The Real Prestige Rankings: Part III

This is the third part in my series of Prestige Rankings for NCAA Basketball over the past 24 years. My rankings are a more accurate and simplistic approach to the Prestige Rankings released by ESPN several weeks ago.

Here I will unveil all of the teams in conferences rated No. 22-24, and all of the teams rated No. 36-40.

Conferences: (Conference Rank, Team, Points, Overall Rank, ESPN’s Overall Rank)

24) MEAC – Average Point Total: 9.73

1) Coppin State – 39 (141, T-90)
2) Hampton – 37 (148, DNQ)
3) North Carolina A&T – 12 (T-157, T-161)
4) South Carolina State – 10 (T-160, T-111)
T-5) Florida A&M – 5 (T-189, T-237)
T-5) Delaware State – 2 (T-226, T-229)
7) Howard – 2 (T-226, 260)
T-8) Morgan State – 0 (T-273, T-290)
T-8) Norfolk State – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-8) Maryland Eastern Shore – 0 (T-273, T-298)
T-8) Bethune Cookman – 0 (T-273, T-298)

It is very rare for No. 15 seed to defeat a No. 2 seed in the first round of the NCAA tournament. The last team to do it was Hampton in 2001. Hampton defeated No. 2 seeded Iowa State. However, the MEAC also has another team that shares this record of biggest NCAA tournament upset. No. 15 seeded Coppin State defeated No. 2 seeded South Carolina in 1997.

The MEAC conference does seem to be losing prestige lately however. The NCAA play-in game was instituted in 2001, and three of the eight play-in game losers have come from the MEAC (Coppin State, Hampton, Florida A&M).

In one of the closer conference races thus far, Coppin State gets the top spot over Hampton because they have qualified for one more tournament. It should be noted however, that Hampton only became a Division I program in 1995. Coppin State had ten extra years to accrue points, which is more than a slight advantage.

23) Ohio Valley – Average Point Total: 10.18

1) Murray State – 54 (120, T-30)
2) Austin Peay – 40 (T-132, 122)
T-3) Eastern Kentucky – 4 (T-191, T-253)
T-3) Samford – 4 (T-191, T-192)
T-3) Tennessee State – 4 (T-191, T-251)
T-3) Eastern Illinois – 4 (T-191, T-233)
7) Southeast Missouri State – 2 (T-226, T-210)
T-8) Jacksonville State – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-8) Morehead State – 0 (T-273, T-258)
T-8) Tennessee Tech – 0 (T-273, T-192)
T-8) Tennessee Martin – 0 (T-273, T-258)

Although the Ohio Valley Conference is the first with an average point total over ten, it is extremely top heavy. Almost all of the points come from Murray State and Austin Peay.

Murray State has made the tournament eleven times since 1985, notching a win in 1988 as a No. 14 seed over No. 3-seeded NC State. They have had several other very successful years and received many better seeds. They were actually tied for 30^th place in the ESPN Prestige Rankings, which again illustrates the major flaw in their rankings.

Austin Peay has only made the NCAA tournament four times in the last 24 years, but they have a high point total from their win in 1987. They defeated No. 3-seeded Illinois as a No. 14 seed.

While all of the tournament wins for the Ohio Valley Conference came in a two-year span, the conference has had several very good teams throughout the years. The serious lack of depth keeps this from being a more prestigious conference.

22) Big West – Average Score: 13.33

1) Pacific – 72 (T-102, 101)
2) UC Santa Barbara – 38 (T-142, T-138)
3) Long Beach State – 6 (T-175, T-181)
T-4) Cal State Fullerton – 2 (T-226, T-221)
T-4) Cal State Northridge – 2 (T-226, T-225)
T-6) California Polytechnic– 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-6) UC Davis – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-6) UC Irvine – 0 (T-273, T-221)
T-6) UC Riverside – 0 (T-273, T-DNQ)

Like the Ohio Valley, this is another top heavy conference. UC Santa Barbara does have a tournament win, but Pacific is really the pride of the Big West.

Pacific has two tournament wins, both coming in back-to-back seasons. They defeated No. 5 seeded Providence as a No. 12 seed in 2004, and then beat No. 9-seeded Pittsburgh as a No. 8 seed in 2005. Despite no tournament appearances before 1997, the two tournament wins easily puts Pacific atop the Big West.

