Dolphin Ratings - Women's National Basketball Association

Explanation: Each team is listed with its record, overall score differential, and its ratings. Brief explanations of the ratings follow.

Schedule The number in this column is the effective opponent strength of a team. In other words, they would be expected to have the same record had they played all games against an opponent of this predictive rating at a neutral site. Because this calculation depends on the strength of the team in question, it is not possible to rank schedules using these values.
Expected Losses For college teams, this number is the number of losses an average ranked (top 15 hockey; otherwise top 25) team would be expected to have against the team's schedule. For pro teams, this is the number of losses an average team would be expected to have against the team's schedule. Unlike the schedule ranking, this value can be used to rank schedules.
Standard Ranks teams in an order such that a team is "probably better" than all teams ranked lower than it. This calculation uses margin of victory only for computing a team's opponents strengths; the team's rating itself is computed using only wins, losses, and ties relative to its schedule
Median Likelihood Determines the likely ratings for each team, based on its wins, losses, and ties relative to its schedule. This generally produces the same or similar ratings as the standard ranking.
Predictive Both schedule strength and rating vs. schedule strength are determined considering both the wins and losses and the score differentials. This rating contains none of the biases in the standard rating, but does weight recent games slightly more than past games since those are a better indication of the team's current strength. This rating is the best of the first three for seeing how good teams are, and thus is the best for predicting future results.
Improved RPI Rating The improved RPI formula is similar to the standard RPI, except that the schedule strength is carried out to infinite depth instead of ending with opponents' opponents, thus allows for a better comparison of isolated groups of teams than is given by the standard RPI calculation. It is similar to the simple rating, except that all games are given equal weight.
Scoring. This value indicates how many points a team would be expected to score if it played an identical team.
Offense. This combines the predictive and scoring ratings to measure how many points a team scores. The number is the predictive rating of an opponent against whom the team would be expected to score the league average number of points. This does not necessarily rate a team's offensive abilities, as a fast pace in basketball or big-play defense in football can make a team score more points.
Defense. This combines the predictive and scoring ratings to measure how many points a team allows. The number is the predictive rating of an opponent against whom the team would be expected to allow the league average number of points. The same caveat in the predictive-offense rating applies here.

In order to increase early-season stability, the three main rankings, the improved RPI, and the college pseudopoll include priors based on the previous season final predictive ratings and occasionally incorporating preseason predictions of various major publications. The other rankings for college sports do not include priors, and thus can be wildly unstable early in the year. A team whose rankings are affected by this prior is noted with a P following its rankings.

Full Ranking

                                          STANDARD   MED LIKELY  PREDICTIVE  IMPRVD RPI    SCORING     OFFENSE     DEFENSE 
TEAM       W  L   PF   PA  SCHED  ELOSS  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING
LYNX      31  9 3441 3071  0.020 18.489    1  0.631    1  0.630    1  0.664    1 0.5630    8  3.616    1  0.584    1  0.745
MERCURY   25 14 3240 3105  0.062 19.299    2  0.364    3  0.370    3  0.291    2 0.5362    6  3.630    6  0.272    4  0.311
ACES      26 14 3308 3263  0.026 19.644    3  0.351    2  0.372    5  0.179    3 0.5354    5  3.651    7  0.248    6  0.109
DREAM     25 14 3254 3008  0.037 18.529    4  0.328    4  0.320    2  0.538    4 0.5318   11  3.598    3  0.380    2  0.695
LIBERTY   24 16 3405 3240  0.048 19.442    5  0.241    5  0.239    4  0.217    5 0.5248    3  3.672    2  0.381    7  0.052
FEVER     22 18 3392 3271 -0.017 18.666    6  0.090    7  0.087    7  0.155    7 0.5081    4  3.664    5  0.284    8  0.025
STORM     22 19 3379 3276  0.020 19.820    7  0.089    6  0.092    6  0.167    6 0.5089    9  3.612    8  0.069    5  0.264
VALKYRIES 20 18 2997 2934 -0.015 17.992    8  0.034    8  0.036    8  0.143    8 0.5051   13  3.536   10 -0.276    3  0.563
SPARKS    17 20 3183 3266 -0.003 18.303    9 -0.103    9 -0.087    9 -0.165    9 0.4908    1  3.751    4  0.357   12 -0.687
MYSTICS   16 24 3116 3264 -0.042 19.546   10 -0.253   10 -0.240   10 -0.400   10 0.4747   12  3.586   11 -0.610    9 -0.190
TEAM       W  L   PF   PA  SCHED  ELOSS  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING
SUN       10 29 2976 3342 -0.030 19.788   11 -0.566   11 -0.552   12 -0.564   11 0.4429   10  3.609   12 -0.674   10 -0.453
WINGS      9 31 3269 3524  0.009 20.535   12 -0.601   13 -0.617   11 -0.489   13 0.4379    2  3.711    9 -0.151   13 -0.826
SKY        9 30 2957 3353 -0.000 20.439   13 -0.605   12 -0.599   13 -0.735   12 0.4384    7  3.617   13 -0.814   11 -0.657

