(11-27-2013 11:18 AM)Rick Gerlach Wrote:  Ham, you are only offering two choices above. And two of the teams you offer in the 'bad' set of OOC games are conference games for us this year. ECU will not be on our schedule if they are OOC, and neither will Marshall. Also, we're not traveling to Bowling Green unless they pay top $$$, and they are not coming to Houston for the same reason.

You realize, of course, that the rankings of the good and bad lists are almost exactly the same, right? The point is obvious. You're saying we wouldn't possibly go to Bowling green without big money, but we went to New Mexico? WHy schedule EITHER of those teams if you don't have to? We are FAR more likely to lose to Bowling Green than NMSU, so it doesn't even offer THAT advantage?

The fact that ECU and UH are in our conference this year is similarly meaningless, because they aren't next year, and NMSU is. This is really just arguing to be arguing. You know darn well that given choices of those two schedules, you would choose the one with the bigger names. Unfortunately, I can't give you the PERFECT comparison because there are so few non p5 schools in the top 60 and so few NON p-5 schools NOT in the top 60. Your complaint actually proves the point.

Quote:It doesn't matter how well the first group would draw at home. We won't ever play them at home.

I asked home OR away. We've played plenty of "big" names at home. Heck, we played NMSU on the road. How did Kansas, UCLA and Purdue draw at Rice? Why? I'd rather play Nebraska on the road on National TV and get paid $$ to do it than play Bowling Green at home on regional TV.... and their rankings are almost exactly the same, meaning our probability of a W is almost the same.... because I think we can use the money and exposure to a greater advantage than we can a win over Bowling Green at home.

Quote:And until we go 4-0 against the OOC schedule we have I think it's kind of pointless to speculate about going 4-0 versus Nebraska, Michigan, Tennessee and Florida on the road.

Which only proves that you're just arguing to argue. First, I didn't say we HAD to go 4-0... I said we were just as likely based on rankings. Second, I asked you to choose. As you note, A&M is better than any team I listed... so is UH according to Sagarin. NMSU and Kansas are clearly far far worse, We went 2-2 against the schedule we had... Just based on (iirc) going 2-2 against #21, #37, #100 and #180 we COULD have gone 4-0 against either of the examples I gave which were basically #45-55).... and ANY wins against p5 teams is better than "looking good" against one, or "barely losing" to a good, non p5 team. It would only take being a top 50 team ourselves to do so... yet here you are acting like it is impossible. You never had a chance to do it. You want to keep #100 Kansas in there, fine. AT LEAST they're a p5 school. Beating #100, but p5 Kansas is probably worth more than "coming close" against #37, but non p5 UH. I may be wrong on that but it's probably close. If it's even remotely close, it proves my point.

Quote:I've already conceded in other posts that it is to our advantage to play a power conference team in the bowl game, so that's what I meant by 'get a good opponent."

Having said that, and acknowledging that obviously none of us can see the future, at the end of the day the opponent in our bowl is less important than the outcome.

Could these two statements POSSIBLY be more in conflict?

Quote: If we lose to a 6-6 power conference team, and we would've beaten a strong MWC team, then in the end, we haven't maximized what we take out of a bowl (for the players, momentum and for public perception). There is no question in my mind that the Air Force win helped the 2013 Rice Owls team.

Flies completely in the face of it being to our advantage to play a "good opponent". You place greater value on wins. You assume that a 6-6 power conference team is weak when the rankings show that they are almost exactly as strong as a strong MWC team, which I have demonstrated and is precisely why the bowls PAIR a strong MWC or CUSA team against a 6-6 power conference team. Our champ plays like #9 of what, 12 from the SEC? You say I present two extremes, but I am giving you the reality of the situation, while you are sort of blindly deciding that a 6-6 p5 team /= a strong MWC team. They ARE considered to be the same, which is why they are paired up that way. I just put names to the pairings... and you prove my point by calling them "extremes".

Ok, in 2008, would you have rather had Western Michigan or Notre Dame? iirc, that was a possibility. Are you convinced that we would have lost to Notre Dame? If so, based on what? If we had beaten Notre Dame, would it have meant more or less than beating WMU?

Quote:But you lay out two extreme scenarios, and there are hundreds of potential opponents and outcomes.

