Conference RPI Rankings: Pac-12 Better on Average, Big Ten on Median

  2 Braden Keith | October 01st, 2018 | ACC, Big 12, Big East, Big Ten, Big West, College - Women's Indoor, Conference USA, Division I Mid-Major, Missouri Valley Conference, Mountain West, News, Pac 12, Rankings, SEC, WCC

There are 32 conferences in Division I women’s volleyball, and there’s not much dispute that the Big Ten and the Pac-12, in some order, are the two best of them. Both in terms of top-end quality, and depth, nobody presents the gauntlet, top-to-bottom, that those two conferences do.

The order of the two conferences, however, is a topic of much debate. With the reveal of the first RPI rankings of the season, we can cannot settle the debate yet, because the two conferences rank in a different order, depending on the metric used.

The reason we use RPI for these averages is simple: it’s the only ranking that goes deep enough to evaluate an entire conference, and to evaluate every conference.

If we look at the average ranking of each team in the two conferences, the Pac-12 reigns supreme. With Stanford at #1, and all 12 of their teams ranked in the top 100 nationally (Cal is ranked 98th, Oregon State is ranked 97th), their average is pulled higher than the Big Ten, which has 13 teams ranked in the top 68 of the country, but the 14th, Rutgers, sitting at just 178th in the RPI ratings.

When measuring the conferences a different way, by median rank, however, the Big Ten jumps to the top. The median, which looks at the “middle” number of each data set, smooths the extremes of the data set and focuses on the middle teams. Of course, these aren’t huge data sets, so this isn’t a perfect measure either.

Another highlight of the data is the improvements in the ACC. In past seasons, they’ve been back-and-forth with the WCC for 5th-best conference in the country. In spite of BYU’s impressive run, the ACC still is 8 points ahead of the WCC by ‘average ranking.’

The RPI system, used in basketball, baseball, softball, hockey, soccer, lacrosse, and volleyball, is designed to help committees select teams for the 64-team NCAA tournament as well as the seeding of those teams once they get there.

The index comprises a team’s winning percentage (25%), its opponents’ winning percentage (50%), and the winning percentage of those opponents’ opponents (25%).

As compared to the VolleyMob Power Rankings, the RPI rankings calculated mathematically. The intent is to create a more objective ranking to juxtapose the subjectivity of the AVCA poll, though by their nature there is still some subjectivity as to which numbers matter more than others in their calculations.

Conference Average RPI Rankings:

CONFERENCE # of Teams Average Rank Median Rank
1. Pac-12 12 38.66666667 33.5
2. Big Ten 14 41.5 30
3. Big 12 9 51.33333333 53
4. SEC 13 65.46153846 51
5. ACC 15 80.73333333 74
6. WCC 10 88.8 60.5
7. AAC 12 112.0833333 123.5
8. MVC 10 126.5 130
9. Big West 9 131.5555556 106
10. WAC 9 137.1111111 99
11. Big East 10 143.7 164.5
12. MWC 11 148.2727273 127
13. CAA 9 153.5555556 180
14. C-USA 13 156.3076923 148
15. Ivy League 8 169.75 156
16. Sun Belt 12 185.1666667 183.5
17. MAC 12 185.3333333 175.5
18. SoCon 9 189 223
19. Atlantic 10 10 190.2 217
20. Big Sky 11 202.0909091 197
21. Horizon 9 205.5555556 196
22. Summit League 9 208.2222222 194
23. ASUN 9 209.6666667 209
24. Patriot 9 214 242
25. Southland 13 220 219
26. Big South 10 229 242.5
27. OVC 12 233.5 262
28. America East 7 250.4285714 263
29. NEC 8 253.625 264
30. MAAC 10 290.7 299
31. MEAC 12 302.3333333 314.5
32. SWAC 10 321.1 323.5

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Andrew Plugge

Just curious. The SEC has 13 teams, not 9. Was this a typo or did you not calculate the other 4 teams in the SEC rankings. Thanks in advance.

About Braden Keith

Braden Keith

Braden Keith is the Editor-in-Chief and co-founder of VolleyMob.com. Braden's first foray into sports journalism came in 2010, when he launched a swimming website called The Swimmers' Circle. Two years later, he joined SwimSwam.com as a co-founder. Long huge fans of volleyball, when Braden and the SwimSwam partners sought an opportunity to …

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