CSNbbs

(12-21-2014 10:41 PM)ThreeifbyLightning Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-21-2014 10:16 PM)ODUDrunkard13 Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-21-2014 10:01 PM)moss2k Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-21-2014 05:06 PM)ThreeifbyLightning Wrote: [ -> ]We jumped out to an 18-0 lead and then 27-7 against Tennessee State and then proceeded to play awful the rest of the game.

Final 65-47.

BTW, this is why it's better to play a Division II instead of playing a team with a RPI of 350 that's in a league that's going to be well below .500 and one of the bottom five to seven conferences in the nation.

Games like this will drag down on C-USA's RPI all season even though we won it. Individually our RPI ballooned by over 35 places just for playing and winning this game.

Just schedule a tougher game. Non-D1's are not the answer. CUSA needs to increase it's bball profile, stop playing non-D1's, build a schedule that can get you an at-large consideration if you handle business.

Yep. ODU is giving the rest of the league the road map to building your RPI. Look at our schedule and let me know what schools in CUSA couldn't set a similar schedule:

Sat, Nov 15 vs UNC Wilmington W76-56
1-0 (0-0) Tue, Nov 18 vs Richmond W63-57
2-0 (0-0) Fri, Nov 21 vs LSU* W70-61
3-0 (0-0) Sun, Nov 23 vs Illinois St* L64-45
3-1 (0-0) Mon, Nov 24 vs Gardner-Webb* W58-46
4-1 (0-0) Sat, Nov 29 vs #14 Virginia Commonwealth W73-67
5-1 (0-0)Wed, Dec 3 @George Mason W75-69
6-1 (0-0) Sun, Dec 14 vs North Carolina A&T W85-48
7-1 (0-0) Wed, Dec 17 vs Georgia St W58-54 OT
8-1 (0-0) Fri, Dec 19 vs Maryland-Eastern Shore W60-43
9-1 (0-0) Mon, Dec 22 vs William & Mary
Mon, Dec 29 vs Mt. St. Mary's

The caveat to scheduling like this, you need to beat the bad teams you schedule.

It can be easier said that done. Take Teke's point about TSU. They were 112 two years ago and 300 last year.

Also, it's not as simple as just scheduling tougher. If everyone schedules up and you have a overall league win ptc of less than 50% it will kill your conference RPI once you get into the league. There's a delicate balance and not a one size fits all answer.

Middle's scheduling this year isn't that big of an issue in my eyes. They scheduled tough enough. LT is a perfect example of bad scheduling. They are 8-3 and have an RPI in the 200s. That's unacceptable.

And BTW, we are still below .500 overall as a conference, so the rest of us are going to drag UTEP and ODU down all season.

By comparison the A10 is 30 games over .500 (.611). They'll get a bunch of teams in again this year. The American is 21 games over .500. Even the MAC is 19 games over. We suck again this year. We could be doing a lot better and should be.

Plus the better you do the harder it gets to schedule. Especially at home.

North Texas beat Creighton (Big East) for a quality win. We have had several teams beat P6 (in Basketball the Big East still counts as a power conference in my opinion). We have also had several teams (my Toppers included) lay eggs in games. Conference play is going to be fun.

(12-21-2014 11:44 PM)TeKERaider Wrote: [ -> ]Plus the better you do the harder it gets to schedule. Especially at home.

I don't agree with this. Scheduling falls almost entirely on the coach and their ability to put together a quality schedule.
Some of ODU's strongest teams had home and homes with Missouri, Georgetown, and other quality teams; we annually play quality Atlantic 10 teams.

Right now UTEP's strength of schedule is #9 according to realtime rpi. Three of UTEP's four losses have come against teams that are a combined 32-0. The only thing hurting UTEP right now is a road loss to rival NMSU. If NMSU gets healthy and wins the WAC which they will most likely do UTEP will have a top 40 RPI with a top 20 strength of schedule out of conference.

(12-21-2014 11:22 PM)ThreeifbyLightning Wrote: [ -> ]And BTW, we are still below .500 overall as a conference, so the rest of us are going to drag UTEP and ODU down all season.

By comparison the A10 is 30 games over .500 (.611). They'll get a bunch of teams in again this year. The American is 21 games over .500. Even the MAC is 19 games over. We suck again this year. We could be doing a lot better and should be.

