For any of you guys that study closely how the NCAA committee selects teams for the tournament, are closes losses and/or getting blown out taken into consideration at all?
I ask because i know that some years ago the NCAA in college football tried to get away from teams running up scores to improve their BCS computer rankings and thus scores didn't factor in much anymore, just whether a team won or not.
Has this thought process entered into college basketball also so that if we had lost to Georgetown by 28 or 2 points, it doesn't matter either way in say how our RPI is figured out? So it wouldn't matter to the committee if we end up on the bubble that we lost by an only combined 11 points to Villanova twice/West Virginia/Syracuse compared if we had lost by a combined 45 points in those games instead? Beating South Florida tomorrow by 1 point would be the same to the RPI than if we won by 20?
Obviously MU isn't the only team who could find themselves on the bubble that has numerous heart wrenching close losses, plus we never get blown out either. Will any of this end up mattering though to the NCAA committee or will the losses all simply be viewed as a loss and final score being irrelevant?
As far as the RPI, no. Margin of victory is not a factor in the RPI.
But subjectively, maybe. When teams are discussed, you would hope that would be a factor, that committee members will have done their homework enough to know that MU has played 6 teams against teams that could all be 3 seeds or better, and have been outscored by an average of less than 3 points per game in those games, with 4 of the 6 on the road. But it's also possible it isn't discussed.
The only time I figure it would come up is if the committee was trying to settle a 5 teams for the last 3 spots problem. If they're trying to settle whether MU is a 8 or a 9 seed, I don't think it comes up.
RPI is an overrated metric. The Media Mock Selection sponsored by the NCAA that just took place over the last few days excluded a California team (with an RPI of 25) from their bracket. Teams with RPI's in the 20s and 30s are excluded from the tourney more often than one would think, perhaps just as often that teams with 60's RPI's are included (by virtue of an at-large bid).
When it gets down to a number of teams fighting for the last few at-large bids, the committee looks very closely at the remaining teams' entire body of work.
Each member of the committee will consider close losses differently, some perhaps not at all. Close losses will play to the advantage of a team already on the bubble, but you have to get onto the bubble first by sporting a competitive conference record, some signature wins, and a "respectable" RPI.