I didn't lay out extremes at all. One list is "names" the other is "not names". That is the ONLY difference. The "power" of those rankings is about the same, thus the potential outcomes should be very similar.

Quote:There are no guarantees that playing "the optimum" opponent gets us better public perception. I worked at a firm full of SWC alumni of all persuasions in the 1980's (I frequently drove to Houston from DFW for games), so I have some history with that.

You're missing the point entirely. Our average opponent in the 80's, despite some obvious cream-puffs was (iirc) #27. It's now generically more like 90. I've suggested something more like 30 OOC (trying to put as many as possible around 20-50 as opposed to matching #10 and #100) and probably 90 in conference (we can't control that) for an average close to 60. You can't just play them, you have to beat them. 1) I'm shooting much lower than in the 80's and 2) I'm spending more money to improve our chances. 3) I'm creating more opportunities for signature wins, close meaningful losses and limiting as much as possible the possibilities of upset.

I mean, if we expect to be competitive in CUSA and compete for the championship, we have to AT LEAST be in the 70's or so anyway, right?

I'm trying to avoid the top 10 as much as I can... and pick up "names" in the 30-50 range as opposed to "non-names" in the 30-50 range. I avoid teams in the bottom 50 because we already have enough games against them. If/when that changes, we can schedule more cream-puffs OOC... but if UNT and UTSA become top 50 programs (which I see happening... and UH and Tulsa generally were this as well) and we're perennially finishing 2nd or 3rd in our division, much less the conference... we're screwed.

Quote:And I thought our 2013 non-conference schedule worked out almost as good as it could have:
* positive public perception against A&M
* winnable game (although we didn't) against a Top 40 team
* win over a P5 conference team
* road win that built confidence for our team.

Rick

Your entire argument here is that winning games, or even just playing well against top 40 or 50 p5 teams is a positive, especially on the road. So why are you against scheduling more top 50 p5 teams?

Given your statements above... What is the positive from scheduling weak non p5 teams OOC? If we're going to schedule weak, at least try and make them p5 weak, right? If we're scheduling a TOUGH team, why would we schedule a tough NON p5 team rather than an equally tough p5 one?

We can't expect a perfect schedule. I thought this year's schedule was good. We weren't good enough, but had we beaten A&M and run the table, we'd be battling it out with NIU and Fresno in the rankings for a BCS bowl.

(11-27-2013 12:27 PM)Hambone10 Wrote:  

Quote:And I thought our 2013 non-conference schedule worked out almost as good as it could have:
* positive public perception against A&M
* winnable game (although we didn't) against a Top 40 team
* win over a P5 conference team
* road win that built confidence for our team.

Rick

Your entire argument here is that winning games, or even just playing well against top 40 or 50 p5 teams is a positive, especially on the road. So why are you against scheduling more top 50 p5 teams?

Given your statements above... What is the positive from scheduling weak non p5 teams OOC? If we're going to schedule weak, at least try and make them p5 weak, right? If we're scheduling a TOUGH team, why would we schedule a tough NON p5 team rather than an equally tough p5 one?

I read what both of you are saying and I feel like you aren't that far apart. And I'd use the 2013 schedule above to illustrate. I feel like the only place you guys disagree about the 2013 schedule is the NMSU. Hambone, it seems like you wish we had scheduled something a little better than NMSU because they are so bottom dwelling, but Rick is just pointing out that it's nice to get a cream puff on the OOC schedule.

Besides that, are we really disagreeing about any other aspect of the 2013 OOC games? I also feel like perception-wise, the Kansas game was more valuable than the ranking, and I've mentioned before that the Armed Forces bowl win over AFA gave us some credibility with casual fans.

Hambone is advocating that we try to get lower-tier P5 teams that we can beat on our OOC schedule and at the same time saying that given a ~60-ish ranking target to prefer a P5 ~60 ranked team to a non-P5 ~60 ranked team. I don't think that anyone would disagree with that. I think the debate may be if all 4 OOC games need to be that good, or should we leave ourselves 1 easier game to get our win total up and also build a bit of confidence for the team early in the season.

(11-27-2013 12:27 PM)Hambone10 Wrote:  Rick

Your entire argument here is that winning games, or even just playing well against top 40 or 50 p5 teams is a positive, especially on the road. So why are you against scheduling more top 50 p5 teams?

