NCAA Basketball: NET Rankings, UNC, and Oral Roberts among key storylines

Why do all “Basketball Experts” feel the need to incorporate the NET rankings into their conversations about how good a team is?

This was not a question that was posed to me directly but a question that I saw a lot floating around the Twitterverse and it gained some momentum over the last few days for me.  You will always see the “the eye test says that this team should be in the tournament,”  “Explain to me without using the NET, why this team should be in the NCAA tournament?”  Those are just two of the many examples that have been used to try and justify a fan’s perspective on why their team deserves to be in the tournament.

I don’t consider myself an expert on anything, and I especially don’t consider myself all that knowledgeable on the NET rankings.  I don’t know if anyone truly does, even those who are bracketologists that I respect in the industry.  No one is going to argue with you about the NET rankings and how they don’t make sense and it does not make sense how things are calculated.

When the NET first came out the formula had it built in for Margin of Victory.  The NCAA has now said that is no longer a factor but it does seem to have a little bit of relevance at some points this season.  The NET is confusing we would all admit that, but it is one of the main metrics the NCAA uses for the tournament field and for seeding.

It would not be beneficial for anyone who covers the sport to talk about a team and its metrics without discussing the NET rankings.  The tournament uses it, the NET was created specifically for the NCAA tournament.  The NET ranking is discussed ad nauseum for the same reasons that we all discuss BPI, Strength of Schedule, and KenPom.  Those metrics matter and are used by the NCAA tournament seeding committee.

The committee has not, and will not ever use the eye test.  Why?  The eye test is extremely subjective and is going to change game by game depending on who teams play.  The NET and the rest of the predictive metrics may not be great but they are what we currently have to measure a team’s worth. This often gets forgotten, there is no set number of wins that a team must achieve to get into the tournament.  There has never been a number.  It is always who you beat and who you lose to. That is why us “experts” always refer to the NET rankings when talking about whether a team should make the tournament or not.