http://www.collegesportsmadness.com/mens...kly-awards

No idea how legitimate this website is, but Nathan won CAA player of the week. Congrats Nate. What amused me more is that they classify the CAA as a high major conference. It's nice to think that people are taking notice and that the league profile is growing.

The site has Knight as 4th team preseason all CAA, listed as a G/F... He's an athletic 5 with a good shot, but Guard seems like a stretch.

And while the CAA is no high major it's definitely a cut above the mid major conferences they have. Though I think relegating most of the mid major conferences to small, and putting us, the MVC, CUSA, Sun Belt, MAC, Horizon as mid majors would make more sense. MWC, A10, and WCC can stay as high majors.

To me, the CAA isn't a high major until it consistently gets respect from the post season selection committees. Year after year it feels like a good CAA team gets snubbed in tournament selection, seeding, or travel. High major conferences don't get 1 team into the tourney.

(01-01-2018 02:29 PM)TDenverFan Wrote:  The site has Knight as 4th team preseason all CAA, listed as a G/F... He's an athletic 5 with a good shot, but Guard seems like a stretch.

And while the CAA is no high major it's definitely a cut above the mid major conferences they have. Though I think relegating most of the mid major conferences to small, and putting us, the MVC, CUSA, Sun Belt, MAC, Horizon as mid majors would make more sense. MWC, A10, and WCC can stay as high majors.

The high major group needs the AAC. The WCC was worse than the CAA two seasons ago and worse so far this season. Conference USA is excluded from the mid-major poll because of its reputation (and maybe that it has FBS), but it was 23rd last season and 21st two seasons ago. The Horizon League, which no longer has Butler, is 27th so far this season. The Sun Belt is 24th so far this season and is rarely better than the CAA. I think the Big East, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12, SEC, ACC, AAC, A10, MWC, WCC, MVC, MAC, and CAA are the top thirteen. In the four complete seasons the AAC has existed and 2017-2018 so far, there has been one conference each season other than those thirteen to be in the top thirteen of the Conference RPI.

If you go by the RPI, a hypothetical CAA vs. WCC challenge would be close. The WCC would go 6-4, but nine of the games would be between teams within 20 spots in the RPI.

Who cares what they are called, we are placed with the right group of teams.

They have the 5 BCS schools plus AAC and Big East in one group. They have 8 other teams in the next group (we are consistently in the top 15 so that makes sense) and the 17 other teams in the other group.

With the number of teams that have been picked off by the first group (AAC and Big East especially), the other conferences will rarely have more than 3 or 4 at-large bids. Each of the last 2 years has been 3 total for the other conferences and this year, ESPN and Bracketmatrix both have a prediction of 1 as of the end of the non-conference schedule (with 2 being in next 8 out). For this year, only Gonzaga, Nevada and URI are predicted by Bracketmatrix as "others" conference champs who are top 11 seeds so will be tough for upsets to get extra bids though A-10's regular season champ often finds a way to lose to get that extra bid.

Based on the RPI, Rhode Island and St. Bonaventure are the only at-large possibilities in the Atlantic 10, which is doing worse than usual. The Atlantic 10 has only 2 teams in the top quarter of the RPI and 7 teams in the bottom half. Two seasons ago the Atlantic 10 had 6 teams in the top quarter and 4 teams in the bottom half. Based on the RPI, here are top teams from outside the top conferences and the three you listed)

25. Boise State (11-2 vs. Division I, no bad losses, no home losses, SOS 60th)

38. New Mexico State (10-3 vs. Division I, no bad losses, the only team to beat Miami, SOS 71st, since the Western Athletic has only one other Top 100 team, it could be good for them that having only 14 conference games makes out of conference games affect their schedule more)

42. Buffalo (7-5 vs. Division I, no great wins, SOS of 9th)

43. Saint Mary's (13-2, beat New Mexico State, SOS 144th, only played 2 out of conference away games, I doubt they get an at-large bid but maybe if they sweep Gonzaga and win the regular season title that would be enough)

45. California-Santa Barbara (9-3 vs. Division I) and 48. California-Davis (7-5 vs. Division I): The Big West was the fourth worst conference last season, but now it has two teams in the Top 50, which is more than the Missouri Valley, CAA, and West Coast. California-Santa Barbara doesn't have any great wins, and their SOS of 145th will probably get worse.
California-Davis has a hard SOS of 51st and has only played 2 home games, but a mid-major with 5 losses already won't get an at-large bid.