Commentary: The top five, as determined by Rewards, matched the polls' top five fairly well, except for Santa Clara, whose only loss was to 16-8 San Jose State (during the regular season). Santa Clara ended up ranked #3 by the AP poll - and #4 in the UPI - but ended up #8 in the Rewards ranking, mainly because even though their best win was over 20-4 Columbia, their next strongest opponent was only 16-10 (Houston). Therefore, their weighted average win was much lower than many other teams that had more losses, placing them lower than 5 such teams. Likewise for the next five teams: only New Mexico State (#19 according to Rewards) ranked fairly far away from their placement in the polls: #12 in the AP, and #9 in the UPI.
UCLA won NCAA championship for a third year in a row, and runner-up Purdue (#6 in both polls and the Rewards ranking) moved up to #4 in the Rewards ranking, with their 5 losses keeping them "behind" LaSalle (one loss, and they were not allowed to play in any post season tournaments this year) and Davidson (3 losses, and #5 in the AP, and #3 in the UPI polls that can out before the tournaments). Marquette's success in making the Elite Eight elevated them four places (to #17) in the final Rewards ranking, and Colorado State (#19 according to the UPI pollsters, and unranked by the AP voters) defeated Colorado (#18 in the, #12 in the UPI), which them moved up from #31 to #28. Miami of Ohio's upset of Notre Dame (#17 in the AP poll) caused them to jump from #83 to #67, and Weber State's win over Seattle - and regional consolation win over #12 (AP) /#9(UPI; #19 - Rewards) New Mexico State - pushed them forward 3 places (to #13) in the final Rewards ranking. NIT champion Temple, jumped from #39 to #27, and runner-up Boston College (who lost by 13 points to the Owls) moved up some too: from #10 to #7.
(This page last modified January 06, 2011 .)