Big East teams hurting each other; too much depth?

[dmac80]

Kevin McNamara: A-10, Big East teams hurting each other
By KEVIN McNAMARA

Journal Sports Writer

kmcnamar@providencejournal.com

Any college conference worth its salt wants several of its teams to contend for NCAA Tournament berths.

The good news is both the Atlantic 10 and the new-look Big East have their fair share of teams in position to challenge for spots in the field. The bad news is that the depth of both conferences is starting to muddy the waters, sinking teams’ March dreams along the way.

The Big East is developing into a curious test case for the NCAA selection committee. Villanova is a potential one seed and Creighton is so good at home (27-2 last two seasons) that the Jays will almost assuredly be a top-four seed. But after that, the conference is scrambling. Perceived giants Georgetown (12-9) and Marquette (12-10) are struggling through their worst seasons in years and still face a load of tough games in the second half of the conference schedule.

That leaves Providence and Xavier as the next two teams in line. If the field was picked this morning, both the Musketeers (36) and the Friars (37 RPI) would be firmly in the tournament. But there is a long way to go. Both teams have home losses to Seton Hall, for one thing. The Pirates actually aren’t bad when healthy, but their 121 RPI gives both teams a black eye.

PC’s front-loaded home Big East schedule is a concern. The Friars are 2-2 on the road so far, but after Tuesday’s big home game against a dangerous St. John’s team, PC finishes with five of its final eight games away from the friendly confines of the Dunkin’ Donuts Center.

The Friars have some nice numbers (two top-50 wins, 7-5 vs. top 100) so far but need to continue to build a tournament-worthy resumé.

Xavier lost at home (12-1) for the first time all season on Saturday, against Seton Hall, and doesn’t have a win over Villanova, Creighton or PC. A win Monday night in Philadelphia would certainly help Chris Mack’s club.

The biggest issue with the Big East? Teams such as Georgetown, St. John’s, Marquette, Seton Hall and Butler. They are far from bad, especially at home. They also all probably need to win the Big East Tournament to be NCAA teams, and they’ll have plenty of chances to knock off Providence and Xavier and cost their league at-large berths.

Turnaround issue

Providence improved to 3-1 in so-called turnaround games when Ed Cooley and his staff have just one day to prepare in between games. A fourth quick flip comes next weekend when the Friars play at Xavier on Saturday and Georgetown on Monday.

Some of these turnarounds are explainable in an era when TV windows need to be filled, but the Big East butchered its first try at scheduling for a 10-team league.

The A-10, for example, didn’t schedule Rhode Island into a single one-day turnaround. Fox Sports executives were heavily involved in drafting the Big East’s schedule, much to the dismay of head coaches around the league. One coach (not Cooley) insisted recently that the tight scheduling “will cost us an (NCAA) at-large berth or two, for sure. We made a major mistake here.”

http://www.providencejournal.com/sports ... -other.ece

That's the thing with a 10 team league with no horrible teams. Even though all the programs are pretty good, the problem is they all can't be 20 win teams. Someone has to fall down, and with the parity in the league now we're going to end up with a bunch of .500 conference records and few NCAA berths. This is why the league must expand, the sooner the better imo. It is also why contrary to conventional wisdom, sometimes having a league with 4 or 5 strong teams and 4 or 5 weak teams isn't a bad thing. The bad thing is when its the same 4 or 5 on each end year after year. But parity like we're seeing now (even Depaul isn't too bad) means that we're going to be perceived as a "weak" league and be lucky to see 3 or 4 invites.

I do think the BET will be wide open, ideally we get an extra invite that route.

[GumbyDamnit!]

I understand the logic here but one thing trumps all of this and that is how you do OOC. If SJU, SHU, Marq and Butler (even XU) had performed better OOC then even a .500 league record might garner them consideration. I think that is where Gtwn is right now. They have 3 quality OOC wins now (with 1 really bad loss) and finishing at 4th or 5th in the league might just get them in. SHU, especially has to be kicking itself. They lost to both potential tourney teams they played in Mercer and OU, and lost those 2 horrible games. They could be in the mix had they done better prior to conf season First they need to beef up their OOC and secondly you can't lose at home to cupcakes. But generally speaking we can't start complaining that we are beating each other up to our detriment after we've shot ourselves in the foot OOC.

