Ned Dumps on NPI

I wanted to do an NCAA Power Index (NPI) article the first week. The problem is the numbers really don’t mean much but I thought that would be the story I needed to tell. At the same time, it would show some practical insight into how this new system will work. One issue my teams are encountering is whether the NCAA schedule is correct. There are often mistakes and they aren’t easy to find. The other issue is making sure that certain teams don’t count towards NPI. (Like UT-Dallas who is transitioning to DII.) All of that is to say, don’t trust the numbers. Just enjoy the writing.

I begged both teams (the Latvians and Ned) to give me some numbers so I could write an article. Ned gave me his dump (probably should have reworded that) and then I cross checked it with the Latvians. Immediately we had an issue because the dump just didn’t smell right. (Yeah, this is going south quickly.)

Let me rephrase. Ned’s numbers were coming in higher than the Latvians. They agreed on the ordering of teams but the NPIs were different. We think we have the problem figured out (deals with throwing out good losses) but I’m going to use Ned’s dump (ugh) although I believe the numbers are too high.

The first thing I wanted to know was who was our NPI leader after week one. I’m pretty sure I could give you 400 guesses and you might not get it. Currently, after the first weekend, our NPI leader is Cairn University. Now, before AD David Babb starts work on the regional hosting paperwork, we should probably wait a few matches. The Cairn Highlanders are out of the United East Conference and are 1-0 on the season.

The first thing you might be wondering is why a team that’s 1-0 our NPI leader? Why wouldn’t it be a team that went 4-0 or 3-0 this past weekend and that’s a great question. Let’s jump over to the Captain’s Classic where four teams played: Juniata, Johns Hopkins, Christopher Newport and Willam Paterson. The results were probably as expected with Juniata going 3-0, JHU 2-1, CNU 1-2 and William Paterson 0-3. Ned has Cairn at 63.3. He has Juniata at 57.9. (Remember, the numbers arek probably wrong but the gaps between them are representative of what is really happening.) Again, how is this possible? Well, Cairn beat Penn State-Abington who then went 2-0 the following day (they are currently 2-1 on the season). Ned has PB-Abington at 54.2. Remember that Cairn only played one match and you basically get 10 NPI points higher than the team you beat in a match. (That’s a D3VbWest Rule-Of-Thumb.) So, why isn’t Juniata’s NPI higher? Because although they beat a 2-1 team like Cairn did, they also played a “poor schedule” (a little NPI humor there) and beat a 1-2 team and an 0-3 team. It doesn’t matter that they caused two of those losses. Remember that all wins count right now because you need a minimum of 10 and that William Patterson win nets Juniata something like a 52 NPI for that match, which drops their overall NPI.

Getting away from the specific numbers, here is some fun facts from Ned’s dump:

• Farmingdale is second after Cairn.

• The first 4-0 team is UW-Superior. They are third in the list.

• The first 3-0 team is Stevens who are fourth in the list.

• Rounding out the Top 5 is Allegheny who is 4-0.

• The highest placement for a team with a loss is Centre as they come in at 50.

• Southwestern, who went 3-0, are right behind Centre along with a number of undefeated teams.

• There are other 1-0 teams but most only played another team that only played them. The initial NPI for this case is 55.6.

• Framingham State is currently last although there are teams that are at 0 because they haven’t played a match.

• The highest winless team is Emmanuel College (at 255). They are above teams that have wins.

• The lowest placed team with a win is Lakeland who sit 306.  

• In Region X, Howard Payne is our leader sitting at 11. Trinity is behind them at 15 followed right behind by Whitworth. La Verne leads the SCIAC sitting at 27.

So, just a quick article showing how NPI is working this first weekend. There just isn’t enough data for any of this to be significant. Keep in mind that DIII Football is using this system and they only play like 10 games total! This should give you a small insight into how dumb that decision was.

We will resolve our issue with the NPI numbers not matching up and will probably start releasing them weekly so you can see how they are starting to firm up. (I controlled myself there. Be proud of me.) Once team’s get to 10 wins, you should expect a big jump in their NPI as bad wins get discarded. Until then, Go Highlanders!