The ESPN rankings and my rankings agree very closely with all the teams in this conference. UC Irvine had a few good seasons with losses in the conference tournament, and so they are rated a little higher in the ESPN rankings.

While the Big West may not turn out serious upset threats every year, low seeds usually don’t get easy blowouts when they play the representative from this conference in the first round.

Top 50 Teams:

40) St. John’s Red Storm – Total Points: 356

• 1 Final Four Appearance, 2 Elite Eight Appearances, 12 Missed Tournaments
• ESPN Rank: T-35

Despite not having won a tournament game since 2000, St. John’s success between 1985 and the beginning of the 21^st Century is enough to put the Red Storm among college basketball’s most elite programs.

St. John’s made the Final Four as a No. 1 seed in 1985 and had Elite Eight appearances in 1991 and 1999. While they have only moved past the second round of the tournament three times in the time frame, St. John’s has won 2/3 of its first round games.

There is no end in sight to the St. John’s drop-off in tournament success. The Big East is arguably the strongest conference every season since the most recent realignments, and St. John’s has struggled to qualify for the conference tournament the last few years.

39) North Carolina State Wolfpack– Total Points: 358

• 2 Elite Eight Appearances, 2 Sweet Sixteen Appearances, 13 Missed Tournaments
• ESPN Rank: 52

NC State overcame a ten year drought from 1992 to 2001 easily by making the NCAA tournament in all but three of the other seasons and only losing three first round games.

As a basketball program, NC State is usually remembered for their improbably NCAA Championship in 1983 as a No. 6 seed. Unfortunately, this was before the 1985 cut-off, so they get no credit for that championship.

The Wolfpack’s two Elite Eight appearances also came in the mid 1980’s, but they have been a tough out in the NCAA tournament several recent years as well. They made the Sweet Sixteen in 2005 as a No. 10 seed after upsetting No. 2-seeded Connecticut.

T-37) Boston College Eagles – Total Points: 364

• 1 Elite Eight Appearance, 2 Sweet Sixteen Appearances, 14 Missed Tournaments
• ESPN Rank: T-70

The highlighted tournament finishes for Boston College does not appear as impressive as a lot of other teams inside the top 50. However, what is very impressive is that Boston College has only lost one first round game in the past 24 seasons.

A loss to No. 6-seeded Texas as a No. 11 seed in the 2002 tournament is the only first round blemish for the Eagles. Since most of the teams by far are eliminated in the first round of the tournament, the biggest point jump is gained by winning the first round game. This is why the Eagles are so high in the rankings.

In 2008, Boston College missed the NCAA tournament for only the second time in the past eight years. The Eagles still have a lot of talent, but as a program they may be starting to feel the effects of moving to a conference dominated by North Carolina and Duke every year.

T-37) Wisconsin Badgers – Total Points: 364

• 1 Final Four Appearance, 1 Elite Eight Appearance, 2 Sweet Sixteen Appearances, 12 Missed Tournaments
• ESPN Rank: T-43

For the first nine year of this 24 year time period, Wisconsin did not qualify for a single NCAA tournament. Since then they have only missed three tournaments; the Badgers have not been left out of the tournament since 1998.

The recent success of Wisconsin can best be seen in that they finished tied for 8^th place in the 2000-2008 Rankings. The highlight for the team was making the Final Four as a No. 8 seed in 2000. There they lost to conference foe and eventual champion Michigan State.

T-35) Seton Hall Pirates – Total Points: 378

• 1 Championship Game Appearance, 1 Elite Eight Appearance, 3 Sweet Sixteen Appearances, 14 Missed Tournaments
• ESPN Rank: 51

I would first like to apologize to any Seton Hall fans for including them in this post and putting the team they are tied with in the next post. I chose to put the Pirates here because they have missed more tournaments.

Seton Hall is the first team so far to have made an NCAA tournament championship game. As a No. 3 seed they lost the 1989 National Championship game to No. 3-seeded Michigan by one point.

Seton Hall is past its prime as an elite basketball program. They achieved the vast majority of their tournament success in this time from 1987 to 1993, when they were among the nation’s top teams. They have only made the tournament three times since 1995.

The Real Prestige Rankings: Part II

This is the second part in my series of Prestige Rankings for NCAA Basketball over the past 24 years. My rankings are a more accurate and simplistic approach to the Prestige Rankings released by ESPN several weeks ago.

Here I will unveil all of the teams in conferences rated No. 25-27, and all of the teams rated No. 41-45.

