11/5 KenPom ratings update
There were just two games in the Missouri Valley Conference last night, as Valpo rallied late to beat Eastern Illinois at home, 66-63, and Evansville fell at #1 Purdue, 82-51.
Despite losing by 31 points, Evansville only dropped four spots in the KenPom rankings, while Valpo, who won by three, dropped six spots. The Beacons were expected to win by more points at home against EIU, and since they underperformed from that perspective, the computers dinged them.
There is a very justifiable thought process that winning is the only thing that should matter. For the computers, margin of victory is something that is taken into account, so for those metrics, winning is important — but winning by as much as you can is maybe even more important.
To paraphrase one college basketball writer from last season: “Blowing teams out is a skill.”
Especially early in the season, there will be a lot of variance, on nearly a daily basis, in these rankings until we get more games behind us and things can settle down. For now, these are a few rules of thumbs to keep in mind with most computer rankings:
Winning at home is good
Winning on the road is great
Losing on the road can be OK
Losing at home is bad
Road wins and home losses will provide the biggest metric shifts throughout the year.
I hope any of that made sense.
Moving along, after last night’s games, here are this morning’s updated KenPom rankings for the Missouri Valley Conference:
#105 Belmont — Down 1 spot (Next: Hosts #243 Tennessee State Saturday)
#115 Bradley — Up 1 spot (Next: Hosts #269 Central Michigan Saturday)
#116 Northern Iowa — Up 1 spot (Next: Hosts #161 Cal State-Northridge Thursday)
#122 Illinois State — No change (Next: At #164 Ohio Thursday)
#124 Drake — Down 1 spot (Next: Hosts #215 Robert Morris Thursday)
#126 UIC — No change (Next: At #140 Oregon State Friday)
#128 Murray State — No change (Next: Hosts #365 Mississippi Valley State Friday)
#130 Southern Illinois — No change (Next: Hosts #315 Kansas City Friday)
#220 Indiana State — Up 3 spots (Next: Hosts Non-D1 Illinois Tech Thursday)
#253 Evansville — Drops 4 spots after losing to #1 Purdue, 82-51 (Next: Hosts Non-D1 Calumet Friday)
#290 Valparaiso — Drops 6 spots, (Next: At #3 Kentucky Friday)
On the conference rankings, KenPom has the Missouri Valley Conference listed as the 10th-best league in the country. Last season, only seven conferences received multiple bids to the NCAA Tournament:
SEC +19.95
Big Ten +18.54
Big 12 +17.25
Big East +14.76
ACC +14.33
Mountain West +7.30
Atlantic 10 +6.14
The American +3.59
WCC +2.34
Missouri Valley +0.85 (Down -0.05)
Conference USA -1.21
Ivy League -3.24