CSNbbs

Some of us were talking about our conference RPI on our board and I thought it would be an interesting discussion for the entire conference.

Right now, given the season is young, our conference RPI is standing at 24. That is a new low for the MAC, especially in recent times and it is a REALLY long fall from where the conference has been in the past. The RPI isn't going to change much unless a few teams with tougher schedules get some really big wins in the coming weeks. (Go EMU, beat Ohio State!)
Otherwise, the conference RPI will be finalizing itself by mid-January for the most part.

It seems to me that with some exceptions (not many,) the same teams in the conference have tough schedules, while some of the same other teams line up cupcakes all the way up to MAC play every single year.

This year our conference SOS is ranked 26 among the 33 conferences in NCAA DI. That ranking is comprised of only 1 (WMU,) school ranked in the top 100 which is a far cry from even last year when Kent, Miami, Western and I think Toledo all were in the top 100. So as a whole the conference seems to be dropping off in SOS.

Out of the entire MAC, 6 teams are playing a schedule with an S0S from 200-0 and the other 6 are 200 or higher. Believe it or not, despite the fact that the East has been considered the stronger of the two halves the past few years, a VAST majority of the weak scheduling is going on in the MAC East, not the west. Miami and Kent have SOS's of 119 and 140 respectively, with the next best being Ohio at 258.

There was a great deal of talks about our conference getting an At-Large bid if Kent would have lost to Akron 2 seasons ago in the conference finals. I am willing to bet that if that situation were to arise again this year, with our conference ratings being so low the "experts analysts" on TV would be placing that team outside the bubble instead of in just because their RPI would be so much lower after conference play.

Anybody can see the obvious fun in lining up a a series of cupcakes to get your team's confidence up before conference play but it presents kind of a big dilemma if you ever want your team to be respected or want to play for things bigger than a MAC trophy.

So I guess I have two questions:

Is it a reasonable assumption that some programs only care about winning in Cleveland and don't see the point in trying to go to the tournament?

Should the MAC be doing something to ensure those teams that are serious about taking their programs and this conference to the next level aren't being dragged back to the bottom by teams that schedule too easily?

I got all of my information for this post here, sorry if any of my facts pertaining to previous seasons leave somebody out or aren't quite accurate. I am pulling them from memory alone.

Miami has had a pretty good OOC schedule thus far, with games against Kentucky (2 point loss) and Dayton (7 point loss) already. If only we could knock one of these better teams off once in awhile...

What's been killing MAC hoops for the past five years is the lack of better quality players. This is the worst the MAC has been since, maybe, EVER. The last bad drought was during much of the 80's.

60s Good to great (relatively speaking) Note: I originally thought only fair, but was corrected by OU historians.
70s Good to great
80s Poor
90s Great (best the MAC has EVER been)
00s Miserable (excepting the first few years, which marked an extended conclusion to the glorious 90s era).

After last night's loss to Dayton, Miami's strength of schedule moved to #75. Our next 3 games are #14 Temple, #37 UC, and #57 Wright State, so our strength of schedule may be top 25 by then. We are 2-5 now, just hoping we are not 2-8 in 10 days.

(12-03-2009 07:59 PM)Okie Chippewa Wrote: [ -> ]What's been killing MAC hoops for the past five years is the lack of better quality players. This is the worst the MAC has been since, maybe, EVER. The last bad drought was during much of the 80's.

60s Fair to Poor
70s Good to great (relatively speaking)
80s Poor
90s Great (best the MAC has EVER been)
00s Miserable (excepting the first few years, which marked an extended conclusion to the glorious 90s era).

Mmm. I detect a pattern.

Overall I agree but I think you are selling the 60s way, way short. Ohio had an Elite Eight appearance in 1964 which included wins over Wisconsin, St. John's, Louisville and #4 Purdue. In 1969 Ohio had consecutive wins at Northwestern, home against Purdue, at Ohio State and at Indiana.

NCAA Tournament Wins by Decade

2000s - 5
1990s - 9
1980s - 2
1970s - 5
1960s - 5
1950s - 1

First Round Record by Decade

2000s - 3-7
1990s - 6-7
1980s - 2-10
1970s - 4-7
1960s - 4-6
1950s - 1-6

The MAC's record in first round games during the 60s was 4-6 with the largest margin of defeat being 7 points and included three 1 point losses.

(12-03-2009 10:59 PM)OUVan Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-03-2009 07:59 PM)Okie Chippewa Wrote: [ -> ]What's been killing MAC hoops for the past five years is the lack of better quality players. This is the worst the MAC has been since, maybe, EVER. The last bad drought was during much of the 80's.

60s Fair to Poor
70s Good to great (relatively speaking)
80s Poor
90s Great (best the MAC has EVER been)
00s Miserable (excepting the first few years, which marked an extended conclusion to the glorious 90s era).

Mmm. I detect a pattern.

Overall I agree but I think you are selling the 60s way, way short. Ohio had an Elite Eight appearance in 1964 which included wins over Wisconsin, St. John's, Louisville and #4 Purdue. In 1969 Ohio had consecutive wins at Northwestern, home against Purdue, at Ohio State and at Indiana.

