« What's that sound? Ben on the radio | Main | MRI 2008 - Rankings Week 13 »
MRI 2008 - Rankings Week 12
February 23, 2009
By Benjamin Miraski
Roy Williams knows his team caught
a break to stay at No. 1 this week,
its third in a row at the top.
(AP Photo/Rob Carr)
North Carolina is getting a reprieve this week. The team may have lost a tough one against Maryland, but they also benefitted from the fact that all of their main competitors lost except one.
Pittsburgh narrowed the gap to less than a single MRI point this week. That means any more bobbles and the Panthers will return to the top spot.
Pitt has been under the radar as everyone has talked about Connecticut and the Tar Heels, but maybe the time for that is over. The Panthers have what it takes to make the long run this year and a lot of that credit has to go to Jamie Dixon who has continued with Ben Howland started (and has kept doing at UCLA) and made it even better.
I am previously on record for saying that the new, bigger Big East is too tough to actually generate a Final Four candidate that has enough gas to win it.
I might be eating my shoe this season. I can honestly see Pittsburgh making the deep run and winning the whole thing. As we saw this weekend, North Carolina has trouble with defense. Duke has trouble with defense. And Connecticut, despite one of the most confounding foul calls contributing, still couldn't stop Pitt.
This is the team we have been waiting for out of the Western half of Pennsylvania for quite a while.
They just didn't quite make it over the hump in the MRI this week.
One more note. In my radio show on Sunday I talked about how I could not believe that the Big Ten had eight teams in the bracket in Joe Lunardi's latest tournament projection. Things are getting back to normal. They are down to seven today, which is still more than I can fathom, but as I have been reminded, the bubble is quite soft this season.
Maybe the MRI is crazy, but it can't see more than five even with the soft bubble, but I think there is a lot of fluidity near the cut-off and this could come down to the Saturday before Selection Sunday before we see all the disputes settled.
A tough week for the MRI. The computer predicted 65.64 percent of the games correctly this week. For the season, the computer has predicted 70.70 percent of the games correctly.
MRI Top 25 Rankings
| Rank | Team | Record | MRI | LW |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | North Carolina | 23-3 | 197.91 | 1 |
| 2 | Pittsburgh | 24-2 | 197.03 | 2 |
| 3 | Memphis | 24-3 | 180.73 | 3 |
| 4 | Duke | 22-5 | 177.51 | 4 |
| 5 | Connecticut | 25-2 | 169.43 | 5 |
| 6 | West Virginia | 19-8 | 160.95 | 7 |
| 7 | Kansas | 22-5 | 155.51 | 11 |
| 8 | Missouri | 22-4 | 152.37 | 8 |
| 9 | Oklahoma | 25-2 | 152.05 | 6 |
| 10 | Clemson | 22-4 | 150.51 | 12 |
| 11 | Michigan State | 21-5 | 147.15 | 9 |
| 12 | UCLA | 20-7 | 145.89 | 10 |
| 13 | Marquette | 23-4 | 142.67 | 13 |
| 14 | Louisville | 21-5 | 139.53 | 18 |
| 15 | Villanova | 22-5 | 135.69 | 15 |
| 16 | Washington | 20-7 | 135.50 | 16 |
| 17 | LSU | 23-4 | 134.31 | 14 |
| 18 | BYU | 19-6 | 133.45 | 17 |
| 19 | Gonzaga | 20-5 | 127.07 | 23 |
| 20 | Purdue | 21-6 | 125.58 | NR(26) |
| 21 | Arizona State | 21-5 | 124.80 | 19 |
| 22 | Xavier | 22-5 | 123.10 | 22 |
| 23 | Wake Forest | 20-5 | 123.08 | 21 |
| 24 | Florida | 21-6 | 120.67 | NR(28) |
| 25 | Utah State | 24-3 | 117.00 | NR(27) |
Teams Dropped From The Top 25: Davidson (LW #20, TW #26), Texas (LW #24, TW #27), Illinois (LW #25, TW #29)
Other Teams People Might Care About
| Rank | Team | Record | MRI | LW |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 27 | Texas | 18-8 | 116.23 | 24 |
| 29 | Illinois | 22-6 | 114.81 | 25 |
| 32 | Butler | 22-4 | 111.31 | 33 |
| 33 | Kentucky | 19-8 | 108.92 | 34 |
| 39 | Dayton | 23-4 | 101.09 | 38 |
| 44 | Wisconsin | 16-10 | 95.73 | 43 |
| 47 | Syracuse | 18-8 | 94.87 | 41 |
| 49 | Miami | 15-10 | 93.73 | 44 |
| 58 | Maryland | 17-9 | 85.98 | 50 |
| 62 | Arizona | 18-9 | 81.81 | 60 |
| 63 | Florida State | 21-6 | 81.35 | 72 |
| 66 | Boston College | 19-9 | 79.69 | 59 |
| 68 | Auburn | 16-10 | 78.12 | 71 |
| 69 | Notre Dame | 14-11 | 77.92 | 74 |
| 70 | Ohio State | 17-8 | 77.37 | 64 |
| 82 | Vanderbilt | 16-10 | 69.70 | 84 |
| 86 | Michigan | 16-11 | 68.15 | 85 |
| 87 | Northern Iowa | 17-10 | 66.81 | 86 |
| 103 | Northwestern | 14-11 | 58.11 | 94 |
| 105 | Drexel | 15-11 | 57.44 | 108 |
| 127 | Iowa | 14-13 | 46.06 | 135 |
| 141 | Illinois-Chicago | 13-14 | 41.47 | 156 |
| 144 | Georgia Tech | 10-16 | 41.10 | 130 |
| 179 | Ohio | 13-13 | 26.23 | 151 |
| 194 | Texas Tech | 11-15 | 20.77 | 176 |
| 198 | Wofford | 12-12 | 18.73 | 193 |
| 204 | Ball State | 11-13 | 13.41 | 212 |
| 243 | Pennsylvania | 8-15 | 0.98 | 238 |
| 268 | Indiana | 5-20 | -11.84 | 251 |
| 277 | Valparaiso | 6-20 | -17.17 | 277 |
Last Place this week: NJIT (1-26) at -134.92.
Biggest Gain this week: Clemson gained 13.91 points. (Beat Maryland (93-64) and Georgia Tech (81-73))
Biggest Loss this week: Southeast Missouri State lost 17.81 points (Lost to Murray State (60-79) and Northern Illinois (73-97))
Conference rankings this week: ACC, Big 12, Big East, PAC-10, Big Ten, SEC, Mountain West, C-USA, MVC, Atlantic 10, WAC
The MRI Rankings are copyright 2009 by MRISports.com. Ben Miraski is a freelance reporter, edits and writes for MRISports.com and is a featured blogger on FanIQ. He also is the Northwestern Wildcats Examiner for Examiner.com. Readers can contact Ben at bmiraski@mrisports.com
Posted February 23, 2009 3:27 PM