Conferences: (Conference Rank, Team, Points, Overall Rank, ESPN’s Overall Rank)

27) America East – Average Point Total: 5.78

1) Vermont – 38 (T-142, 159)
2) Boston University – 8 (T-163, 108)
3) Albany – 4 (T-191, DNQ)
4) UMBC – 2 (T-226, T-256)
T-5) Hartford – 0 (T-273, 270)
T-5) Binghamton – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-5) New Hampshire – 0 (T-273, 297)
T-5) Stony Brook – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-5) Maine – 0 (T-273, T-278)

The high moment for the America East conference was No. 13 seeded Vermont’s victory over No. 4 seeded Syracuse in the 2005 NCAA Tournament. The conference has also had several upset scares recently. The same Vermont team played No. 2 seeded Connecticut to a very close game the year before their big upset and Albany gave No. 1 seeded the biggest scare any No. 16 seed has provided in recent memory in 2006.

Boston University, whose four tournament appearances are spread out over the 24-year time period, is rated inexplicably high in the ESPN rankings. Also, it is easy to see that the bottom five teams in this conference that have never qualified for the NCAA tournament make it impossible for America East to climb very high in the conference standings.

26) SWAC – Average Point Total: 7.50

1) Southern – 44 (T-126, 98)
2) Mississippi Valley State – 8 (T-163, T-141)
3) Texas Southern – 7 (174, 167)
4) Jackson State – 6 (T-175, T-177)
T-5) Alabama State – 4 (T-191, T-203)
T-5) Alcorn State – 3 (225, T-201)
7) Prarie View A&M – 2 (T-226, T-292)
8) Alabama A&M – 1 (272, DNQ)
T-9) Arkansas Pine Bluff – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-9) Grambling State – 0 (T-273, T-271)

The lone first round victory for the SWAC came in 1993 when No. 13 seeded Southern soundly defeated No. 4 seeded Georgia Tech. Southern University also qualified for the NCAA tournament five other times since 1985 to easily capture the top spot in this conference.

Texas Southern and Alabama A&M have both fallen victim to the NCAA play-in game in recent years, losing before qualifying for the first round. Even though these teams have lost, after analyzing some of the other conferences it certainly seems like there are teams from even less prestigious conferences that could be placed into the play-in game instead of these teams.

25) Big South – Average Score: 7.63

1) Winthrop – 47 (123, 79)
T-2) Liberty – 4 (T-191, T-203)
T-2) Coastal Carolina – 4 (T-191, T-196)
T-4) UNC Asheville – 2 (T-226, T-183)
T-4) Radford – 2 (T-226, T-168)
T-4) Charleston Southern – 2 (T-226, T-241)
T-7) High Point – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-7) VMI – 0 (T-273, T-294)

The recent success of the Winthrop basketball program is what gives this conference all of its rating. The rest of the conference is traditionally very weak.

Winthrop burst on to the scene of college basketball by easily handling No. 6 seeded Notre Dame in the 2007 tournament as a No. 11 seed. This win was on the heels of a last second loss to No. 2 seeded Tennessee in the 2006 tournament on a last second fade-away three-pointer by Chris Lofton. Winthrop has represented the Big South conference in the NCAA tournament in eight of the last ten seasons.

Top 50 Teams:

45) Iowa State Cyclones – Total Points: 304

• 1 Elite Eight Appearance, 2 Sweet Sixteen Appearances, 12 Missed Tournaments
• ESPN Rank: T-57

Iowa State as a basketball program never really recovered after a devastating loss as a No. 2 seed in the first round of the 2001 NCAA tournament to No. 15 seeded Hampton. From 1985-2001, Iowa State qualified for 11 of 17 NCAA tournaments. They have only appeared in the eight years since.

The Cyclones’ lone Elite Eight appearance came in 2000 when they lost to eventual champion Michigan State as a No. 2 seed.

44) Auburn Tigers – Total Points: 310

• 1 Elite Eight Appearance, 3 Sweet Sixteen Appearances, 17 Missed Tournaments
• ESPN Rank: T-90

No team has made the most of their NCAA tournament appearances better than Auburn. The Tigers have more missed tournaments than any other team inside the Top 50, but they have also never lost a first round game. If not for tournament droughts from 1989 to 1998 and again from 2004 to the present, Auburn could be much higher in the rankings.

