It’s a key indicator for the NCAA basketball tournament selection when
they’re picking – and seeding – teams for March Madness. And over the past five years, Baylor Basketball ranks in the Top 10 nationwide for average strength of schedule.
The responsibility for building that schedule falls to assistant coach Sam Patterson ’08, MSED ’10, who joined the staff as a manager in 2004, during Coach Scott Drew’s second year, and became a graduate assistant in 2008. Patterson now handles schedule making as part of his responsibilities as the team’s director of video operations. Patterson has also served as camp director of the Scott Drew Basketball Camps at Baylor, and has been a camp coach at more than 20 summer basketball camps nationwide, including Notre Dame, Florida, Ohio State, Butler, and Five Star Basketball.
“A good Big 12 season gets you into the tournament,” Patterson says. “Success with your non-conference schedule and a strong RPI gets you a higher seeding.”
The Rating Percentage Index, commonly as camp director of the Scott Drew Basketball Camps at Baylor, and has been a camp coach at more than 20 summer basketball camps nationwide, including Notre Dame, Florida, Ohio State, Butler, and Five Star Basketball.
“A good Big 12 season gets you into the tournament,” Patterson says. “Success with your non-conference schedule and a strong RPI gets you a higher seeding.”
The Rating Percentage Index, commonly known as the RPI, is a quantity used to rank sports teams based upon a team’s wins and losses and its strength of schedule. The foundation for long-term success is a regular-season schedule that prepares the team to compete in a six-game tournament over three weeks. From 2007-15, Baylor rose to national prominence with Coach Scott Drew leading the team to seven 20-win seasons; seven postseason appearances; the Big 12’s first NIT championship, Baylor’s first postseason tournament title in its 107-year history; and a Big 12-best and school-record 17 postseason wins.
Through mid-December as this issue went to press, Baylor’s RPI was the best in the nation, thanks to an 8-0 record, three wins against Top 10 teams, another win against a perennial national power and two more wins and two more wins against teams predicted to win their conference championships (Florida Gulf Coast and Sam Houston State).
“This has been a best-case scenario for us as we enter our conference schedule,” says Patterson. “At the Atlantis tournament, our opponents were out of our control but we got to play the two best teams (Michigan State and Louisville). We were fortunate that Xavier was undefeated and a highly-ranked team. This kind of early success gives you a great deal of confidence as you get ready for conference.”
Patterson considers former Baylor Assistant Coach Matt Driscoll a mentor and recalls with amusement Driscoll’s parting words when he left Baylor in 2009 to take the head coaching job at the University of North Florida. Driscoll told him that there are two things you never want to be in charge of for a college-basketball program – scheduling and sum- mer camps. “I think it’s actually a good thing,” Patterson says. “It helps you build relationships; many of the managers I’ve worked with are now the guys I’m calling. Will Wade is now the coact at VCU (who Baylor defeated Nov. 23) and I stayed with him at the Clemson camp.”
Patterson believes that the relationships built between coaching staffs play a vital role in maintaining a respectable non-conference schedule year after year.
“Who you know gets you there.” says Patterson. “What you know keeps you there.”
Patterson knows that Baylor basketball fans – like fans of every other competitive team – spend a lot of time commenting on whether this team or that team belongs on the schedule and will place the blame for missing the tournament or getting a tough first-round opponent on the regular season. Patterson sat down with the Baylor Line just before the season tipped off to talk about what goes into building a great schedule.
Where does the process start? It’s a year-round activity. First, I look at the school calendar so I avoid finals, December graduation, and other school events. We can’t schedule games on football days so if I’m scheduling before the football schedule comes out, I make sure the other team knows we may have to move the date, And with the exception of our opening game, we limit doubleheaders with the women’s team so I have to work around their schedule too.
How much input does Scott have? After eight or nine years of doing this, I have a pretty good feel for what Coach Drew wants.He wants me to make sure we have a marquee home game, a good test on the road, no games against Power Conference teams during Christmas break, home games when students are here, and an afternoon game for the ESPN marathon early in the season. We’ll also talk about each opportunity as it comes up. (Editor’s Note: The Power 5 conferences are the Big 12, ACC, Big 10, Pac 12, and Southeastern Conference.)
What impact does football have on the schedule?The university doesn’t let us play on game days, but we’ll try to piggyback a football weekend if we can. We played Vanderbilt last year the day after the Texas game and fans stayed an extra night. This year, (we played) Florida Gulf Coast the night before the Kansas State game.
Where do ideas for opponents come from? From lots of different places. Coach Drew will make suggestions; he tells me every year he’d like to play Georgetown, Connecticut, and UCLA, but it’s tough to get them down here to Waco before their conference schedules. There are message boards for coaches who tell everyone what they’re looking for in terms of specific dates, locations, and willingness to play Home and Home series. Our indicator is wins. We would rather i play a SWAC (Southwestern Athletic Conference) team like Texas Southern that might win 20 games than a mid-to-lower Power 5 team that might only win four conference games.