Given your statements above... What is the positive from scheduling weak non p5 teams OOC? If we're going to schedule weak, at least try and make them p5 weak, right? If we're scheduling a TOUGH team, why would we schedule a tough NON p5 team rather than an equally tough p5 one?

I don't think playing a scheduling four teams OOC who are likely to be more highly ranked than us at worse (and historically who have been much better - Nebraska, Michigan, Tennesee, Florida) is a good plan. In general, you'd think all 4 would be ranked much lower, and it was a sheer crapshoot that they were all ranked low this year.

I think a balanced schedule OOC is a good idea. No team needs to be playing the majority of games against teams ranked ahead of them. Per you, our 1978 and 1979 schedules were the toughest in the country. I was a freshman and sophomore. We won 1 and 2 games against that schedule.

I also think we have to have some OOC home games. Kansas will do that for us. But if we have 4 'name' programs, we will be on the road for all 4 games. Normally, I would take Vandy over Florida and Tennessee. You'd have a chance for a home and home. Duke maybe. Wake Forest. Schools that don't give up a game with 100,000 in attendance to come to Houston.

That's just an opinion. I like having a UT or A&M, or Baylor or Tech on the schedule. Heck, add TCU. But I would not make every OOC game one in which we would either have to pull an upset, or play on the road in venues where the schools have a marked home field advantage. Avoid a Murderer's Row, or the shot that it becomes a murderer's row.

Not opposed to tough games, but we need bowl games and winning records, and our schedule should be set up to optimize our record and get us to where we are in bowls more often than not. Right now our track record is 4 bowls in 60 years.

I don't think even Boise and TCU took that same route, at least for every OOC game. They played their A&M's (Washington's), sure. But not every game.

(11-27-2013 04:03 PM)owl95 Wrote:  

(11-27-2013 12:27 PM)Hambone10 Wrote:  

Quote:And I thought our 2013 non-conference schedule worked out almost as good as it could have:
* positive public perception against A&M
* winnable game (although we didn't) against a Top 40 team
* win over a P5 conference team
* road win that built confidence for our team.

Rick

Your entire argument here is that winning games, or even just playing well against top 40 or 50 p5 teams is a positive, especially on the road. So why are you against scheduling more top 50 p5 teams?

Given your statements above... What is the positive from scheduling weak non p5 teams OOC? If we're going to schedule weak, at least try and make them p5 weak, right? If we're scheduling a TOUGH team, why would we schedule a tough NON p5 team rather than an equally tough p5 one?

I read what both of you are saying and I feel like you aren't that far apart. And I'd use the 2013 schedule above to illustrate. I feel like the only place you guys disagree about the 2013 schedule is the NMSU. Hambone, it seems like you wish we had scheduled something a little better than NMSU because they are so bottom dwelling, but Rick is just pointing out that it's nice to get a cream puff on the OOC schedule.

Besides that, are we really disagreeing about any other aspect of the 2013 OOC games? I also feel like perception-wise, the Kansas game was more valuable than the ranking, and I've mentioned before that the Armed Forces bowl win over AFA gave us some credibility with casual fans.

Hambone is advocating that we try to get lower-tier P5 teams that we can beat on our OOC schedule and at the same time saying that given a ~60-ish ranking target to prefer a P5 ~60 ranked team to a non-P5 ~60 ranked team. I don't think that anyone would disagree with that. I think the debate may be if all 4 OOC games need to be that good, or should we leave ourselves 1 easier game to get our win total up and also build a bit of confidence for the team early in the season.

pretty much correct in your assessment IMO.

(11-27-2013 04:03 PM)owl95 Wrote:  [quote= 'Rick Gerlach']
I don't think playing a scheduling four teams OOC who are likely to be more highly ranked than us at worse (and historically who have been much better - Nebraska, Michigan, Tennesee, Florida) is a good plan. In general, you'd think all 4 would be ranked much lower, and it was a sheer crapshoot that they were all ranked low this year.

