A closer look at the 2011 schedule

Here are the final 2010 RPI numbers for the teams on MU's tentative 2011 schedule. RPI numbers are from Boyd's World Pseudo-RPI final rankings. MU is also listed with their 2010 RPI, for comparison purposes.

0.624 Texas (3 games)
0.604 Oklahoma (3 games)
0.590 Texas A&M (3 games)
0.583 North Carolina
0.571 Baylor (3 games)
0.561 Kansas State (3 games)
0.556 Texas State
0.548 Texas Tech (3 games)
0.547 Kansas (4 games)
0.545 Southern Cal
0.544 Nebraska (3 games)
0.536 Missouri
0.529 UNC-Charlotte (4 games)
0.520 Oklahoma State (3 games)
0.515 Central Michigan (4 games)
0.514 Lemoyne (3 games)
0.503 Cal Poly
0.499 Illinois
0.479 Gonzaga (2 games)
0.479 Missouri State (2 games)
0.464 Illinois-Chicago (4 games)
0.464 Central Arkansas (2 games)
0.456 Eastern Illinois
0.423 SIU-Edwardsville

As we do every year, we've adapted a statistic used by Boyd Nation at Boyd's World which he calls the Intended Schedule Strength. We're taking a look at the average final RPI numbers for the teams on the schedule (counting each team's RPI as many times as they will play MU on the schedule), with the goal of seeing what the Tiger coaches are expecting from their assemblage of opponents. Of course, neither they nor we have any way of knowing how well MU's opponents will actually perform in 2001 as compared to 2010, but their most recent statistics are all we have to go on.

Based on that approach, Missouri's intended schedule strength for 2011 comes out to 0.533

Tim Jamieson's Intended Schedule Strength had been moving slowly upward over the past few years, with a dip of just .001 last year. The 2011 ISS, though, represents a step backward.

2011: .533
2010: .540
2009: .541
2008: .537
2007: .534
2006: .532
2005: .528
2004: .528

I'm really hoping someone will send me an e-mail telling me I've made a mistake in my math, but those are the numbers I come up with.