I believe CUSA is 12 games over .500 (79 67) 12/22/14

Old Dominion 0-0 9-1
Louisiana Tech 0-0 8-3
UTEP 0-0 7-4
North Texas 0-0 6-4
Middle Tennessee 0-0 7-5
Florida Atlantic 0-0 5-4
Charlotte 0-0 6-5
Florida International 0-0 6-6
Southern Miss 0-0 5-5
Western Kentucky 0-0 5-5
UT San Antonio 0-0 4-5
Marshall 0-0 4-7
UAB 0-0 4-7
Rice 0-0 3-6

Link ... http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/standings

(12-22-2014 10:31 AM)ODU Oldtimer Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-21-2014 11:22 PM)ThreeifbyLightning Wrote: [ -> ]And BTW, we are still below .500 overall as a conference, so the rest of us are going to drag UTEP and ODU down all season.

By comparison the A10 is 30 games over .500 (.611). They'll get a bunch of teams in again this year. The American is 21 games over .500. Even the MAC is 19 games over. We suck again this year. We could be doing a lot better and should be.

I believe CUSA is 12 game over .500 (79 67) 12/22/14

Old Dominion 0-0 9-1
Louisiana Tech 0-0 8-3
UTEP 0-0 7-4
North Texas 0-0 6-4
Middle Tennessee 0-0 7-5
Florida Atlantic 0-0 5-4
Charlotte 0-0 6-5
Florida International 0-0 6-6
Southern Miss 0-0 5-5
Western Kentucky 0-0 5-5
UT San Antonio 0-0 4-5
Marshall 0-0 4-7
UAB 0-0 4-7
Rice 0-0 3-6

Link ... http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/standings

He's probably using the RPI/Division-I records. That makes a big swing:

North Texas is 4-4
MTSU is 6-5
FAU is 3-4
FIU is 4-6
Southern Miss is 3-5
UTSA is 3-5
Marshall is 2-7
UAB is 3-7
Rice is 1-5
etc.

According to rpiforecast, CUSA's current record is 61-64: http://www.rpiforecast.com/confs/CUSA.html

(12-22-2014 10:38 AM)TribeNiner Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-22-2014 10:31 AM)ODU Oldtimer Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-21-2014 11:22 PM)ThreeifbyLightning Wrote: [ -> ]And BTW, we are still below .500 overall as a conference, so the rest of us are going to drag UTEP and ODU down all season.

By comparison the A10 is 30 games over .500 (.611). They'll get a bunch of teams in again this year. The American is 21 games over .500. Even the MAC is 19 games over. We suck again this year. We could be doing a lot better and should be.

I believe CUSA is 12 game over .500 (79 67) 12/22/14

Old Dominion 0-0 9-1
Louisiana Tech 0-0 8-3
UTEP 0-0 7-4
North Texas 0-0 6-4
Middle Tennessee 0-0 7-5
Florida Atlantic 0-0 5-4
Charlotte 0-0 6-5
Florida International 0-0 6-6
Southern Miss 0-0 5-5
Western Kentucky 0-0 5-5
UT San Antonio 0-0 4-5
Marshall 0-0 4-7
UAB 0-0 4-7
Rice 0-0 3-6

Link ... http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/standings

He's probably using the RPI/Division-I records. That makes a big swing:

North Texas is 4-4
MTSU is 6-5
FAU is 3-4
FIU is 4-6
Southern Miss is 3-5
UTSA is 3-5
Marshall is 2-7
UAB is 3-7
Rice is 1-5
etc.

According to rpiforecast, CUSA's current record is 61-64: http://www.rpiforecast.com/confs/CUSA.html

Gotya....thanks

(12-22-2014 09:24 AM)monarchman Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-21-2014 11:44 PM)TeKERaider Wrote: [ -> ]Plus the better you do the harder it gets to schedule. Especially at home.

I don't agree with this. Scheduling falls almost entirely on the coach and their ability to put together a quality schedule.
Some of ODU's strongest teams had home and homes with Missouri, Georgetown, and other quality teams; we annually play quality Atlantic 10 teams.

I'm amused at the number of ODU fans who think scheduling quality is just so easy.

One thing you ODU fans are missing is that your school is located in an general geographic area with a heavily concentrated set of good conferences and good basketball schools some of which don't have football and focus almost exclusively on basketball.

