Texas vs. West Virginia

The Horns will travel far to the east this weekend to play road conference games with the Mountaineers. I wanted here to address what seems an unlikely RPI rating of W.Va when you look at their W-L record . "Phil Elliot" in an earlier thread questioned the validity of the RPI rating as it pertained to TxTech. I have also been baffled by the high RPI of W.Va . In the last two weeks their RPI has fallen from 23 to now 36. The RPI of the Horns during that time has been fairly stable in moving from 31 to now 30. Our record is 29-15 while theirs is 20-18. How can this be? The RPI rating technique is strictly calculated by weighting of the winning percentages of teams.

I think it is instructive to compare the records of TCU and WVa because their W-L records are quite similar. Yet the RPI of TCU ( @75 ) is twice that of WVa. I believe the skew in the RPI rating is understandable when you compare the fact that WVa is a much better at playing on the road than at home. This is emphasized by the more severe early spring weather of the states of WVa vs Texas. Also big is that there is a significant difference in the strength of schedule for wins in their competition. At the core of the RPI is that a road win is almost worth twice as much as a home win. The ratio of the weighting is actually 7 / 13. Here is a table of the Big12 current standings with the RPI shown.
STANDINGS
Here are tables for TCU and WVa comparing their records in more detail.

TCU

WVa

The overall records between the two teams are quite similar. However, look at the difference between the records in RPI groups 3 and 4. Also, the ratio of home to road games for TCU is 21:14. The ratio of home to road games for WVa is 15:19 .

I guess we should be glad that we are playing this weekend at their home site????

 

Preview of series from Texassports, need to take 2 out of 3.

https://texassports.com/news/2018/4...-west-virginia-april-27-29.aspx?path=baseball

 

Lightning delay

Down 0-2 bottom of 3rd

 

Horns up 10-6 bottom top 9th

Mathew Whelen pitching effectively.

West Virginia announcers are terrible and have nothing to talk about except various woodpeckers and other birds living around their homes. Students???

 

Great win for the RPI against a Top 50 team even though I am still kind of confused on how WVU is still ranked that high. Higher than OSU and they crushed OU tonight. Also, if TCU can hold on, that will be good for Texas too. Time to take care of business the next couple of days!

 

Horns take opener 11-6. Summary from texassports:

https://texassports.com/news/2018/4...-in-11-6-comeback-win-over-west-virginia.aspx

Horns have now won 12 Big XII games, 1 more than last year with 8 still left to play. They are 21-6 in their last 27 since starting year 9-9. That killer opening 18 games could have really set this team back but they used it and learned from it and are much stronger as a result of it.

 

Do they play dueling banjos at the end of every game like we play The Eyes of Texas?

 

Horns leave bases loaded in ninth and drop Saturday game 8-6. Rubber match tomorrow as they still look to win series.

 

Well that sucks. Gotta get a W tomorrow.

 

We had 14 LOB....we seem to do this with scary frequency. Throw in our pitching woes and it’s a sure-fire losing formula. I now have a bad feeling about our home-stretch.

 

Off of one game? Overreact much?

 

Normally I would agree with you Sangre, but this team doesn't seem to be able to shake off a loss - which leads to more consecutive losses. Probably due to a pitching staff that features one pitcher (Kingman).

 

Horns drop finale 8-3 and fall to 12-6 in conference with road trip to Lubbock looming. They have lost 3 of last 5 and need to get some momentum going this Tuesday with home clash against Texas State.

 

No, my analysis (FWIW) is based in a pattern of multiple games. Today’s loss is another example. While I’m generallly pleased wth our overall record, we have thrown away too many possible W’s (today’s loss was not one of those...just a plain beatdown). Losing 2 of 3 to WVU is not a good omen. Our regional host chances just took a major hit. We likely need to go 5-1 vs TT & TCU to be in the regional host discusssion.

 

I'm not too hopeful for next weekend - our pitching on the road sucks.

 

My expectations at the start of the season did not include hosting a regional, so I'm not filled with angst over a road series loss to WVU.

 

Very disappointing. We are not out of the Big 12 race, but we have our work cut out for us now.

 

If we get swept in Lubbock next week (which I expect), we'll need to redeem ourselves with at least a series win over TCU to end the regular season (not to mention beating Texas State twice). If you take a look at our starting pitchers' ERA's, it's kind of puzzling that we've done as well as we have.