(11-18-2014 07:24 PM)At Ease Wrote:  Marshall remains unranked in the playoff rankings just released.

Behind the likes of a couple 3-loss teams like Clemson and Minnesota.

http://www.cbssports.com/collegefootball...abama-no-1

Sorry, but that it udderly ridonkulous!

(11-18-2014 02:04 PM)Middle Ages Wrote:  

(11-18-2014 01:41 PM)gsloth Wrote:  

(11-18-2014 12:53 PM)At Ease Wrote:  So when is our last top 50 win?

That's like catnip to me (when I'm looking to do anything other than work) - you realize that?

In 2006, there were 2 wins against teams in the 60s (Tulsa and ECU).

Hawaii (61) and Boise State (58) in 2001.

It's the destruction of TCU in 1999. TCU is ranked 42 according to Massey.

1998 has a 2-point loss to #11 Purdue and a 6 point loss to #15 Air Force. And losses to 2 teams in the 80s - Northwestern and San Jose State - plus a blowout to #12 Texas.

Looking for top 25 wins is near impossible.

1994 Texas was 36.
1992 Baylor was 36.
1991 Baylor was 28.

We finally get to 1980 (there really isn't much in the 80s for wins), where LSU was 28, Arkansas was 31, and Houston was 25. (Jackpot!)

As I keep going, there's 1972 Arkansas (25), 1970 California (18), 1966 LSU (26), 1963 LSU (15), 1962 LSU (5 - tie game), 1962 Texas (10 - tie game), 1961 LSU (4), 1960 Florida (11 - at Miami, FL), and 1960 Texas (20). I'm going to stop there, in part because Massey stops ranking teams then.

1963 Rice is #18 in Massey's rankings, 1961 Rice is #12, and 1960 Rice is #17.

The highlight film on youtube for that game says Baylor was ranked #8 going into the game.

I remember that. But in looking at the actual teams they beat to start that season, they finished 75, 18, 70, 127, and 55 in Massey's ranking. It's like the SEC teams that beat a bunch of creampuffs, one other decent SEC team, and because they're still undefeated, they're called top 10 (see A&M and LSU earlier this year).

Same thing with Utah in 1996. Yes, they were 7-1 with a good win over Stanford to start the 7-game streak (#28, per Massey). But their initial loss was to a #87 Utah State, and their best win in that streak after Stanford was a #59 Kansas team that finished the season 4-7. Creampuff city. Utah showed its Massey ranking is about right with a 1 TD win at New Mexico (#68), followed by a 20 point loss to BYU (#12). That 50 is really about right for the season they put together, not their AP ranking at the time.

(11-16-2014 11:06 PM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  

(11-16-2014 09:14 PM)waltgreenberg Wrote:  Yes, many of those wins that year were close, and required our share of good fortune, but they were wins none the less with a far less talented team with far less depth than the ones under Bailiff the past couple years....and against far tougher CUSA competition than we're facing today.

Our homestretch in 2006:

Rice 31, SMU 27
Rice 18, ECU 17
Rice 41, Tulsa 38
Rice 37, UTEP 31
Rice 40, UCF 29
Rice 34, UAB 33

6 wins by a total of 26 points, five of them by less than a TD. Yep, some luck was involved, and some grit. I always thought our kids had grit before, but whatever. I will take your word for it that those teams were tougher than what we face now. I know of no way to prove it either way.

I don't know how to prove it either way, but what I can do is provide the Massey performance ratings for each of those games:

UAB: 31.91
@UCF: 47.73
@UTEP: 42.47
@Tulsa: 51.35
East Carolina: 40.53
SMU: 37.55

In Rice's now-ended six-game win streak, every game in that streak had a higher performance rating than every game in the 2006 winning streak except for the Tulsa game. Perhaps people are looking at 2006 through a nostalgic haze, but the competition in C-USA wasn't really much better than this season. In the group of six teams listed above, only Tulsa had an adjusted power rating above 40 (it would be comparable to UTEP for this season), and UAB's was about the same as Old Dominion's is for this season, with everyone else in between.

Quote:A FG here or there, a dropped or completed pass or two, and Todd is not 7-5, he may be 4-8. I am not talking about incomplete passes we knocked down - just passes our opponents dropped. That wasn't Todd's coaching. The missed FGs? How many did we block? We had the UAB game in the bag - for them - and they gave it back.

I was happy, overjoyed, delirious, during that 6 game run, but I know how close we were to yet another heartbreaking year, just like so many before. I think I will give the credit to the players.

We were celebrating 1 point wins then, and upset with 20 point wins now. That alone is a change.

I disliked Todd after the Lassley incident. I disliked Bailiff after the NickSt game. Maybe if Todd had stuck around, I would have learned to like him better. But he didn't, and I didn't.

Not praising Bailiff - just not in agreement that Todd was all that for us. My opinion Is that with more time here, he would have taken us backward from where we were in 2006. He DID coach the Bowl game, right?

Yes, he did, and that game was a 14.81. Bailiff hasn't had a game that bad since the Tulsa and UTEP games in 2010.

Graham did one good thing, and that was in wins above expectancy. Rice won seven games in 2006 but was expected by Massey's system to win only about 4.34. However, it should be pointed out that Bailiff hasn't been too bad in that category, either. He was nearly that good in 2012 (seven wins, 4.65 expected) and almost that good in 2013 (ten wins, 8.37 expected), and in fact Bailiff has exceeded his win expectancy every year he's been at Rice except his first (although right now he's about 0.05 behind this season).

Bailiff is a good coach. We can stop that debate.

That doesn't mean we can't do some things better. Athletes are always striving to do more, and so are Rice students in general.

I think David plays things close to the vest. This has its upside and downside... but if he were a gunslinger, he would be more like T Graham and looking to move to the next challenge.

I understand the value of continuity, but I also understand the value of innovation. Innovative coaches (unless they have some sort of a natural affinity for a place) are (by nature) counter to continuity... so you don't want a dozen of them... but you might want one or two... ESPECIALLY if they also have an affinity for the place. At the top, you want stability. If you're not losing people below you, you probably aren't doing as much as you could. Maybe as much as you can afford (and we need to stop that), but not as much as you could.

I think Bailiff can get us there... I just don't think he can get us there with the current resources and by playing things close to the vest. I think doing so relegates us to being NEAR the top of CUSA... occasionally 1st... occasionally 5th.... with a ranking of between 80 and 50. I think there are other things we can do to help him, like recruiting resources (for identification and attraction of student-athletes) and funds to keep his good and reliable coaches... PLUS funds to attract and then potentially replace the innovators.

I am pretty adamant about the recruiting resources (and the EZF is part of that) because when things start getting tight financially, you start cutting corners. That means you defer maintenance and you economize on recruiting. We can't get the best athletes (the focus of the coaches) who are also great students (the focus of the university) if we economize on recruiting.