Some people don’t like seeing teams like Stephen F. Austin and New Mexico State on our schedule, but they are huge RPI games for us. I keep a spreadsheet of mid-major teams that includes wins and losses for the past five years, their top five. returning scorers with their year (e.g., freshman, sophomore), their conference RPI. I’ll look for situations where the top two scorers were freshmen or sophomores and they won 14 games. When we’re the better team on paper, we want to play teams that play fast and have a history of playing a consistent style. All the scheduling people meet during the Final Four. and that’s a good place to build relationships that can result in agreements.
How do you approach:
Rivalry games? Most of our rivalries come from within the conference. We had a Home and Home with Texas A&M that was not renewed because there are some Baylor (and A&M alumni) who want nothing to do with each other. We’re starting a Home and Home series with Xavier this year and that could become a rivalry because we’ve beaten them in the NCAA tournament twice… there was no discussion about playing Georgia State or Yale (which eliminated Baylor from the tournament in the past two seasons).
Non-conference opponents? We tend to play SEC and Pac 12 teams (outside of tournaments) because the Big 10 has : quotas for home games and their challenge is with the ACC.When it comes to playing an in-state team vs an out-of-state ! team and the RPIs are similar, we’ll play the out-of-state team because there is always the possibility that the players for instate schools will have added motivation to play a large Texas school: Especially if they felt we should have recruited them harder or given them a scholarship out of high school.
Holiday tournaments? Atlantis (where Baylor played this year) has been on the schedule for four years. We’ll play in the CBE Coaches vs. Cancer tournament next year and were! looking for our 2018 tournament now. Coach Drew wants us to play a really good Power 5 team and: look for the best field. For the newer tournaments, we’ll wait a bit and look for one where we can add something.I spoke to one elite P5 team and asked them to tell us if they commit to a 2018; tournament that we’re both looking at because that would be a great fit.
True road games? Coach Drew wants to play a tough road game to get us ready and they moved the SEC-Big: is Challenge back into late January this year, so we decided to play a couple of scrimmages at Vanderbilt and Gonzaga in October this year so the players could deal with the travel and playing good teams in different arenas with Big 12 officiating. The only difference is no (hostile) home crowds.
What sort of loyalty do you have toward local opponents or other schools where the coaching staff has relationships? We’re playing John Brown, a NAIA school this year because their head coach and assistant coach were Baylor graduate assistants. They’re excited and they’ll play their game, and it’s a chance for us to help out their program and give them some exposure.
Did moving back the SEC-Big 12 Challenge make your life more difficult? I think there are pros and cons. All we know at the beginning are the dates and whether we’re playing home or away. This year, we il play Ole Miss on the road a few days before we play at Kansas and a few days after we play Texas Tech at home: But it does open up a date in your non conference schedule before conference starts in late December or early January.
Do you pay guarantees? Paying guarantees allow us to play teams at home that will win a lot of games because that drives RPI but not require us to play the next year on their home court. We do pay guarantees up to about $90,000, but we’ve never paid six figures and a lot of teams do. I keep a spreadsheet of mid-major teams that includes wins and losses for the past five years, their top five returning scorers with their year (e.g., freshman, sophomore), their conference RPI I’ll look for situations where the top two scorers were freshmen or sophomores and they won 14 games. We want teams that play fast and have a history of playing a consistent style and won’t change that just to try and beat us. I’ll call around and talk to past opponents. There is no such thing as a good loss in a guarantee game, and in the few cases where we’ve had a close game, I’ve avoided eye contact with Scott on the bench and knew that I was going to be told not to schedule them in the future. (Editor’s Note: Baylor’s guarantee games this season were against Oral Roberts, Sam Houston State, Southern, Texas Southern, and Jackson State).
How does Baylor’s schedule impact recruiting? When we’re recruiting out-of-state players, we’ll let them know we’ll try to play road games in their state if there’s low risk. For example, one of the benefits of playing a few seasons ago at Southern University (in Baton Rouge) was that two of our players were from Louisiana so their friends and families could come see them play. Tournaments are also part of recruiting, because players love the idea of going to Maui or Atlantis. Being on TV is also big for recruiting, and all of our games have been on TV for the past few years.
How is Baylor perceived by other teams looking for opponents? We’re valuable because we’re in the Big 12 and bring a good RPI because of the quality of our league. Overall, we’re probably a tier below the four or five teams considered blue bloods. It’s difficult for anyone to get teams like Kentucky and Duke to play on the road; you normally have to schedule Home and Neutral Site for games against them.
What is your biggest frustration about building a schedule? Not hearing back from a school. Early on, I made the decision I was going to do this job with integrity. There’s nothing worse than being led on by a team that’s trying to get more guarantee money or that really doesn’t want to play you in your building. This is a job that requires a lot of phone calls, a lot of voice mails so the relationships you build are important.
