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When you compare ouR program to others, who are you comparing it to? (mens bb only)

Pick as many of the following as you want.
I have 3

wku: is it the high water mark
La Tech: upper mid level mark
UCA: low water mark but soon to be even

I am going to use the results for the pre and post game write ups this year based on the poll.

It will be called, How would our bench marks do?


Example

North FLA @ home

WKU - wins by 10
La Tech - wins by 10
UCA - loses by 20

Just trying to judge where we are game by game. If none of the above would win the game, then not much to worry about but if they would have then you got something to gauge progress by.
I don't see a selection for Philander Smith...
(09-10-2013 08:01 AM)insideualr Wrote: [ -> ]I have 3

wku: is it the high water mark
La Tech: upper mid level mark
UCA: low water mark but soon to be even

I am going to use the results for the pre and post game write ups this year based on the poll.

It will be called, How would our bench marks do?


Example

North FLA @ home

WKU - wins by 10
La Tech - wins by 10
UCA - loses by 20

Just trying to judge where we are game by game. If none of the above would win the game, then not much to worry about but if they would have then you got something to gauge progress by.

I don't see a comparable program on that list. All but ORU has football which greatly changes the equation. ORU is not comparable because they are private and have a huge endowment. Closest programs I can think if are UMKC, UTA, and UNO. Before they added football, I would have also compared us to USA, GaState, and UTSA. All are state schools in urban settings; most likely have a high percentage of commuters. Those things make them very comparable to UALR.
(09-10-2013 03:56 PM)mjs Wrote: [ -> ]I don't see a comparable program on that list. All but ORU has football which greatly changes the equation. ORU is not comparable because they are private and have a huge endowment. Closest programs I can think if are UMKC, UTA, and UNO. Before they added football, I would have also compared us to USA, GaState, and UTSA. All are state schools in urban settings; most likely have a high percentage of commuters. Those things make them very comparable to UALR.

I was looking at comparable in basketball, and I want to be at least as good as ASU. Would actually like to be like WKU, but the way our program is being run, no way in hell for that to be. We might as well wish to be comparable to Duke as WKU, because we ain't gonna be comparable to UCA much longer.
You can write in if you have a school not on the list.

I just want about 3 I can us. uca and stAte are no brainers. wku or la tech will be the other one.
(09-10-2013 05:54 PM)insideualr Wrote: [ -> ]You can write in if you have a school not on the list.

I just want about 3 I can us. uca and stAte are no brainers. wku or la tech will be the other one.

My right in vote is UMKC. A branch campus of a major SEC university. Located in a major population area with a nearby medical school. A state university. A metropolitan university. A commuter campus. No football. They have the same type of apartment style on campus housing that UALR has. 14,000 total students, about 2000 more than UALR. Can't think of a regional school more like UALR. It's comparing apples to apples. UTA and UNO are probably close but likely have more oncampus students than UALR.
ORU, UMKC, Arlington

Good question, Inside. That takes some thought to answer.
I guess i should add that i have to know the team and the coaching. I don't know umkc.
(09-10-2013 09:24 PM)MICHAELSPAPPY Wrote: [ -> ]ORU, UMKC, Arlington

Good question, Inside. That takes some thought to answer.

The reason I voted against ORU is that it is a private school with a lot of money. Who are the midmajors that have made the jump to the "major" level- Butler, Gonzaga, and Creighton. All private schools that I am sure have big endowments. They can do what they want with their money, for the most part. They don't have state legislatures watching over them. The don't have a "big brother" in the northwest part of the state. They don't have football to deal with. I'm sure folks can think of some midmajor state schools that have done very well. Don't think any match the 3 I named.
(09-10-2013 09:41 PM)mjs Wrote: [ -> ]
(09-10-2013 09:24 PM)MICHAELSPAPPY Wrote: [ -> ]ORU, UMKC, Arlington

Good question, Inside. That takes some thought to answer.

The reason I voted against ORU is that it is a private school with a lot of money. Who are the midmajors that have made the jump to the "major" level- Butler, Gonzaga, and Creighton. All private schools that I am sure have big endowments. They can do what they want with their money, for the most part. They don't have state legislatures watching over them. The don't have a "big brother" in the northwest part of the state. They don't have football to deal with. I'm sure folks can think of some midmajor state schools that have done very well. Don't think any match the 3 I named.

Siu and several of the mvc schools were rolling at one point. Northen Iowa.
As long as we are both in the Belt, ASU would have to be a direct comparison.
(09-10-2013 09:50 PM)MICHAELSPAPPY Wrote: [ -> ]As long as we are both in the Belt, ASU would have to be a direct comparison.

SLU is also private, which apparently can be an advantage if you have a board of directors who wants to excel in athletics. I suspect Northern Iowa is a traditional campus and in a more rural area.