43) LSU Tigers – Total Points: 314

• 2 Final Four Appearances, 1 Elite Eight Appearance, 1 Sweet Sixteen Appearance, 11 Missed Tournaments
• ESPN Rank: T-40

LSU is the lowest rated team with more than one Final Four appearance in the rankings. Seven first round exits are what moves the Tigers lower down in the rankings.

LSU made the 1986 Final Four as a No. 11 seed, which was the highest seed to do so until George Mason tied the record in 2006. Ironically, this was the other year that LSU made the Final Four.

42) Missouri Tigers – Total Points: 316

• 2 Elite Eight Appearances, 1 Sweet Sixteen Appearances, 10 Missed Tournaments
• ESPN Rank: T-37

Missouri tops the preceding two Tigers in the rankings because of their consistency. They have been involved in 14 of the last 24 NCAA tournaments.

Their seven first round losses are compensated for by Elite Eight appearances in 1994 and 2002. Missouri has not qualified for the tournament since 2003.

41) Gonzaga Bulldogs – Total Points: 318

• 1 Elite Eight Appearance, 3 Sweet Sixteen Appearances, 13 Missed Tournaments
• ESPN Rank: 26

Ever since their miracle run to the Elite Eight as a No. 10 seed in 1999, the Zags have firmly established themselves as the best mid-major team in the country.

Gonzaga had only one tournament appearance prior to 1999 (a first round loss in 1995), but they have easily qualified for the tournament every year since 1999.

In several recent years, the Bulldogs have been popular Final Four picks, but have still yet to reach that threshold. Gonzaga actually ranked 15^th when I ranked the teams only back to the year 2000.

The Real Prestige Rankings: Part I

This is the first part in my series of Prestige Rankings for NCAA Basketball over the past 24 years. My rankings are a more accurate and simplistic approach to the Prestige Rankings released by ESPN several weeks ago.

Here I will unveil all of the teams in conferences rated No. 28-32, and all of the teams rated No. 46-50.

Conferences: (Conference Rank, Team, Points, Overall Rank, ESPN’s Overall Rank)

32) Independents – Average Point Total: 0

T-1) Cal State Bakersfield – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-1) Chicago State – 0 (T-273, 296)
T-1) Longwood – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-1) N.J.I.T. – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-1) North Carolina Central – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-1) Savannah State – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-1) Texas-Pan American – 0 (T-273, T-268)
T-1) Presbyterian – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-1) Utah Valley State – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-1) Winston Salem – 0 (T-273, DNQ)

No team that is currently independent of a conference has made the NCAA tournament since 1985. That means all of these teams are part of the 68-team tie for last place. Only two of these teams have actually been around for the entire period, as most did not qualify for the ESPN Rankings.

31) Summit Conference – Average Point Total: 1.20

1) Oral Roberts – 6 (T-175, T-124)
T-2) Oakland – 2 (T-226, DNQ)
T-2) IUPUI – 2 (T-226, DNQ)
T-2) Southern Utah – 2 (T-226, T-210)
T-5) Centenary – 0 (T-273, T-268)
T-5) IPFW – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-5) North Dakota State – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-5) South Dakota State – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-5) UMKC – 0 (T-273, T-241)
T-5) Western Illinois – 0 (T-273, T-276)

The Summit Conference is what remains of the old Mid-Continent Conference. With the loss of Valparaiso and the addition of several teams new to Division 1, the conference is rated last of all the actual conferences.

No team has actually won a game in the NCAA tournament since 1985. Oral Roberts has dominated the conference for the last three years, but has been blown out in all three NCAA tournament games.

30) Northeast Conference – Average Score: 3.64

T-1) Monmouth – 8 (T-163, T-134)
T-1) Farleigh Dickinson – 8 (T-163, T-115)
T-3) Central Connecticut State – 6 (T-175, T-189)
T-3) Mount Saint Mary’s – 6 (T-175, T-206)
T-3) Robert Morris – 6 (T-175, T-175)
T-6) Wagner – 2 (T-226, T-247)
T-6) Long Island – 2 (T-226, T-260)
T-6) Saint Francis (NY) – 2 (T-226, T-260)
T-9) Quinnipiac – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-9) Sacred Heart – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-9) Saint Francis (PA) – 0 (T-273, T-276)

The Northeast Conference consistently supplies the NCAA tournament with No. 16 seeds and had not had a first round tournament win to date.

