I am using Ragdyer's solution to assign a rank based on score (col BH) among
matching items (col BF):

=SUMPRODUCT(($BF$5:$BF$291=BF8)*(BH8<$BH$5:$BH$291 ))+1

But what's buggin me is why RANK is malfunctioning for this application:

=RANK(BH5,IF(BF5=$BF$5:$BF$291,$BH$5:$BH$291))

Instead of returning the rank of BH5 among only matching items (when all the
terms in column BF match the current term), I am getting a RANK of the items
as if there were no subarray produced by referencing column BF. The IF
statement seems to be producing an array of values (when BF matches) and
"FALSE" (when BF does not match). If the RANK function does not even see all
those non-matching values, how could it be working (malfunctioning)?

Bueller? . . . Bueller?

TIA