Unless Penn wins at Miami two weeks from now or beats either Temple or Saint Joseph’s next month, it faces the ghastly prospect of its best win of the season coming from within the Ivy League. RPI-wise, Penn hasn’t beaten a better team yet this year, and Thursday’s victory over Elon (currently ranked 255th out of 341) was the best yet, better than Monmouth (267th), The Citadel (307th) and Navy (318th), Penn’s only other wins this season.
Here’s the remainder of the nonconference schedule, with current RPI in parentheses:
FGCU (260th)
Miami (17th)
NJIT (N/A)
La Salle (226)
St. Joe’s (112th)
Temple (55th)
Penn is sitting at 235th right now. That number will surely get better once some winnable Ivy road games roll around, but it’s still a far cry from previous years. That doesn’t bode well for the Quakers should they manage to win the Ivy League, which I still think they have a fighting chance of doing.
Here’s the Quakers’ highest-quality victory from the past six Ivy championship teams. Penn’s final RPI and NCAA Tournament seed from each year are in brackets:
2006-07 [89th, 14-seed]: Drexel (43rd)
2005-06 [98th, 15-seed]: Hawaii (100th)
2004-05 [58th, 13-seed]: Saint Joseph’s (56)
2002-03 [59th, 11-seed]: Villanova (70th)
2001-02 [41st, 11-seed]: Temple (79th)
1999-2000 [74th, 13-seed]: California (71)
Tags: RPI
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December 23rd, 2007 at 12:53 pm
Why even bother discussing RPI and seeding? This year is so far from what we’re accustomed to that I’m actually having a good time not caring about non-conference games w’s and l’s. Not worrying about losing to Elon this year is definitely easier than the pressure filled game last year @ NC (which would have ruined our seed) and I for one am just going to enjoy trying to win the league. We know that if we somehow do win the league, we will be a 16 seed at best (if they don’t have to play the play-in-game), so why even bother thinking about it? I am enjoying watching them grow and look forward to seeing if we can still win the league. If we win this year, it will be arguably the sweetest championship since the 01-02 three-way tie. 20 years of P dominance is at stake, and that’s all I’m worrried about right now.
December 23rd, 2007 at 4:21 pm
I agree with Justin about RPI in general. But also, I can see Penn winning either St. Joe’s or Temple. It is the big 5, and anything can happen there.
December 23rd, 2007 at 8:11 pm
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