[Bill Marsh]

I think what this kind of article overlooks is the benefits of strong league to strength of schedule. SOS is a significant part of the RPI formula. As a league, the Big East is currently ranked #4 with no single team ranked lower than 140. As conference play progresses, Big East teams only get stronger in RPI while teams from lesser conferences decline in RPI even when they win due to the weakness of their conference schedule.

Providence is projected by RPI Forecast to finish 20-11, using Sagarin's power rating. But even with 11 losses, RPI Forecast has them making the tournament. Same for Xavier, projected to finish at 19-11.

Contrast that with a prominent program like Missouri, projected to finish at 22-9 but on the wrong side of the bubble because the SEC is only rated 7th in conference rankings. Here are several others who are projected to miss the tournament (with their projected records):

Indiana State (20-8, Missouri Valley, ranked 11th as a conference)
Louisiana Tech (24-6, CUSA, ranked 13th)
Ohio (22-8, MAC, ranked 12th)
New Mexico State (23-8, WAC, ranked 22nd)

Here are some others projected to make the tournament despite double figure losses:

Colorado (20-11, PAC-12, ranked 3rd)
Florida State (19-11, ACC, ranked 5th)
Minnesota (18-12, Big Ten, ranked 2nd)
Kansas State (19-12, Big XII, ranked 1st)

A real dilemma faces teams in the AAC where the 5 teams in the top half of the conference are all ranked in the top 50, which has boosted the conference to a rank of. 8th, but the bottom 5 teams are all ranked 166 or lower. A loss by a team from that league's top half to any of the teams in its 2nd division would be devastating. The effects of such a loss can be seen in the case of UConn which is only headed for an 8 seed right now despite a 17-4 record and wins over tournament bound teams like Florida, Memphis, Harvard, and Stanford. But a loss to #198 Houston has hurt them badly. Comsider that the 6th highest ranked team in the AAC is ranked 26 spots lower than DePaul, the lowest ranked team in the Big East. Playing that kind of league schedule really hurts SOS even when you win.

[BillikensWin]

I think what this kind of article overlooks is the benefits of strong league to strength of schedule. SOS is a significant part of the RPI formula. As a league, the Big East is currently ranked #4 with no single team ranked lower than 140. As conference play progresses, Big East teams only get stronger in RPI while teams from lesser conferences decline in RPI even when they win due to the weakness of their conference schedule.

Providence is projected by RPI Forecast to finish 20-11, using Sagarin's power rating. But even with 11 losses, RPI Forecast has them making the tournament. Same for Xavier, projected to finish at 19-11.

Contrast that with a prominent program like Missouri, projected to finish at 22-9 but on the wrong side of the bubble because the SEC is only rated 7th in conference rankings. Here are several others who are projected to miss the tournament (with their projected records):

Indiana State (20-8, Missouri Valley, ranked 11th as a conference)
Louisiana Tech (24-6, CUSA, ranked 13th)
Ohio (22-8, MAC, ranked 12th)
New Mexico State (23-8, WAC, ranked 22nd)

Here are some others projected to make the tournament despite double figure losses:

Colorado (20-11, PAC-12, ranked 3rd)
Florida State (19-11, ACC, ranked 5th)
Minnesota (18-12, Big Ten, ranked 2nd)
Kansas State (19-12, Big XII, ranked 1st)

A real dilemma faces teams in the AAC where the 5 teams in the top half of the conference are all ranked in the top 50, which has boosted the conference to a rank of. 8th, but the bottom 5 teams are all ranked 166 or lower. A loss by a team from that league' stop half to any of the teams in its 2nd division would be devastating. The effects of such a loss can be seen in the case of UConn which is only headed of an 8 seed right now despite a 17-4 record and wins over tournament bound teams like Florida, Memphis, Harvard, and Stanford. But a loss to #198 Houston has hurt them badly. Comsider that the 6th highest ranked team in the AAC is ranked 26 spots lower than DePaul, the lowest ranked team in the Big East. Playing that kind of league schedule really hurts SOS even when you win.

