2018 Season - Non-BE Games Of Interest...

[DudeAnon]

No problem. Thanks for listening.

I'm not some "Hey, we're just as good as you!" homer. I'm a realist. We're a ridiculous long-shot to ever be a Big East team because everyone ASSUMES the same thing about conference expansion.

It would be an incredibly ballsy move to add St. Bonaventure to the Big East. Because you'd either have to say "We don't NEED strength, we're good with strength. They help us CONFIGURE." (Which you shouldn't say). Or you'd have to say "We can't find a program that's at our level outside of Gonzaga... so we're going to MAKE ONE." (which you probably wouldn't say either.

But the fact is, conference play is a limiting agent. If the Big East had a SINGLE-ROUND robin, you could send all 10 teams. But when the 9th best team in the league plays 16 games against NCAA calibre programs, they're probably going 5-13 in conference. And that's not going to be enough to get a bid.

Is anyone complaining about the inability to make the NCAA tournament? I can't think of a single time yet when a fanbase here was outraged over not making it. Big East now averages more than half of the conference making the dance every year. All you have to do is defend home court and you are guaranteed an entry.

Don't get me wrong, I am not opposed to expansion (although only UD, VCU and UConn should be considered) but unlike the Bonnies who have reasons to hate the selection committee thus far it has been more than fair to the Big East.

[gtmoBlue]

Outrage no, but several fans have voiced disappointment over not making the dance. Perhaps the committee has been "fair" to the BE, for the most part, but everyone can't win all their home games, so the 7th and 8th place teams are always on the bubble. Teams can go 10-8 and 9-9 but not make it in. With 1 or 2 more teams those bubble teams get 2 to 4 more wins.

You are betting on the wrong teams to get in (Dayton, VCU, UConn) as other conference teams will block them, and the UConn ship sailed away.

The Zags are gone, so give me ND and Duke. No chance with them? Give me SLU and St Bonaventure.

[JPSchmack]

Is anyone complaining about the inability to make the NCAA tournament? I can't think of a single time yet when a fanbase here was outraged over not making it. Big East now averages more than half of the conference making the dance every year. All you have to do is defend home court and you are guaranteed an entry.

Don't get me wrong, I am not opposed to expansion (although only UD, VCU and UConn should be considered) but unlike the Bonnies who have reasons to hate the selection committee thus far it has been more than fair to the Big East.

Right... I don't think anyone in the Big East is saying "Hey, this conference is screwing our chances to make the NCAA Tournament" because it IS results based. It’s your own fault if you miss the dance, because you had the chances and you lost too much. But that’s my point: It is impossible to have a 10-team conference as strong as the Big East, playing 18 conference games, without 3 or 4 teams losing “too much” to make the NCAA Tournament.

TEAM A: 10-2 OOC vs OOC SOS 18, OOC RPI 18
TEAM B: 10-2 OOC vs OOC SOS 9, OOC RPI 17

TEAM A: 1-1 vs RPI Top 50 in conference play
TEAM A: 8-0 vs RPI 150+ in conference play

TEAM B: 2-10 vs RPI Top 50 in conference play
TEAM B: 1-1 vs RPI 150+ in conference play

Team A is in 107 of 110 bracket projections right now (Bona)
Team B is 14-16 and has to win the BET to make the dance (St John’s)


xudash was saying my philosophy is “manufacturing” bids. But I think it’s the opposite. I think your configuration is destroying bids from teams capable of getting them. Ten programs THIS STRONG in the same conference is forcing teams to be weaker than they really are. St. John’s isn’t losing because they aren’t an NCAA program. St. John’s is losing because someone in the Big East has to.

I don’t see how anyone can say “You’re wrong, it isn’t the strength of the Big East; St. John’s just isn’t good enough” when St. John’s beat Duke and Villanova. NINE of you have appeared in the ESPN bracket projection at one point in the season. aka "Take care of business, and you're in" but you taking care of your business means you just handed a loss to someone else.

Other power conferences have bad teams because they are good football/bad basketball; Or because they joined the league in the 1930s, before TV contracts were a thing. The Big East doesn’t have football, and is brand new conference. You’re a peer group of one. That’s why it’s possible for you to kill the NCAA hopes of 3 to 4 NCAA programs administratively through your configuration and no one else is really in that position. Because they don’t have the top-to-bottom strength of the Big East. It makes for amazing TV. And no one in their right mind would say “this league is too tough for us, we should leave.”

But if you had two programs who knew their job was to win OOC games and take their lumps in conference. Someone with a lot of people in the area and a passionate fan base, and those teams soaked up conference losses for you, the 10 of you would be much better off.

