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No. 4/4 UCLA is climbing in the strength of schedule rankings at just the right time.
UCLA despite two home losses to No. 1/1 BYU during the weekend jumped five spots to No. 5 in the new strength of schedule rankings that the NCAA released this week.
The Bruins entering the final week of the regular season have the third best strength of schedule among teams projected in Off the Block’s bracketology to be under NCAA Tournament consideration. In addition, UCLA can potentially surpass both BYU and Long Beach State in the strength of schedule rankings by the end of the weekend, according to Off the Block projections.
Along with UCLA moving into the top five, UC Irvine continues to hold the top spot in the strength of schedule rankings. Mount Olive also remained at No. 1 in the non-conference strength of schedule rankings.
Strength of schedule is among the various pieces of criteria the selection committee can use to determine the NCAA Tournament field.
Strength of schedule (as of April 3)
1. UC Irvine
2. Long Beach State
3. BYU
4. Hawai’i
5. UCLA
6. Pepperdine
7. Stanford
8. Ohio State
9. USC
10. CSUN
11. UC Santa Barbara
12. Lindenwood
13. Loyola
14. Ball State
15. Mount Olive
16. Lewis
17. Penn State
18. Quincy
19. IPFW
20. Cal Baptist
21. McKendree
22. UC San Diego
23. Princeton
24. Erskine
25. Barton
26. Limestone
27. George Mason
28. North Greenville
29. Pfeiffer
30. Grand Canyon
31. Alderson Broaddus
32. St. Francis
33. Emmanuel
34. NJIT
35. Lees-McRae
36. Sacred Heart
37. Coker
38. King
39. Belmont Abbey
40. Charleston
41. Harvard
42. Concordia-Irvine
43. Holy Names
Non-conference strength of schedule (as of April 3)
1. Mount Olive
2. UC Irvine
3. Pfeiffer
4. UCLA
5. Penn State
6. Princeton
7. Erskine
8. Limestone
9. Stanford
10. Ohio State
11. Ball State
12. Loyola
13. Lindenwood
14. George Mason
15. Hawai’i
16. Barton
17. Long Beach State
18. USC
19. Lewis
20. Emmanuel
21. St. Francis
22. Quincy
23. NJIT
24. Sacred Heart
25. UC Santa Barbara
26. IPFW
27. BYU
28. Alderson Broaddus
29. Coker
30. Pepperdine
31. Lees-McRae
32. King
33. Harvard
34. Concordia-Irvine
35. Charleston
36. Holy Names
37. CSUN
38. McKendree
39. North Greenville
40. Grand Canyon
41. Cal Baptist
42. Belmont Abbey
43. UC San Diego
Where does one go to learn how this is calculated?
SOS is the overall average winning percentage of all the opponents a team has played this season. It’s updated real-time so Long Beach State’s upcoming match vs. UC San Diego is going to drag down the 49ers SOS because the Tritons have less than a .200 winning percentage.
Interesting, thank you. For some reason I was thinking it only counted the games yet to be played.