NPI bubble

[kansas hokie]

First NPI is out (games through 9/28) so this is silly season for projections, but it's still fun:

Last four at-large in: Muhlenberg, Middlebury, Catholic, Southwestern (TX)

Last four at-large out: Buffalo St., Bowdoin, Conn College, SUNY Oneonta.

multi-bid conferences:
NESCAC - 6
UAA - 4
ODAC - 3
Liberty League - 3
MIAC - 3
NJAC - 2
SAA - 2
SUNYAC - 2
Centennial - 2
Landmark - 2

[kansas hokie]

Also, my assumption is we have 21 at-large bids again this year, I haven't tracked any changes in conference auto-bids from last year that could move that number up or down. If someone else knows about those changes, please post, thanks.

[deiscanton]

4:16 PM ET update-- The aforementioned NPI Summary Report which had been published earlier today was embargoed this afternoon and taken off the NCAA Statistics website.   It is unclear at this time whether or not the report will be republished this week, or whether or not we will have to wait until after games from October 5 have been played for a new report to come out.  Sorry about that. 

First NPI is out (games through 9/28) so this is silly season for projections, but it's still fun:

Last four at-large in: Muhlenberg, Middlebury, Catholic, Southwestern (TX)

Last four at-large out: Buffalo St., Bowdoin, Conn College, SUNY Oneonta.

multi-bid conferences:
NESCAC - 6
UAA - 4
ODAC - 3
Liberty League - 3
MIAC - 3
NJAC - 2
SAA - 2
SUNYAC - 2
Centennial - 2
Landmark - 2

[kansas hokie]

10-5 NPI is out - https://stats.ncaa.org/selection_rankings/nitty_gritties/45910

Last four at-large in: Ithaca, SUNY Oneonta, Catholic, Conn College
First four at-large out: Skidmore, Bridgewater, Colby, Washington & Lee

multi-bid conferences:
NESCAC - 8
UAA - 4
ODAC - 3
Liberty League - 3
MIAC - 3
SAA - 3
SUNYAC - 2
Landmark - 2

[Freddyfud]

10-5 NPI is out - https://stats.ncaa.org/selection_rankings/nitty_gritties/45910

Last four at-large in: Ithaca, SUNY Oneonta, Catholic, Conn College
First four at-large out: Skidmore, Bridgewater, Colby, Washington & Lee

multi-bid conferences:
NESCAC - 8
UAA - 4
ODAC - 3
Liberty League - 3
MIAC - 3
SAA - 3
SUNYAC - 2
Landmark - 2

A nit but the NJAC would also have 2. And I checked online for the list of this year's conference AQ's.  I could only find last year's list...

[kansas hokie]

Thank you for catching that, I missed that.

This means that Conn College would drop down to "first four out" and be the bubble team. Cutoff line is 41 right now for at-large. Still assuming 21 at-large bids available.

[kansas hokie]

21 at-large bids is confirmed. It's documented in the NCAA pre-championships manual along with lots of great info on the selection process.

https://ncaaorg.s3.amazonaws.com/championships/sports/soccer/d3/common/2025-26D3XSO_PreChampsManual.pdf

[Kuiper]

I took a quick look at the top 54 in the Oct. 5th NPI to see which schools had losses (or half-losses/ties) since Oct. 5 to teams outside the Top 54. I don't mention losses/ties against other top 54 teams unless it is their second non-win of the week.

Doesn't mean any of these schools are necessarily going to drop (or drop significantly) because of these results, especially since they could be offset by wins (including the half-win of a tie), or could be droppable if the team already has 10 NPI wins, but these are teams to watch out for in terms of drops.  Any non-win (or non full-win) at this stage of the season is a chance for other teams that won a full game, especially against a team where they receive an NPI bump, to pass a school in the rankings.

4.  Wheaton (MA) (tied #125 Endicott 1-1)
5.  Cortland (tied #57 Buffalo State 1-1)
13. Virginia Wesleyan (lost 0-1 to #91 Randolph Macon and lost 0-1 to #14 Lynchburg)
16. Denison (tied #68 Wooster 1-1)
17. Hampden-Sydney (tied #166 Shenandoah 1-1)
20. Dickinson (tied #74 Haverford 1-1)
21. Gustavus-Adolphus (tied #67 Carleton 1-1)
28. Vassar (lost 0-1 to #156 Union)
29. Pfeiffer (tied #173 William Peace 1-1)
32. Calvin (tied 1-1 to #159 Hope)
34. Rowan (tied 1-1 to #316 Alvernia and 1-1 to #90 William Paterson)
36. New Paltz (tied 1-1 to #226 Oswego State)
37. Ithaca (lost 2-3 to #19 Hobart and 1-2 to #181 RPI)
38. Oneonta (lost 1-2 to #82 Plattsburgh State)
44. Bridgewater (tied 2-2 to #205 Averett)
54. Rutgers-Camden (lost 0-2 to #48 Muhlenberg and 1-4 to #58 Stockton)

[kansas hokie]

10/12 NPI is out - https://stats.ncaa.org/selection_rankings/nitty_gritties/46118?utf8=%E2%9C%93&commit=Submit

Last four at-large in: Buffalo St., Middlebury, Carnegie Mellon, Hamilton

First four at-large out: Vassar, Washington & Lee, Sewanee, Wooster

multi-bid conferences:
NESCAC - 9 (all but Colby and Trinity)
UAA - 5
ODAC - 3
MIAC - 3
SAA - 2
SUNYAC - 2
Newmac - 2
Landmark - 2

[rdanie03]

I think the NESCAC might have broken this system. They really are about to have an NCAA tourney team that misses the conference tournament.

[paclassic89]

It was designed that way from the start  .  Working as intended

[SKUD]

Goal is best teams regardless of conference. I don't know the math enough but what tweaks need to be made to the formula? Was it SOS vs W/L% ?

[kansas hokie]

So, did some quick calculations and it's not hard to find best/worst case scenarios using NPI. If you click on the ranking number, a pop-up shows you the data for each team. A team's NPI is the average of their "net NPI" scores.

You can then take the "loss value" and "win value" for each team left on a schedule to calculate a worst case and best case. Anything over 10 wins also allows teams to drop their worst NPI.

Now, we can't predict for conference tournaments which most have and those matches will change things, but there's enough to be able to see that some of the top teams from strong conferences (Tufts, Wesleyan, Williams, Emory, Brandeis) have essentially guaranteed an at-large bid for themselves. Teams like Augsburg and Lake Forest haven't but in reality, they will be in.

If anyone is particularly interested in best/worst case numbers for teams, post here and I'll run them.

[NEPAFAN]

Scranton and Catholic please and thank you.

[kansas hokie]

Scranton (9-0-3, 55.905 today #24)

worst case (5 losses) - 49.22 (#212 today)
best case (5 wins) - 57.58 (#10 today)


Catholic (7-0-5, 54.995 NPI #36)

worst case - 51.58 (#129 today)
best case - 56.247 (#16 today)

All of this is not counting 2-3 games in conference tourney, think one likely wins auto-bid and the other ends up squarely on the bubble. I think both need to win the games they are supposed to win and make conference final for a chance at 2 bids for Landmark.