The discrepancy between the ranking systems can be seen clearly with Monmouth and Farleigh Dickinson. ESPN gives these teams credit for beating up on their conference foes, which are clearly among the weakest in Division 1. None of these teams have had tournament success to speak of.

29) Atlantic Sun Conference – Average Score: 4.67

1) East Tennessee State – 44 (T-126, T-82)
2) Belmont – 6 (T-175, DNQ)
T-3) Campbell – 2 (T-226, 281)
T-3) Jacksonville – 2 (T-226, T-251)
T-3) Mercer – 2 (T-226, T-253)
T-6) North Florida – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-6) Kennesaw State – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-6) Stetson – 0 (T-273, 288)
T-6) Lipscomb – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-6) Gardner Webb – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-6) Florida Gulf Coast – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-6) USC Upstate – 0 (T-273, DNQ)

The Atlantic Sun Conference is home to more new teams than even the Summit Conference, but the success of East Tennessee State moves this conference up a few spots in the rankings.

East Tennessee State defeated No. 3 seeded Arizona in the first round of the 1992 NCAA Tournament as a No. 14 seed. No other team from this conference has won a first round tournament match-up, although Belmont came very close to defeating No. 2 seeded Duke this past year.

28) Southland Conference – Average Score: 5.33

1) Northwestern State – 36 (T-149, T-214)
2) Texas-San Antonio – 6 (T-175, T-157)
T-3) Nicholls State – 4 (T-191, T-241)
T-3) Texas State – 4 (T-191, T-241)
T-3) McNeese State – 4 (T-191, T-185)
T-6) Texas-Arlington – 2 (T-226, T-260)
T-6) Texas A&M-Corpus Christi – 2 (T-226, DNQ)
T-6) Southeastern Louisiana – 2 (T-226, T-237)
T-6) Sam Houston State – 2 (T-226, T-201)
T-6) Lamar – 2 (T-226, T-221)
T-11) Central Arkansas – 0 (T-273, DNQ)
T-11) Stephen F. Austin – 0 (T-273, T-214)

Similar to the Atlantic Sun Conference, the Southland Conferences’ average score mainly comes from the success of Northwestern State. No. 14 seeded Northwestern State defeated No. 3 seeded Iowa in the first round of the 2006 NCAA Tournament.

No other teams in the conference have won their first-round games, but most of the teams in the conference do have at least one NCAA tournament appearance.

Top 50 Teams:

50) West Virginia Mountaineers – Total Points: 248

• 1 Elite Eight Appearance, 3 Sweet Sixteen Appearances, 16 Missed Tournaments
• ESPN Rank: 67

West Virginia has really only come on as an elite basketball program in the last couple of years. They have made the Sweet Sixteen in three of the past four seasons, with an Elite Eight appearance in 2005. From 1993-2004 the Mountaineers made the tournament only once.

49) Mississippi State Bulldogs – Total Points: 252

• 1 Final Four Appearance, 1 Sweet Sixteen Appearance, 16 Missed Tournaments
• ESPN Rank: T-86

Mississippi State achieved the bulk of the success by making the Sweet Sixteen in 1995 and then the Final Four in 1996. However, they also won all but two of their first round games, which is what put them ahead of West Virginia.

T-47) Notre Dame Fighting Irish – Total Points: 278

• 2 Sweet Sixteen Appearances, 13 Missed Tournaments
• ESPN Rank: T-86

The Irish have participated in the tournament just under half of the years, but have never made it past the round of sixteen. They failed to qualify for the tournament for ten years in a row from 1991-2000, which hurt their chances to be higher in the rankings greatly. Notre Dame has advanced the first round in eight of their eleven appearances, putting them among the top 50 teams.

T-47) Virginia Cavaliers – Total Points: 278

• 2 Elite Eight Appearances, 1 Sweet Sixteen Appearances, 13 Missed Tournaments
• ESPN Rank: T-70

Virginia’s win over Albany in the 2007 tournament was the Cavalier’s first tournament victory since the 1995 season, when they made the Elite Eight. Most of Virginia’s success was sandwiched between their two Elite Eight appearances in 1989 and 1995.

Five first round losses and very little recent success keeps UVA at the bottom of the top 50.

46) Tulsa Golden Hurricane – Total Points: 302

• 1 Elite Eight Appearance, 2 Sweet Sixteen Appearances, 13 Missed Tournaments
• ESPN Rank: 39

Out of all of the top 50 teams, Tulsa is from the lowest rated conference (WAC is the 13^th rated conference).

