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Feel free to fact-check me on anything I post here; I'm not 100% on the circumstances behind each game on our schedule. All RPI calculations come courtesy of http://www.rpiforecast.com/wizard/index.html.
Anyway, we've taken a lot of flack for a weak schedule. Major conference fans and national media members act as if we deliberately chose to play weaker teams and inflate our win/loss record. Ignoring the fact that teams with similar schedules are not getting the same treatment (ie, Louisville, Syracuse), I really want to show that the opposite was true. We had very little say in our schedule this year.
#1: The MVC
We didn't choose to play in a Creighton-less MVC. Most Shocker fans would jump at the chance to play in a conference with more competition (AAC, MWC, BE). If we skipped our entire OOC schedule and only played MVC teams, our SoS would be 135 (compared to 95 now). So the games we chose to play were considerably better than the games we were forced to play by conference affiliation. It should also be noted that beyond losing Creighton (RPI 8) and adding Loyola (RPI 285), the MVC also has seen a general decline after losing over 50% of their minutes from last year. The closest major conferences were the Big 12 and SEC, both of which returned between 50-60% of their minutes and replaced those minutes with 5* freshmen.
#2: Forced commitments in the OOC schedule:
This is where things get a little trickier. Fans seem to be justified in saying that we should have scheduled up in our OOC to make up for the weak MVC. But looking closer, we only really had about five games we could schedule. Because of our contract with the CBE, we were required to play DePaul (RPI 124) and ended up playing BYU (RPI 40) instead of Texas (RPI 21). But worse yet, we could not forego the CBE unless they happened to match us up with a DII opponent. Instead of giving us a game against an opponent that wouldn't hurt our scheduling, they gave us Tennessee State (RPI 322) and William&Mary (RPI 123).
Our other commitments included the conclusion of the H&H versus Tennessee (RPI 54), the conclusion of the H&H @ Tulsa (RPI 126), the return game from our Bracketbuster series with Davidson (144), and a multi-year home deal with NC Central (128).
The total combination unavoidable OOC commitments would have given us a SoS of 86. Of course, the CBE commitments and the Davidson game were all scheduled by 3rd parties. The games that we actually scheduled would have given us a SoS of 2 (of course, that would have only been 3 games. The games scheduled by 3rd parties would make that SoS 156).
#3: The games we ACTUALLY scheduled
From what I can tell, we had control of only FOUR games this season. For those four, we chose Saint Louis (11) and Alabama (118) for H&H games, ORU (211) and WKU (137) for buy games. Those games would have made our SoS #18 in the nation. Combine those games with the three games we scheduled in past seasons and our RPI would have been #2.
#4: The POINT
3rd party scheduling has killed us and things outside our control have killed us. Could anyone complain about our SoS if we were undefeated and simply played Saint Louis, Tennessee, Alabama, and the rest of those games three times each? I've also avoided mentioned the possible Oklahoma State game we tried to schedule last minute (which might have pushed that #2 mark to #1). The problem is that we could only change 7 games on our schedule; the other 23 games scheduled by the CBE, Bracketbusters, and the MVC have dropped our SoS to what it is. It is fair to critique us for not playing great teams every game, but it is not fair to blame us for that schedule. We didn't design it, and we couldn't fight it. To put it simply:
We we scheduled: 7 games, SOS #2, RPI #1
What we were given: 23 games, SOS #128, RPI #12
It would have taken an amazing 7 games to have a chance at eliminating the much larger burden of 23 forced games against low RPI teams.
Anyway, we've taken a lot of flack for a weak schedule. Major conference fans and national media members act as if we deliberately chose to play weaker teams and inflate our win/loss record. Ignoring the fact that teams with similar schedules are not getting the same treatment (ie, Louisville, Syracuse), I really want to show that the opposite was true. We had very little say in our schedule this year.
#1: The MVC
We didn't choose to play in a Creighton-less MVC. Most Shocker fans would jump at the chance to play in a conference with more competition (AAC, MWC, BE). If we skipped our entire OOC schedule and only played MVC teams, our SoS would be 135 (compared to 95 now). So the games we chose to play were considerably better than the games we were forced to play by conference affiliation. It should also be noted that beyond losing Creighton (RPI 8) and adding Loyola (RPI 285), the MVC also has seen a general decline after losing over 50% of their minutes from last year. The closest major conferences were the Big 12 and SEC, both of which returned between 50-60% of their minutes and replaced those minutes with 5* freshmen.
#2: Forced commitments in the OOC schedule:
This is where things get a little trickier. Fans seem to be justified in saying that we should have scheduled up in our OOC to make up for the weak MVC. But looking closer, we only really had about five games we could schedule. Because of our contract with the CBE, we were required to play DePaul (RPI 124) and ended up playing BYU (RPI 40) instead of Texas (RPI 21). But worse yet, we could not forego the CBE unless they happened to match us up with a DII opponent. Instead of giving us a game against an opponent that wouldn't hurt our scheduling, they gave us Tennessee State (RPI 322) and William&Mary (RPI 123).
Our other commitments included the conclusion of the H&H versus Tennessee (RPI 54), the conclusion of the H&H @ Tulsa (RPI 126), the return game from our Bracketbuster series with Davidson (144), and a multi-year home deal with NC Central (128).
The total combination unavoidable OOC commitments would have given us a SoS of 86. Of course, the CBE commitments and the Davidson game were all scheduled by 3rd parties. The games that we actually scheduled would have given us a SoS of 2 (of course, that would have only been 3 games. The games scheduled by 3rd parties would make that SoS 156).
#3: The games we ACTUALLY scheduled
From what I can tell, we had control of only FOUR games this season. For those four, we chose Saint Louis (11) and Alabama (118) for H&H games, ORU (211) and WKU (137) for buy games. Those games would have made our SoS #18 in the nation. Combine those games with the three games we scheduled in past seasons and our RPI would have been #2.
#4: The POINT
3rd party scheduling has killed us and things outside our control have killed us. Could anyone complain about our SoS if we were undefeated and simply played Saint Louis, Tennessee, Alabama, and the rest of those games three times each? I've also avoided mentioned the possible Oklahoma State game we tried to schedule last minute (which might have pushed that #2 mark to #1). The problem is that we could only change 7 games on our schedule; the other 23 games scheduled by the CBE, Bracketbusters, and the MVC have dropped our SoS to what it is. It is fair to critique us for not playing great teams every game, but it is not fair to blame us for that schedule. We didn't design it, and we couldn't fight it. To put it simply:
We we scheduled: 7 games, SOS #2, RPI #1
What we were given: 23 games, SOS #128, RPI #12
It would have taken an amazing 7 games to have a chance at eliminating the much larger burden of 23 forced games against low RPI teams.
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