As I did with the men yesterday, I’m going to take a look at which teams made the NCAA tournament and the NIT from those who were on the women’s basketball team’s 2007-2008 schedule.
The Colonials (24-5, 12-2 Atlantic 10 regular season) played 28 regular season games against 27 opponents (they played Richmond twice). Thirteen of those teams are in one of the two post-season tournaments, with seven in the NCAA tournament and six in the NIT. The teams in the Big Dance, with their seedings: No. 2 Rutgers, No. 2 Texas A&M, No. 4 Virginia, No. 9 Xavier, No. 11 Temple, No. 11 Auburn and No. 10 Western Kentucky. Those in the NIT (seedings not yet available as of Tuesday afternoon): Charlotte, Dayton, James Madison, Kentucky, South Dakota State and Villanova. GW beat 10 of these teams in the regular season.
According to realtimeRPI.com, the Colonials currently have an RPI of 28 and a strength of schedule of 70, including their win in the quarterfinals of the A-10 tournament and the loss in the semis. Thirty-one of the teams in the NCAA tournament have lower RPIs and 23 have lower strengths of schedule.
Five teams from the A-10 are still playing (GW, Xavier, Temple, Charlotte, Dayton). The conference ranks 10th in RPI.
As is the case every year, the women’s squad played a very tough schedule this season. Its strength of schedule is also hurt because the A10 is somewhat weak, although, with the exception of 0-28 Fordham, the conference was much improved this year. GW had the sixth-highest RPI of schools not in one of the six BCS conferences.