I know you're trying to make a point..but Mizzou isn't prominent anywhere.

[dmac80]

I think what this kind of article overlooks is the benefits of strong league to strength of schedule. SOS is a significant part of the RPI formula. As a league, the Big East is currently ranked #4 with no single team ranked lower than 140. As conference play progresses, Big East teams only get stronger in RPI while teams from lesser conferences decline in RPI even when they win due to the weakness of their conference schedule.

Providence is projected by RPI Forecast to finish 20-11, using Sagarin's power rating. But even with 11 losses, RPI Forecast has them making the tournament. Same for Xavier, projected to finish at 19-11.

Contrast that with a prominent program like Missouri, projected to finish at 22-9 but on the wrong side of the bubble because the SEC is only rated 7th in conference rankings. Here are several others who are projected to miss the tournament (with their projected records):

Indiana State (20-8, Missouri Valley, ranked 11th as a conference)
Louisiana Tech (24-6, CUSA, ranked 13th)
Ohio (22-8, MAC, ranked 12th)
New Mexico State (23-8, WAC, ranked 22nd)

Here are some others projected to make the tournament despite double figure losses:

Colorado (20-11, PAC-12, ranked 3rd)
Florida State (19-11, ACC, ranked 5th)
Minnesota (18-12, Big Ten, ranked 2nd)
Kansas State (19-12, Big XII, ranked 1st)

A real dilemma faces teams in the AAC where the 5 teams in the top half of the conference are all ranked in the top 50, which has boosted the conference to a rank of. 8th, but the bottom 5 teams are all ranked 166 or lower. A loss by a team from that league' stop half to any of the teams in its 2nd division would be devastating. The effects of such a loss can be seen in the case of UConn which is only headed of an 8 seed right now despite a 17-4 record and wins over tournament bound teams like Florida, Memphis, Harvard, and Stanford. But a loss to #198 Houston has hurt them badly. Comsider that the 6th highest ranked team in the AAC is ranked 26 spots lower than DePaul, the lowest ranked team in the Big East. Playing that kind of league schedule really hurts SOS even when you win.

Good post. Lots to think about.

[TheHall]

I think there's been this push to declare OOC more important than conference play & vice versa, but truly as Bill pointed out they both bear scrutiny & they both aren't necessarily determinative for a NCAA bid alone. The holy grail is a nice balance between both. So the next area of growth for the league as a whole is better OOC schedules & results since a strong top-to-bottom conference is already in play. With the in flux of talent next season it seems the BE is on a realistically quick pace for greatness considering what has been lost & how.

[hoyahooligan]

Yeah I think he's a bit off including Georgetown in the group that needs to win the BET to get in. The Hoyas likely get in going 6-3 and 1-1 in the BET and are pretty much a lock if they they go 7-2 in the BE. The bubble is weak and Georgetown has 3 quality OOC wins

[cu blujs]

With the number of teams from BCS conference with .500 or barely above .500 records that get in the tournament year after year, I don't buy that we can't get teams in with just 10 or 11 conference wins. But, you can't win only 6 or 7 OOC games (or play no-one) and be .500 in conference. You need Winning 10 or 11 OOC games with some quality wins and 10 or 11 games in conference to get to 20+ wins should be good enough for just about any BE team to be in the discussion (depending on OOC strength of schedule and who the losses are to).

[Jet915]

Georgetown is the only legit team (outside of the top 4) who has a shot at the NCAA tourney as an at-large. It's because they have a very good non-conference resume with wins against MSU, VCU and KState. 9-9 league finish and 1 win the BET should get them in as a last 4.

[CURx]

If it were up to me, I like the 10 team league and all the arguments for keeping it that way. I also understand the arguments for a 12 team league as well. My opinion means absolutely nothing when they ultimately decide which way to go. With that being said, as a 12 year season ticket holder for Creighton basketball, I just have to say that this season has been an absolute joy to watch from my perspective. I know it may be a bit skewed with the incredible success the Jays are currently having but the teams that we have played at home live and get to watch on the road on FS1 with the production and announcers and everything else are far-and-away better than anything we have ever had in the MVC. The basketball is a pure joy to watch and I am elated that Creighton is where we are now. Hopefully we can keep it up.