I live in the DC area, and the mid-Atlantic is chocked full of good basketball within driving distance to ODU. On the flip side of that take us for example. We have one school in our area that's traditionally a good program (Belmont). We have to go over three hours just to get to the next one in Memphis. Or the only other options for us within three hours are power schools (Louisville, UT). Someone mentioned Louisiana Tech, but they may have even fewer options than us. Most of us in this league don't have a lot good basketball that doesn't require paying for a flight.

And with fewer good basketball options the competition for scheduling is much more intense than it is for ODU.

(12-22-2014 11:26 AM)ThreeifbyLightning Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-22-2014 09:24 AM)monarchman Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-21-2014 11:44 PM)TeKERaider Wrote: [ -> ]Plus the better you do the harder it gets to schedule. Especially at home.

I don't agree with this. Scheduling falls almost entirely on the coach and their ability to put together a quality schedule.
Some of ODU's strongest teams had home and homes with Missouri, Georgetown, and other quality teams; we annually play quality Atlantic 10 teams.

I'm amused at the number of ODU fans who think scheduling quality is just so easy.

One thing you ODU fans are missing is that your school is located in an general geographic area with a heavily concentrated set of good conferences and good basketball schools some of which don't have football and focus almost exclusively on basketball.

I live in the DC area, and the mid-Atlantic is chocked full of good basketball within driving distance to ODU. On the flip side of that take us for example. We have one school in our area that's traditionally a good program (Belmont). We have to go over three hours just to get to the next one in Memphis. Or the only other options for us within three hours are power schools (Louisville, UT). Someone mentioned Louisiana Tech, but they may have even fewer options than us. Most of us in this league don't have a lot good basketball that doesn't require paying for a flight.

And with fewer good basketball options the competition for scheduling is much more intense than it is for ODU.

MT is in a major metro area. You guys shouldn't have problems getting people to come play you. I'm not talking major P5 programs, but respectable opponents from a top 12 conference. It is an easy trip.

Schools like USM, La Tech, and Marshall I will give a pass (although Marshall actually gets a pretty good home slate).

A huge part of scheduling is also relationships your coaches and AD have. For as much grief as Charlotte fans give our AD and coaching staff, they do a nice job getting us into great preseason tournaments and getting a few name team on the schedule every year. Most of those aren't at home, but we usually get 1 good home game each year.

Although Charlotte and ODU have more schools within driving distance of them, most of them won't play us at home. UNC, Duke, and NCSU won't play us at all. Wake Forest has played us in the past, but once away and once at the uptown arena. Maryland did the same. Clemson actually played us in a true home and home and I will always respect them for that.

The only quality school within 3 hours from us that will play us with any regularity is Davidson. ODU gets VCU and Mason (who isn't very good these days) and that's about it. UVA and VT aren't playing ODU in home and home games.

Personally, I think MT would benefit tremendously from a new coach that comes from a solid coaching tree. You have a stale old coach that schedules like crap and mostly recruits JUCOs. You guys can do better IMO.

Look at the best schools on Charlotte's schedule this year:

USC - preseason tournament
Penn State - preseason tournament
Miami - preseason tournament
Miami (2nd time)- not a local game
Davidson - local rivalry
Georgetown - not a local game
Georgia Tech - not a local game
George Washington - not a local game

Our location had NOTHING to do with those games, except the second Miami game since they just rolled it into the Charleston trip since it was only 3 hours away. That said, Miami has played us home and home before.

We gave up home games to go play some name opponents on the road and our AD works the preseason tournaments really well. Why can't MT do the same? All signs point to your coach and AD being bums in the scheduling department. Putting a quality OOC schedule together isn't easy, but it is absolutely do-able and it sometimes requires sacrificing home games. I'll understandably give teams a pass for struggling to bring quality OOC opponents in as home games, but I refuse to give teams a pass on scheduling garbage games away too.

(12-22-2014 11:44 AM)Niner National Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-22-2014 11:26 AM)ThreeifbyLightning Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-22-2014 09:24 AM)monarchman Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-21-2014 11:44 PM)TeKERaider Wrote: [ -> ]Plus the better you do the harder it gets to schedule. Especially at home.

I don't agree with this. Scheduling falls almost entirely on the coach and their ability to put together a quality schedule.
Some of ODU's strongest teams had home and homes with Missouri, Georgetown, and other quality teams; we annually play quality Atlantic 10 teams.

