Updated actual versus expected - B12 and mid majors looking strong

[Phil]

The spreadsheet and graphs are here

My conclusions through 48 games:

The Big East, Sec, and ACC are all close to "on schedule" each with one fewer win than expected.

The B10, yet again, underperforms

PAC10 right on schedule.

Big12 didn't get as favorable seeding as in the past, but is over-performing.

As usual, the mid-majors are ahead of expectations.

 

[KnightBridgeAZ]

The spreadsheet and graphs are here

My conclusions through 48 games:

The Big East, Sec, and ACC are all close to "on schedule" each with one fewer win than expected.

The B10, yet again, underperforms

PAC10 right on schedule.

Big12 didn't get as favorable seeding as in the past, but is over-performing.

As usual, the mid-majors are ahead of expectations.

Help - "other" with the 1 win = Marist??
Gonzaga is a mid-major??

I'm not criticizing, just wondering. I am finding it hard in my own mind to categorize the mid-majors. Historically, the A-10, CAA, MVC, Mountain West, CUSA and maybe one more might have been qualified. But, some of these conferences have slipped with realignment, etc.

Does one good team that can always make the NCAA make a conference "mid-major"?
What does??

 

[Phil]

Sorry, should have clarified. I found a couple different lists of mid-majors; I went with Wikipedia

• Atlantic 10 Conference (A-10)
• Colonial Athletic Association (CAA)
• Conference USA (C-USA)
• Horizon League
• Mid-American Conference (MAC)
• Missouri Valley Conference (MVC)
• Mountain West Conference (MWC)
• West Coast Conference (WCC)
• Western Athletic Conference (WAC)

Yes, Marist in the MAAC is the one win the "other" conferences.

 

[Phil]

Obviously, one potential concern is that Major and mid=major are driven by football. There is no compelling reason why conferences strong in football would be equally strong in women's basketball, but we can understand why the correlation is high. Based upon this year, the list isn't bad. The top 6 in conference RPI match up exactly with the major or power conferences, and the top 13 in conference RPI are 13 of the 15 in the two lists. The only exceptions are the Mountain West and Western Athletic Conference. The Mountain West lost Utah and BYU, which hurt their wbb strength. They gained Fresno State, Nevada, and Hawai'i (football only), which will help keep up their football strength, but won't help their wbb strength.

 

[Phil]

I updated though 60 games.

Overall, the committee looks pretty good. If they would simply believe that Marist is for real, they could be looking great.

The Big East was expected to win the most games and did. Even though we have the FF yet to play, that conclusion won't change. The Big East will win one (or two) more, and lose one (or two) more.

Both the BE and SEC fell one game short of expectations.

Both the ACC and B12 expected expectations by one game, while the B12 has the possibility of exceeding even more.

The B10, once again, isn't expected to do much and fails to even meet that expectation.

The Pac10 is exactly on track with expectations so far, but will either slightly exceed, or slightly fail short based upon this weekends' results.

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