X-band '01

It's more frustrating watching Dayton wet themselves against A-10 also-rans (especially Rhode Island).

Here's something for UD fans to chew on. Let's suppose they finally crack the code and win at Cintas. Let's also suppose they follow that up with another win at home over Xavier. If they go 12-4 or 13-3 in the A-10 with their usual stellar NC performance, they're dancing. Period. end of story.

But if they go 10-6 with losses against teams like La Salle, URI, or Duquesne, they can count on yet another NIT appearance.

(Note to La Salle fans - if you think we're picking on you unnecessarily, we're just not sold on 1-year wonders.)

vaNtR

Still going all-out, look at the non-conference schedule for Temple over the next 2 seasons.

stophorseabuse

JP, you make these claims assuming Detroit and Butler will be near equal. I don't think so. I think Butler is top 50 this year.

As far as X working with the A10 with a bunch of cupcakes, you would have to assume the A10 would win those gimmes. I have seen enough losses to NJIT to not trust the bottom half of this league to beat the cupcakes.

As far as it coming off arrogant, sorry?

X and Temple take care of business like clockwork. It's not X's fault this game was pre scheduled. Xavier doesn't need to change anything. It is almost coming off like this was intentional. It is a freak one time deal.

jpschmack

That's half-right. But EVERY team has aspirations of being top six, and only SIX actually ARE top six teams. All OOC losses devalue your conference slate, no one cares if your marquee wins are conference wins or OOC.

What at-large caliber teams did SDSU, New Mexico and Colorado State beat OOC last season? Saint Louis. That's it. Long Beach State, Colorado, and Cal if you want to use the term loosely. But they went 8-8 vs each other and all got in.

The reason a loss to LaSalle or GW later in the conference schedule "phucks*" over an A-10 bubble team IS BECAUSE WE LOSE TOO MANY NON-CONFERENCE GAMES.

We lose too many OOC games, because everyone thinks like you do ("We have to play four good teams OOC because no one will respect the A-10 games!") and schedules games they're going to lose.

Charlotte played three NCAA tournament teams, plus Miami and Arkansas, went 8-5 OOC. Schedule like Dayton and they'd be 11-2. But they're 13-16 and when UMass loses to Charlotte, they are plucked.

It's not the OOC SOS keeping Dayton out, it's their 9-7, 8-8, 7-9 conference mark that's kept them out. The only time they had double-digit A10 wins the last seven years, the made the dance. Dayton's OOC performance has been absolutely what you want from everyone in the league.

Acting like "The A-10 is a mid-major, so we have to schedule for an NCAA at-large" is what's keeping us from ACTUALLY BEING A MAJOR CONFERENCE.

A major conference is a league with a ton of good teams, where almost everyone is pretty good and lots of teams have the ability to go far in the NCAAs.

Xavier, Temple, Butler, VCU, Saint Louis, Dayton, Saint Joseph's, UMass. That's a ton of good teams.
Our last-place team beat a ranked team last season, so everyone is pretty good.
X goes to Sweet 16s all the time, VCU and Butler have Final Four banners, UMass is the 2014 national champion, and St. Bona had a top 20 NBA draft pick. Sounds like a major conference to me.

Again, that's my point. 10-6 in the A-10 should be enough to make the NCAA Tournament. The reason it's not is because WE SCHEDULE NON-CONFERENCE AS IF WE WERE A MID-MAJOR CONFERENCE.

Mid-Majors are dead. We killed the Horizon and Colonial. Big East football killed C-USA and the MWC. The WCC is in the same boat as us. There's 23 one-bid leagues and the ACC, SEC, B10, B12, P12, WCC and A10 are major conferences. Let's F***ing start acting like it.

jpschmack

I think Butler will be far better than Detroit in terms of talent. But there's a difference between talent and "helping you get an NCAA bid." A marquee win in the NCAA's eyes is an at-large contender or NCAA lock.