Almost all of Tulsa’s success came between 1993 and 2004, and they have not been back to the tournament since. Their high rating can be attributed to the fact that they have made it to at least the second round seven times in the 24-year time frame.

The Real Prestige Rankings: Introduction and Outline

A few weeks ago ESPN released “Prestige Rankings” for NCAA College Basketball teams from 1985 through 2008. As ESPN states, 1985 was the first year the NCAA tournament had 64 teams. After reading through their methodology and scoring system, I have come up with my own rankings for the same time period.

These rankings are solely mathematical and based off of teams’ success in the March Madness tournament rather than arbitrary criteria and point assignments.

After reading through ESPN’s rankings, the main visible flaw I found was that teams from smaller conferences were receiving much more credit than they deserved. This is because of the emphasis on regular season wins. Teams in weaker conferences play much weaker teams; it is much easier for them to accumulate high win totals.

In addition, there is no mathematical explanation for any of the point totals that ESPN assigns. I encourage you to read through their scoring system and you will see what I mean.

In contrast, teams receive points in my rankings purely from their finish in each year’s NCAA tournament.

The scores that I give the teams for each year is essentially their rank based on what round of tournament play they were eliminated in. For example, the champion is ranked No. 1 and the play-in game loser is ranked No. 65.

However, since I was assigning no score to teams that did not qualify for the tournament, I made higher scores more valuable. I inverted the rankings; the champion receives a score of 65 and the play-in game loser receives a score of one.

Also, everyone losing in the same round receives the same score. There is no discrepancy based on seed. Here is the detailed scoring breakdown:

Champion: 65 points

Runner-Up: 64 points

Lose in Final Four: 62 points

Lose in Elite Eight: 58 points

Lose in Sweet Sixteen: 50 points

Lose in Second Round: 34 points

Lose in First Round: 2 points

Lose in Play-In game: 1 point

Fail to Qualify for NCAA tournament: 0 points

While my approach is much simpler than ESPN because it only accounts for post-season success, I argue that it is supremely accurate.

While ESPN tries to reward and penalize teams for many different criteria, it is ultimately impossible to score all aspects of a team’s prestige. In total the differences for missed or incorrectly scored criteria may be small, but for certain teams or groups of teams the discrepancies could be very meaningful.

In addition, the system I use really encompasses all of the important factors. For example, you may think that a No. 1 seed defeating a No. 16 seed should receive fewer points than a No. 12 seed upsetting a No. 5 seed.

However, the No. 1 seeded teams have earned the right to have an easier first round match-up with their regular season success. The regular season success and match-up difficulty for teams are both taken into account already with the setup of the tournament so it would be repetitive for the Prestige Rankings to score for this as well.

It’s also important to note for smaller conferences teams that even though a first round win or even just qualifying for the tournament receives a relatively small amount of points, that it still is significant when compared to their peer group of teams (other small conference teams), who would all get zero points for not making the tournament.

As of 2008, there are 341 Men’s Division 1 Basketball teams that compete for the right to play in the NCAA tournament. 272 of these teams have made the NCAA tournament at least once since 1985. For this reason, I will be breaking up the rankings into eleven different posts (not including this one).

Because there are so many teams that are clearly nowhere near the prestige of the top programs, I will show the rankings within all of the 32 conferences (including the independents as their own conference). This allows comparisons for the prestige of all of the conferences, similar to ESPN’s rankings. Each conference is also rated based on the average point total of all its current members.

For overall prestige, I will also show the top 50 teams with details of their tournament successes throughout the past 24 years.

Here is the outline of posts to come (Part 1 will be the next post):

Part 1: Conferences 28-32, Overall Teams 46-50

Part 2: Conferences 25-27, Overall Teams 41-45

Part 3: Conferences 22-24, Overall Teams 36-40

Part 4: Conferences 19-21, Overall Teams 31-35

Part 5: Conferences 16-18, Overall Teams 26-30

Part 6: Conferences 13-15, Overall Teams 21-25

Part 7: Conferences 10-12, Overall Teams 16-20

Part 8: Conferences 7-9, Overall Teams 11-15

Part 9: Conferences 4-6, Overall Teams 6-10

Part 10: Conferences 1-3, Overall Teams 1-5

Part 11: Summary Rankings: Top 50 Teams, 32 Conferences

Finally, all of my posts will show not only the ranking for each team from my scoring system, but also from ESPN’s rankings. This should make comparisons of the two rankings easier.