When all of this realignment stuff went down, people looked at the ACC and said “That’s 12 NCAA Tournament teams!” and the A-10 and said “Wow, that’s a one-bid league now.”

And I was one of the very, very few people saying: “The ACC won’t send 12. Someone’s gotta lose."
And about the A-10 I said “Our top four are going to be 13-5 or better in the Atlantic 10, 9-3 or better OOC, and make the A-10 semis. That will be three or four teams in the 21-10 to 25-7 ranger. We’ll keep sending 2-4 teams to the dance every year, as long as we win the same number of OOC games.”

[Xudash]

Outrage no, but several fans have voiced disappointment over not making the dance. Perhaps the committee has been "fair" to the BE, for the most part, but everyone can't win all their home games, so the 7th and 8th place teams are always on the bubble. Teams can go 10-8 and 9-9 but not make it in. With 1 or 2 more teams those bubble teams get 2 to 4 more wins.

You are betting on the wrong teams to get in (Dayton, VCU, UConn) as other conference teams will block them, and the UConn ship sailed away.

The Zags are gone, so give me ND and Duke. No chance with them? Give me SLU and St Bonaventure.

If it happens, it probably happens by going to 11 only, not 12.

[JPSchmack]

Outrage no, but several fans have voiced disappointment over not making the dance. Perhaps the committee has been "fair" to the BE, for the most part, but everyone can't win all their home games, so the 7th and 8th place teams are always on the bubble. Teams can go 10-8 and 9-9 but not make it in. With 1 or 2 more teams those bubble teams get 2 to 4 more wins.

You are betting on the wrong teams to get in (Dayton, VCU, UConn) as other conference teams will block them, and the UConn ship sailed away.

The Zags are gone, so give me ND and Duke. No chance with them? Give me SLU and St Bonaventure.

Yeah, you've got no chance for Duke/ND. But why do you think you NEED Gonzaga?

You guys went 90-90 in the Big East. Gonzaga went 17-1 in conference play.
The 11 of you can’t go 107-91 in Big East play. You’ll have to be 108-108 or 110-110.

So either you will make Gonzaga worse; or Gonzaga will make some of you worse.


I understand the logic of “Well, Gonzaga goes DEEP in March, and that’s what we need: More deep NCAA runs.”

Most of the people arguing against my philosophy is “your method gets us another 10 seed, Gonzaga gets us another Top 4 seed.” But again, Gonzaga is getting that top seed by going 29-4, 17-1 WCC. If they go 17-1 in the Big East it means Nova or Xavier is now a 3 or 4 seed instead of a 1 or 2 seed, and so on down the line.


If you added Gonzaga and Bonaventure and let’s say, Duquesne… you could get away with it now. Because Bona has had two Top 30 RPI seasons in three years, and you can say “We’re adding two teams because of how good they are; and Duquense because they’re in a good market, they can grow into playing at PPG Paints Arena, and we want to have schedule/travel flexibility.”

“Bona/Duquense bridge the gap between the Original East Five, the Original West Five; A 12-team with West/East division schedule locks some teams into a Spokane trip every year. Having that bridge between West/East allows us to limit travel and maintain balance.”

That’s a good spin on “We now have a balanced conference of 5 NCAA powers, 5 NCAA teams, and three rebuilding/down/bad teams soaking up conference losses so our 10 NCAA programs go dancing.”

And of course, an unbalanced schedule allows you to take a look at your preseason projected power, and set your schedule so that your bubble teams happen to have 5 games vs the bottom 3, and 3 games against the top 3, instead of the other way around.

[JPSchmack]

If it happens, it probably happens by going to 11 only, not 12.

Expansion, or getting hosed by the committee?

[DudeAnon]

I was happy to see JP had returned for about 5 minutes until he started the longform RPI theses. The Big East would be the laughingstock of america if they added SBU.

UConn, Dayton and VCU are the only programs that would literally not be embaressing to announce were added.

[billyjack]

Over the last say 10 years, and then 5 years, i'd be curious to find out which schools outside of the Top-6 have the best non-conference W-L record, and the best RPI, and the most Top-25 wins, and the most wins vs the Top-6 conferences?

Are there any teams that stand out?

That would a huge undertaking. Maybe stever has some time? I don't remember St Bona as being anything special as JP Schmack is saying, but i'd be curious to find out.

[kayako]

St. Mary's vs. St. John's, who wins?
They might be the most unathletic team I've ever seen.

[JPSchmack]

I was happy to see JP had returned for about 5 minutes until he started the longform RPI theses. The Big East would be the laughingstock of america if they added SBU.

UConn, Dayton and VCU are the only programs that would literally not be embaressing to announce were added.

You're better off not adding anyone.