First off, Xavier is gonna win the gimmes. As for the rest of the A-10, if they play four more cupcakes and lose one of them, we're all still better off than if they play four legit NCAA teams and lose all four. Which GW did last season.

If the bottom half of the league is 11-4 OOC against really bad teams and have four really horrible losses... what does it matter? They'd have more wins, and they get more NCAA money when we send more teams to the dance.

Is it disappointing to lose to crappy team like NJIT? Hell yes. But that doesn't mean going to Syracuse and Kansas State and losing by a combined 48 points is better. I understand you need to get paid, but cut those games in half, take your whoopin at 'Cuse for the paycheck. But if you are 16-14 instead of 13-17, you'll have more fans at home guys. You'll buy out less coaches and you'll get more NCAA loot from the league.

No worries, I probably sound like a pompous know-it-all.

Like I said, there's ONE real reason to not change it. And that's "ESPN would have dropped one of us from the TV schedule to change it."

I know it's a one-time deal by unusual circumstances. But it's a detriment to the league.

And it's a prime example of the logic that's weighing us down. If WE don't respect our conference schedule (by sacrificing their value for "marquee OOC games") why should the Selection Committee or anyone else?

As I've said multiple times, I think Xavier and Dayton have been the models for OOC schedule for a long time. Dayton plays a weaker OOC, but damnit they get their wins. Xavier plays a tougher (often too tough) OOC slate, but they deliver.

It's teams picked in the middle or bottom who play 4-6 games against quality teams. Play 2-3, forget the decent mid-majors and just blow the doors off someone crappy.

Tulane went 12-2 OOC last season. Against the #340 OOC SOS. You could say "it didn't get them ready for C-USA play," but the truth is, they had the same conference record as when they played OOC SOS #144 and went 5-7. They still got paid to go get their butts whipped (at Syracuse instead of at Texas). C-USA got two bids. Their fans were pumped for three months, they sold more tickets, had a better atmosphere and 13-16 looks a lot better than 8-21.

And their SOS Impact was a lot better than GW's, who played the #48 OOC SOS, went 5-9 and killed our RPIs.

FlyingElvis

Yeah, I don't see how any A10 team could be unhappy about what UD has done for the league in the OOC portion of the schedule for the last 10 years. I think their scheduling and OOC results have been what you want. We've just given too much of our mojo to lower level A10 teams during the conference schedule.

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paulxu

All the math aside, if you are bubble material on selection Sunday, and they look at your OOC schedule to see (in their words) if you went on the road and played top teams, a lot of OOC wins against really bad teams (although wins) doesn't fit that criteria.

Sure, the A10 may have more of those bubble selection problems because of inbred bias to the Big 6 conferences, but it is what it is. So one or two really quality road games become important.

So, do you pad the math for the whole conference's benefit...or do you take the tough road game OOC to help yourself on selection Sunday?

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stophorseabuse

JP. Finally, I mainly agree.

The Lasalles, duquesnes, Rhodies, and Daypons of the league need to schedule for wins (not every year, just typically). That makes perfect sense. X going 26-4 with a cupcake schedule would get them a 7 seed, even if the A10 played the same rpi game the big east did. As you point out there is a BE bias. Talking heads would be outraged the a10 beat no one out of conference but has all these top 50 to top 100 rpi teams.

The A10 would get punished.

Finally, I think that would be HILARIOUS.

AdamtheFlyer

"We" don't cry on selection Sunday. We know exactly why Dayton has missed out on 4 of the last 5 NCAA tourneys. It's A10 play. You can't win 7-8-9 A10 games and have any realistic hope for a bid, no matter your OOC record or schedule. The year Dayton won 11 A10 games? Well, they got a bid. With a rather weak OOC slate. That year they had a win over Marquette on a neutral floor, a loss at Creighton (NIT team), and a win over George Mason (NIT team).

The next year, Dayton played a much better schedule with much tougher games away from home, and they went to the NIT. Why? they went 8-8 in the A10. Last year's team had good wins, including a road win at Temple. Everything was set up for them, until they hiccuped and lost two home games they had no business losing. If you're an intelligent person who pays attention, you see exactly why Dayton has made a habit of living in the NIT. It's not the OOC slate.

