The NET rankings system is a way for the Selection committee to evaluate college basketball teams ahead of the NCAA Tournament. Before of the 2018-19 season, the NCAA created NET to replace the outdated RPI, or Ratings Power Index. Is it the best system out there? No. But NET is one of the most powerful ways to evaluate at-large teams, bubble teams and give you an inside glimpse of how good (or bad) a team is.
If you want to get into the NCAA Tournament, your NET ranking matters. Unlike simple winning percentage, the NET isn’t just about stacking victories — it evaluates the quality of your opponents and how you perform against them. Schedule strategically, and the NET can work in your favor.
What is the NET?
The NET, or NCAA Evaluation Tool, is a way for the Selection committee to measure how good a team is ahead of the NCAA Tournament. It uses five different criteria:
- Game results
- Strength of schedule
- Game location
- Scoring margin (capped at 10 points per game)
- Net offensive/defensive efficiency
Another key element of the NET is that it doesn’t factor in when you play an opponent, only how good that team is at the time the rankings are evaluated. That matters because it prevents teams from getting an artificial boost for beating an opponent early in the season who later proves to be mediocre. Instead of rewarding timing, the NET uses its quadrant system to contextualize wins and losses based on opponent quality and game location.
What are Quadrant 1, 2, 3 and 4 wins?
QUADRANTS | NET RANKING |
|---|---|
QUAD 1 | Home: 1-30 |
QUAD 2 | Home: 31-75 |
QUAD 3 | Home: 76-160 |
QUAD 4 | Home: 161-353 |
The NET uses a quadrant system to contextualize how good or bad a win was over a particular opponent. Each quadrant has qualifications, meaning your opponents' NET ranking at the time of the game will classify it as a Quad 1 (the highest ranked teams) or a Quad 4 (the lowest ranked teams) opponent. That said, that could change by the end of the season.
This is important because playing a lot of Quad 1 teams will help your NET ranking. You have to win some of them, but it doesn’t punish you for losing them either.
Why the NET matters this year
The NET matters this week because you get to see the good and the bad. The good is that the undefeated (29-0m ranked No. 18) Miami (OH) RedHawks are on the verge of being a true Quad 1 team. The bad is that their NET ranking is holding them back from being an NCAA Tournament lock. To put it in perspective, most of the ranked mid-major teams have already locked up a probable spot in the tournament.
Miami is a victim of a bad schedule. They have played 26 Division I opponents (and three non-D1 opponents). It’s hard for the Selection committee to say that Miami is as good as they think they are with very bad non-conference opponents.
Because of that, teams like Auburn, which has 14 losses and one win in the last month, can still be a bubble team. Why? Because their NET ranking is 39, despite being 5-11 against Quad 1 opponents. That’s because they have 16 Quad 1 opponents compared to Miami’s zero. That’s the dark side of the NET rankings.
Criticisms to the NET rankings
One of the biggest criticisms is that the NET values Quad 1 games more than it probably should. What the NET does is create all Quad 1 games equal rather than having a substantial enough difference between wins and losses. Essentially, you get credited for playing more Quad 1 teams rather than winning them.
RPI only took winning percentage as its evaluating factor, but the NET overcorrects and doesn’t value wins like it should. That’s why P4 teams will be favored more using the NET over mid-major programs — they’re going to have higher-quality opponents and have more of them late in the season.
How do NET rankings compare to KenPom rankings?
KenPom rankings are the other top advanced analytics used in evaluating teams, but they serve different purposes. KenPom is designed primarily as a predictive tool, estimating how strong a team is moving forward based on efficiency and underlying performance. The NET, on the other hand, is results-driven. It evaluates what a team has actually accomplished and uses its model to contextualize those outcomes. In short, KenPom projects what a team might be, while the NET reflects what a team has done.
It’s good because you get really solid tools like offensive and defensive efficiency. That’s solid in determining how well a team plays and predicting what they’ll look like in the future.