With Big Ten Tournament wins, Rutgers baseball moves up five spots in college baseball RPI

Rutgers baseball is moving up the RPI with their wins at the Big Ten Tournament.

The Big Ten Tournament has been good for Rutgers baseball, likely putting the Scarlet Knights in position to make the NCAA Tournament.

Rutgers opened the Big Ten Tournament with a win over Purdue and then followed it up with a Friday night win over Penn State. Those two wins have now propelled Rutgers (43-14, 17-7 Big Ten) up the RPI standings.

As of an update through May 27, Rutgers baseball is now up five spots in the latest RPI update and sit at No. 38 nationally in the metric.

Only Maryland, at fourth in the RPI, is higher in the Big Ten.

The Scarlet Knights are doing exactly what they’re supposed to do in order to build an NCAA Tournament resume. Before the start of the conference tournament, Big Ten Network analyst Michael Huff said that Rutgers needed a couple of wins to secure their spot in the NCAA Tournament.

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He said that getting their RPI up would be important for them in order to grab an at-large bid.

“Since they are the two seed, they need to win the first two games.  I think this will get their RPI from 41 into the 30s…same can be said of Iowa – win first two games to get RPI into the 40s from mid-50s,” Huff said this past Tuesday in an interview with RutgersWire.

“If you can beat Iowa in the second game, then Rutgers just needs to win one more game before getting knocked out.  3-2, in my opinion, gets you the NCAA.  The easiest way into the NCAA tournament is to just win the Big Ten Tourney.”

Rutgers baseball hasn’t made the NCAA Tournament since 2007.

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