Dayton doesn't need a shift in scheduling philosophy, and they don't need to be "battle tested". They simply need to be better against their direct peers.

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xavierhoops

I know you think your scheduling model will cure all problems in the A-10 and make us a major conference overnight... but the problem is the A-10 does not have enough teams that would classify as "marquee" or big wins. With Temple leaving, it's about Butler and VCU that could consistently be considered marquee wins.

That's why Xavier will play Butler in OOC and not Detroit.

Again, it's a one-time, isolated event. Whether Xavier plays Butler twice or Butler once and Detroit once will not, again WILL NOT, determine whether UMass or St. Joe's or any other A-10 teams makes the NCAA tournament.

paulxu

Adam, I don't think what you say about last year would work.
If you had one more win you would have been at 10-6 in conference like X.
But Dayton only went on the road twice last year; once to Miami and once to Murray St, losing both.
When the committee says that when looking at bubble teams they look to see if you went on the road and played tough games, I don't think that's enough.
Murray St. ended up OK SOS wise, but you need to do that more.

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AdamtheFlyer

You're making an assumption with no facts to back it up. What kind of wins away from home did other bubble teams have? Keep in mind, the committee is not giving out charity, it's about who you beat not who you played. It's also not just about road games now with so many neutral floor exempt events. How many bubble teams had the overall mass of quality wins that UD had?

Again, if you say scheduling is holding UD back, show your work. Feel free to post facts and not lazy assumptions to back up your opinion.

I'll help get you started:

http://realtimerpi.com/rpi_225_Men.html

Look at all those OOC wins away from home.

Did UD deserve a bid? Nope. But it sure wasn't OOC record or schedule that held them back.

Funny thing is, jpschmack is far closer to the truth than people want to admit. The easiest path to an OOC bid in all of the top 8 leagues is to rack up a ton of OOC wins over anyone, and do well in the league (in the A10 that's a top 3 finish). That's the "secret" when it comes to impressing the committee. If you do those two things, you're going to get a bid 9 times out of 10.

Do I want UD playing 12 cupcakes every year OOC? No. I want to see them play the best schedule possible, because they've proven they can handle it, and it's a whole lot more fun to watch. But there's no denying it, playing SEMO and their 14 cousins every year would increase UD's chances at a bid. Same goes for every school in our league.

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Sure, I've been called a xenophobe, but the truth is, I'm not. I honestly just feel that America is the best country and the other countries aren't as good. That used to be called patriotism.

paulxu

From this article: http://espn.go.com/mens-college-bask...l-suited-chair

Our record wasn't all that great last year. A key element seems to have been noted in the article of our 2011-12 schedule...we went on the road and played tough teams at Vandy, Butler and Memphis. Winning 2 out of 3 I think helped us on selection Sunday. But more importantly it was part of our scheduled that we controlled.

I hope you are right for Dayton's sake. Bobinksi is the chair this year.

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MudFlap

I don't think the ESPN article could make it any clearer. They are quoting the chairman of the selection committee. They are TELLING YOU that if Team A plays a tough OOC schedule and goes .500, they will be favored over a B team's 10-0 record against bunnies. Schedule up.

Flyer75

But Adam's argument couldn't be any clearer either. The ESPN article may be right but the FACT remains no matter what OOC schedule UD played last year, 9 wins in last year's A10 wasn't going to get us in...shy of a Top 10 OOC schedule, which no one had in the A10. It's not hard to figure out. Do you, Horse or Flap, really think that if UD were playing as well as X was in the A10 portion that we would be left out...15 wins, 13 wins, 12 wins, 10 win type seasons...??? Really? vs. 8,9,8,7, 8?????

We even had a season where we entered conf play ranked in the Top 25 and beat another ranked conf team (URI in OT) and then proceeded to completely crap the bed. I suppose that was the OOC issue again though....