While Thursday’s overtime loss to No. 23 Ole Miss was painful to say the least, BYU fans can find some consolation in the fact that four major analytics platforms remain high on the Cougars.
We still don’t know if BYU will appear in the AP top 25 this upcoming week, but let’s see how the Cougars stack up in terms of holistic analytics.
ESPN BPI
The ESPN College Basketball Power Index (BPI) is a measure of team strength that is meant to be the best predictor of performance going forward, and it’s calculated by comparing a team’s offensive and defensive performance to the average of all teams.
BYU: 28
Ole Miss: 37
NET Rankings
The NET rankings are used to evaluate teams for the NCAA tournament, and include more components than just winning percentage. They take into account game results, strength of schedule, game location, net offensive and defensive efficiency, and the quality of wins and losses.
NET views the Cougars particularly favorably:
BYU: 12
Ole Miss: 90
KenPom Rankings
KenPom is a predictive ranking system with a complex algorithm based on a variety of factors, including offensive and defensive efficiency, strength of schedule, and recent performance. The goal is to accurately predict how one team would perform against another if they played today.
BYU: 32
Ole Miss: 41
Bart Torvik T-Rank
Similar to KenPom, Bart Torvik’s T-Rank aims to give a complete view of a team’s performance and more positively weights teams that are well-balanced in several areas.
BYU: 25
Ole Miss: 40
Ole Miss absolutely deserves credit for a hard-fought win on Thursday, and metrics should always be taken with a grain of salt. But if these rankings show anything, it’s that statistically the Cougars can go toe to toe with anyone in the country, and they’re doing a lot of things right on both sides of the ball.
This an exciting BYU team that will only get better with every game. It’s early, but this season should be a fun one.