COLUMN: Manipulating the RPI is the next step for WVU baseball coach Steve Sabins

Dominion Post

6 hours ago

MORGANTOWN — My first venture into studying the Ratings Percentage Index (RPI) came in 2007, after a WVU men's basketball team that had gone 22-9 through the end of the Big East tournament with wins against UConn and UCLA had been left out of the NCAA tournament.
And you thought the Mountaineers were snubbed last season.
Anyway, in the years that have followed, two things truly stand out about the RPI:
** There really isn't a better tool to gauge a team's strength of schedule.
** It can also be manipulated like silly putty.
WVU baseball coach Steve Sabins has got to find a way to become a master manipulator.
It's not exactly an easy thing to do as a college baseball coach in the part of the country where the state of West Virginia resides.
Still, if the WVU program is headed where it seems to be headed — a perennial Top 25 program and super-regional contender — Sabins' ability to schedule games is going to become just as critical as any recruit he signs out of high school or the transfer portal.
Because talent wins games, true, but it's that strength of schedule that determines a team's ultimate fate between always being a regional host or always heading out on the road for the NCAA tournament.
First, let's get into some basic numbers.
WVU's nonconference RPI strength of schedule this season was 176th in the nation. That's out of 307 Division I teams, which doesn't exactly look great on the surface.
OK, but here's where a little more research comes in. LSU, which just won the national title, had a nonconference strength of schedule of 124.
Texas — the No. 2 overall seed heading into the NCAA tourney — was at 152. Tennessee, the 2024 national champ, was at 179.
WVU took a beating from the so-called experts of college baseball, because the theme was the Mountaineers didn't play anybody in the nonconference.
You didn't hear that about LSU, though. It wasn't a story told about Texas or Tennessee.
Why? Because once SEC play began, the overall strength of schedules for those schools shot up like a rocket. All three schools finished with an overall strength of schedule no higher than 22nd in the nation. WVU finished with the 78th toughest overall schedule, which included the Clemson Regional games and the super regional against LSU.
'I think that's why I have a difficult time discussing the RPI and some of those factors,' Sabins said. 'There is really only so much you can do and it's an uneven system.'
Meanwhile, the Big 12 season isn't exactly a stroll in the park, but WVU and Arizona were the only Big 12 schools to finish the season ranked in the Top 25.
The SEC had seven of the top 15 and 11 of the top 30, so of course SEC coaches know they have the conference season to fall back on. They essentially don't have to schedule anyone other than cupcakes in the nonconference and then hope for the best once conference play begins.
No one else — not even ACC coaches — have that luxury.
So, is it an 'uneven' system, as Sabins suggested? You bet your baseballs it is.
This is where Sabins' ability to manipulate the system is crucial.
The problem: 'It comes down to you only having four weeks of nonconference games to start the season,' Sabins said. 'It's not like it's 10 weeks. And then, oh by the way, it's still snowing in West Virginia for three of those weeks, so you have to travel south. You can't play midweek games in West Virginia then, either, so you end up asking for a four-game series.'
That is the unfortunate geography mismatch that exists in college baseball, where every school north of Nashville, Tenn. is at a disadvantage in an outdoor sport that begins play on Valentine's Day.
'You don't want to fill your schedule with cupcakes,' Sabins continued. 'But the truth of it is, everybody is playing then. It's not like there are a bunch of good teams searching for games. You kind of get stuck with playing who is willing to play.'
Here is where the RPI can be easily manipulated, and we offer up Hawaii's nonconference schedule as the perfect example.
Hawaii played the second-toughest nonconference schedule in the country this season, so you'd believe that schedule was filled with multiple Top 25 teams and maybe even a couple of series against teams from the American League East, right?
Far from it. Hawaii played just one four-game series against a Top 25-ranked team (No. 4 Oregon State), while the rest of its nonconference schedule was Marshall, Wichita State, a mid-major darling in Northeastern and then one game against USC.
Now, that doesn't exactly look like a gauntlet, but you don't need a gauntlet to manipulate the RPI.
It's really not so much about which schools you can get to agree to play you more than understanding which schools to avoid playing.
WVU played 13 nonconference games last season against schools ranked 201st or higher in the RPI.
Hawaii played none, that's the difference.
So, how can Sabins approach future scheduling?
He believes playing true road games is a boost to an RPI rating, which is true to a point. To that end, WVU was a stellar 24-7 in true road games this season.
But, if it becomes a question of playing a four-game road series against a team ranked 214th in the RPI or playing a neutral-site game against a team in the top 75, the neutral-site game is the way to go.
This is where early-season college baseball tournaments come into play.
To my surprise, there are literally two dozen of them to choose from. One of them is actually played in Surprise (Ariz.), the site of the 2026 Big 12 tournament.
You don't hear much about them, because they are played at the height of the college basketball seasons and only a week, or so after the Super Bowl.
But each one can offer three or four solid RPI matchups against other Power Conference schools who otherwise would never even consider playing the Mountaineers.
WVU traditionally hasn't played in them and hasn't done so since J.J. Wetherholt was a freshman.
'Getting in some of those tournaments is something I think we have to look at for the future,' Sabins said.
It would go a long way toward eliminating the theme of WVU not playing anyone.
It could also be the next evolutionary step for Sabins' coaching career, because he's already proven to be ideal otherwise.
Recruiting, developing players, winning — Sabins is right there. Learning to manipulate the RPI has got to be next on his list.