WESTERN CONFERENCE
                                          STANDARD   MED LIKELY  PREDICTIVE  IMPRVD RPI    SCORING     OFFENSE     DEFENSE 
TEAM       W  L   PF   PA  SCHED  ELOSS  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING
LYNX      31  9 3441 3071  0.020 18.489    1  0.631    1  0.630    1  0.664    1 0.5630    8  3.616    1  0.584    1  0.745
MERCURY   25 14 3240 3105  0.062 19.299    2  0.364    3  0.370    3  0.291    2 0.5362    6  3.630    6  0.272    4  0.311
ACES      26 14 3308 3263  0.026 19.644    3  0.351    2  0.372    5  0.179    3 0.5354    5  3.651    7  0.248    6  0.109
STORM     22 19 3379 3276  0.020 19.820    7  0.089    6  0.092    6  0.167    6 0.5089    9  3.612    8  0.069    5  0.264
VALKYRIES 20 18 2997 2934 -0.015 17.992    8  0.034    8  0.036    8  0.143    8 0.5051   13  3.536   10 -0.276    3  0.563
SPARKS    17 20 3183 3266 -0.003 18.303    9 -0.103    9 -0.087    9 -0.165    9 0.4908    1  3.751    4  0.357   12 -0.687
WINGS      9 31 3269 3524  0.009 20.535   12 -0.601   13 -0.617   11 -0.489   13 0.4379    2  3.711    9 -0.151   13 -0.826

EASTERN CONFERENCE
                                          STANDARD   MED LIKELY  PREDICTIVE  IMPRVD RPI    SCORING     OFFENSE     DEFENSE 
TEAM       W  L   PF   PA  SCHED  ELOSS  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING  RNK RATING
DREAM     25 14 3254 3008  0.037 18.529    4  0.328    4  0.320    2  0.538    4 0.5318   11  3.598    3  0.380    2  0.695
LIBERTY   24 16 3405 3240  0.048 19.442    5  0.241    5  0.239    4  0.217    5 0.5248    3  3.672    2  0.381    7  0.052
FEVER     22 18 3392 3271 -0.017 18.666    6  0.090    7  0.087    7  0.155    7 0.5081    4  3.664    5  0.284    8  0.025
MYSTICS   16 24 3116 3264 -0.042 19.546   10 -0.253   10 -0.240   10 -0.400   10 0.4747   12  3.586   11 -0.610    9 -0.190
SUN       10 29 2976 3342 -0.030 19.788   11 -0.566   11 -0.552   12 -0.564   11 0.4429   10  3.609   12 -0.674   10 -0.453
SKY        9 30 2957 3353 -0.000 20.439   13 -0.605   12 -0.599   13 -0.735   12 0.4384    7  3.617   13 -0.814   11 -0.657

DIVISION             W   L   PCT  RNK RATING
WESTERN CONFERENCE 150 125 0.545    1  0.123
EASTERN CONFERENCE 106 131 0.447    2 -0.142

Home field advantage amounts to:
     0.309 points in main ratings (0.226 for semineutral)
     0.030 points in improved RPI (0.023 for semineutral)
Average of 2.15 points per score

Predict score:








Team Strength vs. Time Plot:






posted: Sun Aug 31 05:30:19 2025
games through: Sat Aug 30 2025

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