Certainly there is no way to avoid the comparison with ASU. I think we have been pretty even over the years. Some years we have been clearly better and visa versa. For years they had the facility advantage. They have the advantage of having a traditional campus. They have football. The main advantage I see is that they actually have a fan base that is passionate about their own school. Sure some of their fans root for "both" teams, but a large number love their school and hate a certain school in NW Arkansas. While hating the hogs is not a requirement, I don't think we can ever be successful until we have several thousand folks in Central Arkansas who consider UALR their team. We are so far from that it is laughable. We had 180 or so members in the Tip In Club last year. I consider those hardcore fans. Their are probably some hardcore fans who are not members, so maybe we can get the number up to about 300-400. Really don't think there are more than that. 8-10 posters on a message board that has been around for years says plenty.
(09-10-2013 10:03 PM)mjs Wrote: [ -> ]I don't think we can ever be successful until we have several thousand folks in Central Arkansas who consider UALR their team.

You sum it up. At this point I would even settle for several hundred.
Just for the record the above was SIU not SLU.

The statement about we have not added a poster in the 10 years I have followed the program is telling. We have not added or dropped a poster for the most part in that time. There has remained a core of about 8 posters on the board.

How do you change that?

Let me tell the SLU story one more time. There are not any answers in it but it is a bit of history that we can draw simulates to.

In 1998 when I started going to SLU games there was a high school kid that had a sign for billikens.com.

Sign guy Steve. SLU had 8,000 to 10,000 real butts in seats for most games at the time.

SLU played spoonball (grinderball). They had less talent but always won enough games to be about 4th in a 14 team cusa that had 2 to 3 top 25 teams most years and at least one in the top ten.


We all hated the style of ball and the fact that the level of talent was below everyone else in the league. Hated the boring grinderball. Hated the fact we could never make it to the semi finals of the cusa tournament. We could win a game or two but talent wins those tournaments not grinderball that requires a lot of coaching them up.

Attendance dropped to 6k a game spoon moved on and Romar moved in. Ro always tried to recruit kids from the west coast to play for us and it would be a bust and we would have to take table scraps and play more grinderball.

He landed Ryan Hollins (10 year nba guy still playing) and Ryan never came because Ro got the job he has now at UW. Hollins played for UCLA.

The next coach lasted a few years and a few NITs. Brad moved on and never coached again at the d1 level that I remember.

We hired the fat man at that point and turned the program around into a top 25 team and ncaa tourney game winner.

The point I was going to make was about the message board. It grew and it helped the program in the tough times.
Billiken Roy was me. He supported the program until one day he had to call out the issues knowing that there could be some pain and some misses while the right guy was looked for.

Today a new coach sits on top of a program that is positioned for success.

The message board is as strong as ever.

Our message board will never have more than 8 people posting on it.

Not until we can win and not play grinderball long term.

The health of a private school in a big city that gets plenty of time in the paper and honestly even on the drive time shows on the radio is a far cry from our program with little to no message board, paper, or talk show coverage and honestly no one on the staff trying to make it happen.

Our level of success we are shooting for is much less than SLU’s, WKU or La Techs. We just want to be able to make it to the conference finals most years and know that some is promoting the program locally.

Is that asking too much?

I started this looking for a fix to adding members to the message board. We have tried to get more people on here over the years and I don’t have any ideas but until we start winning and turn around the yearly 1st round loss in the sbc tournament I can’t ask people to buy tickets or talk on a message board.
No one would judge our program by looking at Middle?

Kermit is Steve. So much of these two is the same.
(09-10-2013 10:48 PM)insideualr Wrote: [ -> ]Today a new coach sits on top of a program that is positioned for success.

Did SLU's current success have anything to do with a different style of play?
I think the fat man used grinder ball with high skill players. He always had great pg play.

so, I think he played it but he also ran when they could. It is a mix.

Steve has done some of the saame.
Let's face it. We're trapped "Under the Dome". The Razorback dome. I was watching the coaches show the other night, and there are a lot of sponsors from the Little Rock area. Fayetteville not only gets all the media hype, they suck all the available money out of Central Arkansas.

How do you start getting some of that money? By winning. As long as we stumble along with no real emphasis on drawing new fans and are willing to be what we are, we'll remain what we are. A low midmajor program. What are the answers? I don't need to list them again. Posters on this board have made them over and over. But it requires what can be answered in one word. CHANGE. Got to make changes. Until we do, the program remains in limbo.
(09-10-2013 09:41 PM)mjs Wrote: [ -> ]
(09-10-2013 09:24 PM)MICHAELSPAPPY Wrote: [ -> ]ORU, UMKC, Arlington

Good question, Inside. That takes some thought to answer.

The reason I voted against ORU is that it is a private school with a lot of money. Who are the midmajors that have made the jump to the "major" level- Butler, Gonzaga, and Creighton. All private schools that I am sure have big endowments. They can do what they want with their money, for the most part. They don't have state legislatures watching over them. The don't have a "big brother" in the northwest part of the state. They don't have football to deal with. I'm sure folks can think of some midmajor state schools that have done very well. Don't think any match the 3 I named.

Looks like ASU and ORU are the runaway winners. We all ready have more votes than people who read the board. Oh, I forgot you could vote for more more than one school.

I think we are better than ORU right now. We'll see about ASU. Their fans feel confident, but so do most of ours.
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