NCAA Tournament Wins by Decade

2000s - 5
1990s - 9
1980s - 2
1970s - 5
1960s - 5
1950s - 1

First Round Record by Decade

2000s - 3-7
1990s - 6-7
1980s - 2-10
1970s - 4-7
1960s - 4-6
1950s - 1-6

The MAC's record in first round games during the 60s was 4-6 with the largest margin of defeat being 7 points and included three 1 point losses.

Consider too that only confernce champions made it to the NCAAs prior to 1975.

(12-03-2009 10:21 PM)DICK Wrote: [ -> ]After last night's loss to Dayton, Miami's strength of schedule moved to #75. Our next 3 games are #14 Temple, #37 UC, and #57 Wright State, so our strength of schedule may be top 25 by then. We are 2-5 now, just hoping we are not 2-8 in 10 days.

What's the point in having a high SOS if you're 2-8?

It hurts the rest of the conference teams' RPI to have to play a team with a poor record, no matter how good their schedule was.

More teams doing that kind of scheduling will only make things worse.

(12-03-2009 11:35 PM)uakronkid Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-03-2009 10:21 PM)DICK Wrote: [ -> ]After last night's loss to Dayton, Miami's strength of schedule moved to #75. Our next 3 games are #14 Temple, #37 UC, and #57 Wright State, so our strength of schedule may be top 25 by then. We are 2-5 now, just hoping we are not 2-8 in 10 days.

What's the point in having a high SOS if you're 2-8?

It hurts the rest of the conference teams' RPI to have to play a team with a poor record, no matter how good their schedule was.

More teams doing that kind of scheduling will only make things worse.

We play a daunting nonleague schedule every year. Once in awhile, when we are really good, it leads us to getting an NCAA at large bid (4 times), which is just about equal to the number of at-large bids the rest of the conference has combined. We may not end up 2-8, as Temple and Wright State are both at home and we beat them both last year. I don't see us beating UC on the road. We have had two close calls at knocking off a top 25 team this year, as we lost at Kentucky on a buzzer beater and we were only down 1 with 34 seconds to go last night vs Dayton.

I think it depends on what kind of team you have. For Ohio its a rebuilding year with so many freshman. Bobcats are playing lots of home games which should give them a decent record, but Marshall, Illinois St, Tulsa, Pitt, Eastern Kentucky, Austin Peay aren't bad teams when you look at the standings.

For a contending team with a lot a starters back a tough schedule would be expected to prepare for a MAC title run and perhaps works their way on to the bubble. Kent State brought in some nice teams UAB, Green Bay and Samford are solid mid major teams. Good rpi with those teams. That SOS of the MAC can change as the opponets hit conference play and the MAC plays each other. Just win games against whoever and it will take care of things. Northern Illinois playing a brutal schedule so far, and not looking like they can handle it. Miami has played their typical brutal slate.

(12-03-2009 11:35 PM)uakronkid Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-03-2009 10:21 PM)DICK Wrote: [ -> ]After last night's loss to Dayton, Miami's strength of schedule moved to #75. Our next 3 games are #14 Temple, #37 UC, and #57 Wright State, so our strength of schedule may be top 25 by then. We are 2-5 now, just hoping we are not 2-8 in 10 days.

What's the point in having a high SOS if you're 2-8?

It hurts the rest of the conference teams' RPI to have to play a team with a poor record, no matter how good their schedule was.

More teams doing that kind of scheduling will only make things worse.

The point is so that your team learns to compete on a level high enough to get the conference out of the basement.

The problem is that you don't have a "crystal" ball in advance that tells you how good (or bad) your team will be year in and year out.....Miami is fortunate to have long-standing relationships with b-ball powers like Dayton, Xavier and UC, and it would be a huge mistake to just let those kind of games go off the schedule because our team isn't so hot every now and then. Most of the time Miami is very competitive, and although our team is off to a poor start, we've been very competive in losing to Ky by 2 and Dayton by 7 (we were just down 1 with a minute to play but had to foul and they hit all their free throws down the stretch).

OTOH, if you have a good team (e.g. Akron), but don't play anyone, your RPI will stink and you have no shot at an NCAA at large berth if you lose in the MAC tourney.

So, in summation- the MAC OOC SOS is a POS hurting our NCAA RPI so its FUBAR, unlike UAB, USC and OSU.

Realtimerpi is just one of many RPI sites. We might be 24 there, but the Pomeroy site and Sagarin has us at 18. Warrennolan.com has us at 21. As of 2 days after the first post, we've jumped up to 22 overall on realtime. Do you really think a few weeks of play should cause a scare when realtime has St John's ranked #4 and Missouri State #9? My guess is we'll finish somewhere between 11-16 or so, that's when it matters.

I'll give you a great reason why you play quality teams. Your RPI goes up even if you lose. KSU jumped from 105 to 71 after losing to Xavier yesterday. I'm pretty sure Akron's RPI went up after losing to Texas A&M. Also, the conference RPI jumped from 24 to 21. KSU and Akron were the only 2 teams that played in the MAC yesterday. So two teams lost and the MAC still gained.

Many times if you beat a team with a team that has an RPI of 300, you drop even if you win. If you lose, you plummet. I'll take a loss to Xavier over beating NJIT any day.

Finally, Miami was only 17-13 last year last year, but had an RPI of 81.......the highest in the MAC.