I'm amused at the number of ODU fans who think scheduling quality is just so easy.

One thing you ODU fans are missing is that your school is located in an general geographic area with a heavily concentrated set of good conferences and good basketball schools some of which don't have football and focus almost exclusively on basketball.

I live in the DC area, and the mid-Atlantic is chocked full of good basketball within driving distance to ODU. On the flip side of that take us for example. We have one school in our area that's traditionally a good program (Belmont). We have to go over three hours just to get to the next one in Memphis. Or the only other options for us within three hours are power schools (Louisville, UT). Someone mentioned Louisiana Tech, but they may have even fewer options than us. Most of us in this league don't have a lot good basketball that doesn't require paying for a flight.

And with fewer good basketball options the competition for scheduling is much more intense than it is for ODU.

MT is in a major metro area. You guys shouldn't have problems getting people to come play you. I'm not talking major P5 programs, but respectable opponents from a top 12 conference. It is an easy trip.

Schools like USM, La Tech, and Marshall I will give a pass (although Marshall actually gets a pretty good home slate).

A huge part of scheduling is also relationships your coaches and AD have. For as much grief as Charlotte fans give our AD and coaching staff, they do a nice job getting us into great preseason tournaments and getting a few name team on the schedule every year. Most of those aren't at home, but we usually get 1 good home game each year.

Although Charlotte and ODU have more schools within driving distance of them, most of them won't play us at home. UNC, Duke, and NCSU won't play us at all. Wake Forest has played us in the past, but once away and once at the uptown arena. Maryland did the same. Clemson actually played us in a true home and home and I will always respect them for that.

The only quality school within 3 hours from us that will play us with any regularity is Davidson. ODU gets VCU and Mason (who isn't very good these days) and that's about it. UVA and VT aren't playing ODU in home and home games.

Personally, I think MT would benefit tremendously from a new coach that comes from a solid coaching tree. You have a stale old coach that schedules like crap and mostly recruits JUCOs. You guys can do better IMO.

Look at the best schools on Charlotte's schedule this year:

USC - preseason tournament
Penn State - preseason tournament
Miami - preseason tournament
Miami (2nd time)- not a local game
Davidson - local rivalry
Georgetown - not a local game
Georgia Tech - not a local game
George Washington - not a local game

Our location had NOTHING to do with those games, except the second Miami game since they just rolled it into the Charleston trip since it was only 3 hours away. That said, Miami has played us home and home before.

We gave up home games to go play some name opponents on the road and our AD works the preseason tournaments really well. Why can't MT do the same? All signs point to your coach and AD being bums in the scheduling department. Putting a quality OOC schedule together isn't easy, but it is absolutely do-able and it sometimes requires sacrificing home games. I'll understandably give teams a pass for struggling to bring quality OOC opponents in as home games, but I refuse to give teams a pass on scheduling garbage games away too.

That's just the point. We are scheduling like that. We were in a tournament this season. But to suggest this is easy is absurd. Plus, the outcome is we have to play a ton of games on the road when it comes to the decent programs. We just spent most of Nov and Dec away from home. Of the schools you all have played they are all in driving distance with the exception of GT and Miami. You can call GW and Georgetown not local but they are all within three hours and easy to get to. We have very schools that are geographically that close that are also "competitive."

In the past three/four years we have played at UCLA, Loyola Marymount, Ole Miss, Florida, Oklahoma St, Ole Miss, and Cincinnati. All of those on the road. We got Ole Miss to do a 1-1-1, which got us a home game, but we also had to play a neutral game just outside their backdoor near Memphis. Our home schedule usually consist of TSU, a SWAC school and some other schools from 20+ ranked leagues because that's all that's around us that doesn't require chartering a flight. Being in a metro is of little consequence scheduling wise if other schools are unwilling to fly into Nashville when these other programs of relevance have tons of options within a couple of hundred miles around them. Take George Washington for example. Good program. Why would they come down here and even bother with a home and home. They won't play a single game that's not a bus ride except for the Hawaii tournament they played in. For that reason, there isn't a single A10 school that will agree to play us, and we've tried to help our RPI. And getting the power conferences is almost impossible. I mentioned Ole Miss, and we've had both UNC and Kansas come to Murfreesboro, but it's a rare feat and these one offs do little to help fill out a 15-game non-conf schedule. So we end up filling out the rest of our schedule with OVC and Atlantic Sun schools just so we can get a home game or two.

