Or they beat three teams in the non-conference that are NCAA tourney teams. ASU does not belong. If ASU wants to go after a team Baylor doesn't belong. Though after the first weekend those teams will be out. Syracuse deserved in before ASU if people want to make a claim. Schedule teams that matter so even if you lose it doesn't hurt chances to get in. I don't think it came down to 'Zona or ASU because Zona is a 10. Look at the 12's. I do believe the committee mentioned that ASU would be the lowest RPI team ever to make if as an at-large if they got in.
RPI is a load of crap.
For example, let's compare three teams.
Team A: 18-13 (9-10 in conference). RPI: 58. SOS: 33
Team B: 18-14 (9-11). RPI: 38. SOS: 2
Team C: 19-12 (9-10). RPI: 82. SOS: 87
Team C beat Team B twice (home and away) and split with team A (won at home).
Team A is Oregon, a nine seed. Team B is Arizona, a 10 seed. Team C is Arizona State, left out.
Without the computers, Arizona State clearly has the best profile of those three teams.
The Sun Devils demolished Xavier (a third seed) by 22 points. In the current system, teams get more credit for losing to a good team, as Arizona did multiple times, than beating a pretty good team.
I agree that close losses to No. 1 seeds should be taken into account. But a team's profile shouldn't be based on the fact that they
almost beat Memphis or Kansas.
Second, I need someone to explain this for me. On February 11th, Kentucky was ranked 87th in the RPI. They then went on the road to Vanderbilt, a good but not great team.
They lost by 41.
When the RPI was re-published the next week, Kentucky had
risen 16 spots. They lost to a pretty good team by 41 points, and jumped 16 spots. Any system that causes that to happen is severely flawed.
ASU got hosed, no two ways about it. RPI is about as flawed as the committee. :shakeno: