Question about how wins are counted towards the NCAA tournament

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basfan445
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So I'd probably say that around 40% if not 50% of all Division 1 teams play against teams from either Divisions 2 or 3. I'm having a discussion with some friends from another forum about how those wins are counted towards the NCAA Tournament. I figure this was a good place because it would apply to WIU basketball rather well, unfortunately our NCAA chances are too good right now. Lets hope that changes soon. Anyway, for example lets say WIU went 27-5 during the regular season but lost in the conference tournament and is being considered for an at large bid, I know I'm stretching. Let's say one of our wins is against Quincy University, a division 2 school. My question is does the NCAA tourney committee count that win or do they not? From my understanding, I don't have any proof, but I thought that if there was only one game played against a non division 1 opponent and it was a win. The result counts towards the NCAA tournament but it doesn't record any RPI. Now also what I understand is that if we play 2 non division 1 opponents and they're all wins only one win will count towards the NCAA tournament, same as before but the other win doesn't count towards the tournament. Can anyone back up my claim or am I fully wrong? Either way can anyone provide resources or a link that would say so. I've tried looking myself but I can't find anything about how these wins are counted towards the NCAA tournament. I'd appreciate any help that I can get and finally settle this discussion. I hope this all makes sense. Thanks!
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Tere North
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Our conference will only get a single entrant into the NCAA tourney. Simply not a strong enough conference, e.g. RPI. Tourney champ will go to NCAA. If season champ is someone else, they'll go to the NIT. Those are guarantees, both for men and women. If tourney and season champ are the same, 2nd place will advance to NIT, but only 1 team is guaranteed, so if it's 2 different teams for runner-up tourney and season, 1 will get to go.
leatherneckcountry
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Tere North wrote: Fri Aug 04, 2017 2:59 am Our conference will only get a single entrant into the NCAA tourney. Simply not a strong enough conference, e.g. RPI. Tourney champ will go to NCAA. If season champ is someone else, they'll go to the NIT. Those are guarantees, both for men and women. If tourney and season champ are the same, 2nd place will advance to NIT, but only 1 team is guaranteed, so if it's 2 different teams for runner-up tourney and season, 1 will get to go.
that wasn't the question but I'm not sure what the rules are but it seems like recently wins don't matter much
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sealhall74
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I dont think number of wins factor in that much either. Aside from the automatic conference qualifiers, they just want the strongest field of 68 they can put together. If we have 27 wins and Purdue has a lowly 21 wins, Purdue is getting in before we do.
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ST_Lawson
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sealhall74 wrote: Fri Aug 04, 2017 8:29 am I dont think number of wins factor in that much either. Aside from the automatic conference qualifiers, they just want the strongest field of 68 they can put together. If we have 27 wins and Purdue has a lowly 21 wins, Purdue is getting in before we do.
Yea, there's not really any specific "rule" to it as far as I know. Since it's a committee of people putting together the at-large field, they'll look at each team's record, who they played, etc.

The more "lower division" schools a team plays, the worse their SoS looks, and the less likely they are going to be to make it in. It's kinda a balance between having the right number of those teams on your schedule...you're more likely to win the games, but your schedule is/appears easier.

If we're talking about the RPI calculation, I believe that a lower division school counts as a "win" (assuming you win), but you get zero credit for "difficulty" in the calculation. Like...no matter how good or a bad a DII school is, it counts as worse than the worst DI school in terms of strength.
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