Tom Pecora screams, big time schools still won't come play at Hofstra.

No matter the varied emphasis of RPI, the measure carries weight when it comes to NCAA selections.

It's being considered more and more as coaches create and craft their basketball schedules. The latest: eschewing a poor RPI division one team in favor of a division two or division three opponent.

As conference season cranks up its engine, thoughts in the college basketball world turn towards familiar foes. January and February are punctuated with seemingly nightly battles that carry stakes.

Many times, those stakes are directly tied to an NCAA tournament berth. Performing well enough in conference goes a long way to positioning a team for an at large berth, should they not win the conference tournament.

Interestingly, though, when the calendar is turning to March, much of the evaluation of a team's credentials or resume (or whatever you want to call it) surrounds those November and December nonconference games. Signature wins and bad losses, long sent to the back of minds, re-emerge with a vigor. They become critical in telling the story of why a team should be included (or excluded) from The Big Dance. Those games are considered the bubble poppers.

And with RPI being a barometer bandied about like a beach ball at a Buffet concert, the concept of good wins and bad wins begs a question. It seems a silly, heretic question on the surface, but perhaps it demands consideration.

The question: if beating a team whose RPI is low is considered "bad" by the NCAA selection committee, and if the committee doesn't factor in non-division one games into its calculations and selections, why not schedule a non-division one game instead of an RPI-negative opponent?

The pros: if you are a coach scheduling a lower division one team, it is likely this is being done because you want to help your team gain confidence by winning or working on improving an aspect of your overall plan; perhaps you didn't have a choice because nobody else would play you at home and you need home games.

Surely a division two or three team would command a smaller guarantee. And you could play a local D2 or D3 team, possibly outdrawing in attendance a faraway lower rung D1 team.

The logistics of scheduling, becoming increasingly difficult to nearly impossible, become easier as well.

"We needed a home opener and we couldn't get anybody to come here," says Chris Mooney, head coach at University of Richmond. His Spiders played local D3 Randolph Macon this season. "If it had been another point in the season we wouldn't have done it. I've been friends with (RMC head coach) Mike Rhoades for a long time, and (Richmond assistant) Jamal Brunt played there."

It worked for Mooney. His Spiders rolled to a big victory and carried momentum into a hard-fought, close loss at Syracuse in New York.

"We played well and Randolph Macon is good, so that helps," says Mooney. "For this specific situation it worked out very well. We didn't set out to schedule a division three team, but I'm not opposed to it."

The biggest issue against this scheduling philosophy is perception: a D2 or D3 team on your schedule just doesn't look good. Alumni hate it, fans are bored by it, players know who they are playing and can more easily let down. A loss to a D2 school is disastrous to fans and far more unforgiveable than a letdown loss to a D1 team.

What's more, the selection committee is comprised of humans. No matter how much they say selections are done by the numbers and they don't "look" at things, we all know better. They know, even if it doesn't appear in their computer printouts.

"For us it was a matter of home games," agrees Hofstra coach Tom Pecora. His Pride defeated Old Westbury, a local D-III school, in November. "We want to have 13 home games for our fans and in the past we've only had 11. We tried everything for six months and couldn't get anybody to play here."

"Besides," adds Pecora, "our travel during the conference season is difficult enough. We don't need to wear out our kids in the nonconference as well. Plus, as you saw with us three years ago and Drexel two years ago, winning on the road isn't taken into account by the committee as much as they say."

The NCAA has looked at various plans over the years to keep division one teams playing division one teams, including counting a non D-I game the same as the last rated RPI D-I team. But for whatever reason it has found no legs.

The answer may be simple: don't play it. With exempt tournaments counting as one official game despite a team playing up to four games, coaches can get the work they need and the mix of opponents they want.

"Depending upon when it was in the season I would give strong consideration to not playing a game," agrees Mooney.

In the end, the issue seems to be more about equity than competition for most schools not in one of the Big Six conferences. To get home games, they are getting creative, and that has spilled into the non-D-I ranks.

At times, it makes perfect sense.

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