It is important to remember that while there are currently 341 teams, 40 of these teams have not been in Division 1 every year since 1985. ESPN does not count these teams, but I do. All years not in Division 1 simply count as years failing to qualify for the tournament.

I see no reason not to allow these teams to accumulate prestige once they become Division 1. The reader can pick out these teams because they will have a DNQ (did not qualify) for their ESPN ranking.

Please also refer to my previous article for Prestige Rankings dating back only to 2000 rather than 1985. More recent rankings may prove to make more sense for younger readers. It also contains more description of the scoring system.

I would also like to note that the scoring system essentially rates all teams failing to qualify for the NCAA tournament as tied for 66^th place (just outside of the tournament field). I was concerned that this may not provide enough penalty to teams not making the tournament, but have since convinced myself that it is an adequate assumption. Since I have no ranking criteria outside of the NCAA tournament, it is impossible to distinguish these teams that do not participate. I have, however, included the number of tournaments missed for all Top 50 teams so the reader may judge for themselves if the scoring system accurately accounts for teams outside of the tournament.

The Real Prestige Rankings: 2000-2008

For those who may not know, last month ESPN released “Prestige Rankings” for NCAA College Basketball teams from 1985 to the present. After reading through their methodology and scoring system, I decided to come up with my own rankings that I believe are more indicative of a team’s prestige.

For starters, I am working on making the rankings go back to 1985, but for now I have only done back to 2000. So these will be rankings for this decade only. I like the idea of having more recent rankings though, because many programs do change significantly over an extended period of time.

Now for the scoring system; I decided to only base my rankings off of success in the NCAA tournament. This is because I believe that is the ultimate goal for every Division I college basketball team, and since it includes all divisions, the tournament really encompasses everyone.

The scores that I give the teams for each year is essentially just their rank for how they finished in the tournament. For example, the champion is ranked No. 1 and the play-in game loser is ranked No. 65.

However, since I was assigning no score to teams that did not qualify for the tournament, I needed to make higher scores more valuable. So I inverted the rankings; the champion receives a score of 65 and the play-in game loser receives a score of one.

Also, everyone losing in the same round receives the same score. There is no discrepancy based on seed. Here is the detailed scoring breakdown:

Champion: 65 points

Runner-Up: 64 points

Lose in Final Four: 62 points

Lose in Elite Eight: 58 points

Lose in Sweet Sixteen: 50 points

Lose in Second Round: 34 points

Lose in First Round: 2 points

Lose in Play-In game: 1 point

Now to the rankings; here I have included the team and total score for all years since 2000. I am only showing the top 50 programs, which coincidentally is everyone scoring over 100 points (which is, on average, losing in the first or second round every year).

Rank	Team	Points
1	Duke	413
2	Kansas	395
3	Kentucky	354
4	Texas	350
5	North Carolina	349
6	UCLA	340
7	Michigan St.	337
T-8	Illinois	326
T-8	Wisconsin	326
10	Arizona	304
11	UConn	301
12	Florida	300
13	Maryland	279
14	Pittsburgh	270
15	Gonzaga	258
16	Stanford	248
17	Oklahoma	226
18	Xavier	222
19	Memphis	216
20	Oklahoma St.	208
21	Syracuse	203
22	Georgetown	196
23	Louisville	192
T-24	Boston College	188
T-24	Cincinnati	188
26	Tennessee	186
27	Indiana	172
28	Butler	170
29	Ohio State	168
T-30	Villanova	160
T-30	Purdue	160
32	West Virginia	158
T-33	NC State	154
T-33	Wake Forest	154
T-33	Notre Dame	154
36	Southern Illinois	140
37	Miss. St.	138
38	Alabama	130
39	Missouri	128
40	Tulsa	126
T-41	Oregon	122
T-41	Utah	122
43	Nevada	120
44	Texas A&M	118
45	LSU	116
46	USC	112
T-47	Washington	102
T-47	Vanderbilt	102
T-47	Marquette	102
T-47	Georgia Tech	102

For the decade, Duke is the top ranked team. This is consistent with ESPN’s rankings, even though they go back fifteen more years.

There were 198 teams that had a score (made the tournament at least one year). For comparison, there are currently 341 teams in Division 1.

I plan to post the rankings going back to 1985 shortly, and then I will make comparisons to the rankings ESPN got.

