The rating percentage index, commonly known as the RPI, is a quantity used to rank sports teams based upon a team's wins and losses and its strength of schedule. It is one of the sports rating systems by which NCAA basketball, baseball, softball, hockey, soccer, lacrosse, and volleyball teams are ranked. This system was in use from 1981 through 2018 to aid in the selecting and seeding of teams appearing in the NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament[1] as well as in the women's tournament from its inception in 1982 through 2020.[2]
During the 2018 offseason, the NCAA announced that the RPI would no longer be used in the selection process for the Division I men's basketball tournament. Effective immediately, it was replaced with the NCAA Evaluation Tool (NET).[3][4]
In its current formulation, the index comprises a team's winning percentage (25%), its opponents' winning percentage (50%), and the winning percentage of those opponents' opponents (25%). The opponents' winning percentage and the winning percentage of those opponents' opponents both comprise the strength of schedule (SOS). Thus, the SOS accounts for 75% of the RPI calculation and is 2/3 its opponents' winning percentage and 1/3 its opponents' opponents' winning percentages.
The RPI lacks theoretical justification from a statistical standpoint. Other ranking systems which include the margin of victory of games played or other statistics in addition to the win/loss results have been shown to be a better predictor of the outcomes of future games. However, because the margin of victory has been manipulated in the past by teams or individuals in the context of gambling, the RPI can be used to mitigate motivation for such manipulation.
Some feel that the heavy emphasis upon strength of schedule gives an unfair advantage to teams from major conferences. Teams from "majors" are allowed to pick many of their non-conference opponents (often blatantly weaker teams). Teams from minor conferences, however, may only get one or two such opponents in their schedules. Also, some mid-major conferences regularly compel their member teams to schedule opponents ranked in the top half of the RPI, which could boost the strength of that conference and/or its tougher-scheduling teams. In basketball, the Missouri Valley Conference has successfully done this: It has become one of the top-rated RPI conferences, despite having very few of its teams ranked in the two national Top 25 polls.[5] In 2006, the NCAA began to release its RPI calculations weekly starting in January. Independent sources, such as ESPN or CNN/SI, also publish their own RPI calculations, which are updated more frequently.