Isn't it also just as much of a crapshoot that UH was ranked higher this year? I don't get your point here, Rick. There are PLENTY of schools in the P5 conferences who are historically good, but not top 10. I chose the ones I chose because they are OBVIOUSLY good names and didn't think I'd get the push back I have. Ga Tech, Va Tech, UVA, Indiana, Illinois, Pitt, Northwestern, Purdue, Texas Tech, Iowa State, Colorado, Cal, Kentucky, Arkansas... I'm no expert but I can't remember the last time one of them was top 10, or even top 20 for any extended period of time. There are undoubtedly NUMEROUS teams from p5 conferences whose long term mean is around number 30 or 40.

Rick Gerlach Wrote:I think a balanced schedule OOC is a good idea. No team needs to be playing the majority of games against teams ranked ahead of them. Per you, our 1978 and 1979 schedules were the toughest in the country. I was a freshman and sophomore. We won 1 and 2 games against that schedule. Geez, Rick...
Isn't there ANYTHING between the toughest schedule in the country and number 60?

The reason those schedules were so tough is that we played 3 games against top 10 teams and 6 against top 20.

You want a balanced OOC schedule. I want a balanced OVERALL schedule. Playing 3 teams between 60 and 100, 6 teams over 100, one at 35 and one at 7 isn't balanced. It basically ASSURES that if you aren't good enough to beat #35, then you are going to end up being AT BEST around number 60-70.

Quote:I also think we have to have some OOC home games. Kansas will do that for us. But if we have 4 'name' programs, we will be on the road for all 4 games. Normally, I would take Vandy over Florida and Tennessee. You'd have a chance for a home and home. Duke maybe. Wake Forest. Schools that don't give up a game with 100,000 in attendance to come to Houston.

Fine... Vandy and Duke would be perfectly fine on my list. Can we never play NMSU or anyone remotely like them (weak team not from a p5 conference) again and play Vandy, Duke, Kansas and Purdue instead? FTR, I suspect our record against 41 Vandy, 40 Duke 123 Kansas and 157 Purdue would have been about the same as against 123 Kansas, 196 NMSU, 49 Houston and 21 A&M.... but at least 2 wins rather than one over p5 teams and probably one or maybe even 2 "good games" against p5 teams as opposed to a close loss to UH and a moral victory against A&M. Everything you said about how "perfect" this schedule was would have been even better against that quartet. No, I can't give you every possible iteration... but the fact is, if you're the 40-50th best team in the country, there are NUMEROUS p5 schools that you can beat.

Quote:Not opposed to tough games, but we need bowl games and winning records, and our schedule should be set up to optimize our record and get us to where we are in bowls more often than not. Right now our track record is 4 bowls in 60 years.

Stop falling back on this (accepting mediocrity just because it is better than it was). If we don't DEMAND better, we won't GET better. CUSA has 6 teams ranked worse than 100 and only 1 in the top 50. If we can't get 6 wins in CUSA, we don't deserve to go bowling.



Owl95, it's actually a little more diverse than that. That's what Rick hears so obviously I'm not articulating it well, but that isn't what I'm saying.

Because we already play so many weak teams, who because they are weak, are unlikely to post any wins against meaningful competition themselves... we are severely handicapping ourselves by playing a schedule like this, PARTICULARLY in that our second toughest game is against a non p5 team who similarly plays numerous games against weaker competition... and only has a few opportunities per year to "surprise" themselves.

UH played some gimmes like Southern, but they also played UCF, Louisville, Byu, UCF, USF and Cincinnati posting a 2-4 record against them, but they are STILL ranked 30+ spots ahead of us. Why? Because they lost a close one to #24 BYU. They also got beat by 25 Louisville, 33 UCF and 60 Cincinnati... Beating 3 teams ranked in the 70's and 4 ranked above 100. Other than the fact that they beat us, how do you explain the difference in their ranking and ours? To me, we had ONE shot (other than UH at a top 60 team and they had 4 of them, and happened to do well in one (and poorly in another).

It should be clear that we need to upgrade the quality of our schedule... and OOC is the only option we have to do that. I'm okay with avoiding the 3 top 10 teams/year that we had in the 70's and 80's... but I'm willing to risk that it happens once in order to get 3 other chances (rather than just one) at just a solid game much less a meaningful upset.

For every NMSU we schedule (historically poor, non p5) it makes it that much harder and less likely that we can pull off a signature victory. I understand why we did it this year... things happen... but we need to try and avoid them.