For readers to lazy to click the link at the top of the page, ESPN’s rankings take a lot more into account than just tournament success. One thing I noticed just by reading the rankings was that teams from smaller conferences seemed to be getting more credit than they should have because they had seasons with large win totals. I will go into this issue more in future articles.

I also will analyze the scores by conference and find the top teams in each conference as well as the top conferences. I was planning on saving this analysis for the rankings back to 1985, but can easily analyze these more current rankings as well if there is interest.

Also, please let me know if there are certain teams you are interested in to a more detailed extent, or teams you are interested in that may have fallen outside of this list.

AL East Playoff Projections

Throughout the entire MLB season, the AL East has stood out as the strongest division. For a big part of the year, all five teams had winning records. Currently four out of the five teams have a winning record, and Baltimore sits at five games under .500.

More important, the race to win the division is more exciting this year because of the Tampa Bay Rays. Not only have the Rays competed with the traditional powerhouse out of Boston and New York, but they currently lead the division by two-and-a-half games.

There are three very strong teams playing for a maximum of two playoff spots, with Toronto trying to join the sprint to the finish.

For those of us that are anxious to see how this race plays out, I have calculated projected standings for the teams involved.

The methodology was actually rather simple. I only looked at Tampa Bay, Boston, New York, and Toronto because Baltimore is currently out of reach. It’s clearly possible that the Orioles could have a hot streak and make a run at the playoffs, but it would be impossible to project that sort of results.

For each team, I listed out all remaining games. I then calculated the probability for that team to win each game.

To do this, I took into account whether the game was at home or away, and then averaged the appropriate winning percentages for the two competing teams.

Here is an example for Tampa Bay’s next game at Seattle:

Seattle has won 40.7% of their home games this year. This means their opponents have won 59.3% of games at Seattle.

Tampa Bay has won 44.2% of their road games this year.

So essentially Seattle is giving teams, on average, a 59.3% winning percentage and Tampa Bay is taking, on average, a 44.2% winning percentage (since the game is in Seattle). I average these two numbers to come up with a compromised probability that Tampa Bay will win.

The average is a 51.8% chance that Tampa Bay will beat Seattle. Tampa Bay loses most of their games on the road, but since Seattle loses a lot at home, the Rays chances of winning is boosted.

Now I repeated this process for each team for each remaining game. I took the final win probabilities and took that as a fractional win for the team in question. So, from the example, Tampa Bay gets .518 wins for that one game against Seattle.

This is a common practice in statistical projections and actuarial work. If there are questions about the process and it’s validity I would be more than happy to answer them in the comments section.

After a fractional amount of wins is assigned for each team for each game, all I had to do was add these together to get the total wins and losses for the remaining games. The losses are just the compliment of the wins.

I added the records for teams to date to the projected records to get final standings for these four teams. I show both the record rounded to two decimal places and the record rounded to the nearest whole numbers for comparison.

1^st Place: Tampa Bay Rays: 92.44 – 69.56 (92-70)

2^nd Place: Boston Red Sox: 91.08 – 70.92 (91-71)

3^rd Place: New York Yankees: 86.53 – 74.57 (87-75)

4^th Place: Toronto Blue Jays: 81.86 – 80.14 (82-80)

As you can see, the spread of teams is very similar to what the standings look like today. This is very good news for the Rays. If these projections were to hold then the Rays would make the playoffs by winning the division and the Red Sox would have a good chance at the Wild Card.

It is important to remember that these projections are assuming that each team performs the same for the rest of the season as they have been for the season to date. What the projections really account for is the strength of schedule remaining along with the mix of home and away games.

The main interpretation of the projections I think is that the Red Sox have the most favorable remaining schedule. The Sox are currently 2.5 games back of the Rays, but the projections (assuming both teams perform as they have been) moves the Sox only 1 game back of the Rays at the end of the season.

This means the Rays have even less breathing room than they may think. It would only take a slight improvement for the Red Sox or a slight choke by the Rays for Boston to claim the division crown.

It is also clear that the Yankees and Blue Jays will need to improve their play in order to move up in the rankings. Either that or the teams above them must play worse.

As you can see, the final rankings are very close for all teams. And the Orioles still aren’t too far behind.

This race should be a great one to watch play out. As we near the end of the season, the teams are still separated by the slightest of margins. One significant winning streak could make the difference as to who makes the playoffs and who stays home.