We have tried to find other good mid-majors that will do home and home but it's been extremely difficult. Akron is one of the few we have been able to get to play us and that's an eight hour drive. So, we end up with a lot of road games and a crap home schedule. And Kermit knows everyone. He's been around forever and is very well like/respected in college coaching circles so this isn't just a relationship thing. Stop making it to be what it isn't. Geography plays a huge factor in basketball scheduling. And with most of the good basketball played in the northeast and/or mid-Atlantic it's an advantage ODU has most of the league doesn't. Of course that advantage is only useful if you have a good team, so while it wasn't so helpful last year it will be this year cause you guys have such a good team.

(12-22-2014 01:31 PM)ThreeifbyLightning Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-22-2014 11:44 AM)Niner National Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-22-2014 11:26 AM)ThreeifbyLightning Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-22-2014 09:24 AM)monarchman Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-21-2014 11:44 PM)TeKERaider Wrote: [ -> ]Plus the better you do the harder it gets to schedule. Especially at home.

I don't agree with this. Scheduling falls almost entirely on the coach and their ability to put together a quality schedule.
Some of ODU's strongest teams had home and homes with Missouri, Georgetown, and other quality teams; we annually play quality Atlantic 10 teams.

I'm amused at the number of ODU fans who think scheduling quality is just so easy.

One thing you ODU fans are missing is that your school is located in an general geographic area with a heavily concentrated set of good conferences and good basketball schools some of which don't have football and focus almost exclusively on basketball.

I live in the DC area, and the mid-Atlantic is chocked full of good basketball within driving distance to ODU. On the flip side of that take us for example. We have one school in our area that's traditionally a good program (Belmont). We have to go over three hours just to get to the next one in Memphis. Or the only other options for us within three hours are power schools (Louisville, UT). Someone mentioned Louisiana Tech, but they may have even fewer options than us. Most of us in this league don't have a lot good basketball that doesn't require paying for a flight.

And with fewer good basketball options the competition for scheduling is much more intense than it is for ODU.

MT is in a major metro area. You guys shouldn't have problems getting people to come play you. I'm not talking major P5 programs, but respectable opponents from a top 12 conference. It is an easy trip.

Schools like USM, La Tech, and Marshall I will give a pass (although Marshall actually gets a pretty good home slate).

A huge part of scheduling is also relationships your coaches and AD have. For as much grief as Charlotte fans give our AD and coaching staff, they do a nice job getting us into great preseason tournaments and getting a few name team on the schedule every year. Most of those aren't at home, but we usually get 1 good home game each year.

Although Charlotte and ODU have more schools within driving distance of them, most of them won't play us at home. UNC, Duke, and NCSU won't play us at all. Wake Forest has played us in the past, but once away and once at the uptown arena. Maryland did the same. Clemson actually played us in a true home and home and I will always respect them for that.

The only quality school within 3 hours from us that will play us with any regularity is Davidson. ODU gets VCU and Mason (who isn't very good these days) and that's about it. UVA and VT aren't playing ODU in home and home games.

Personally, I think MT would benefit tremendously from a new coach that comes from a solid coaching tree. You have a stale old coach that schedules like crap and mostly recruits JUCOs. You guys can do better IMO.

Look at the best schools on Charlotte's schedule this year:

USC - preseason tournament
Penn State - preseason tournament
Miami - preseason tournament
Miami (2nd time)- not a local game
Davidson - local rivalry
Georgetown - not a local game
Georgia Tech - not a local game
George Washington - not a local game

Our location had NOTHING to do with those games, except the second Miami game since they just rolled it into the Charleston trip since it was only 3 hours away. That said, Miami has played us home and home before.

We gave up home games to go play some name opponents on the road and our AD works the preseason tournaments really well. Why can't MT do the same? All signs point to your coach and AD being bums in the scheduling department. Putting a quality OOC schedule together isn't easy, but it is absolutely do-able and it sometimes requires sacrificing home games. I'll understandably give teams a pass for struggling to bring quality OOC opponents in as home games, but I refuse to give teams a pass on scheduling garbage games away too.

That's just the point. We are scheduling like that. We were in a tournament this season. But to suggest this is easy is absurd. Plus, the outcome is we have to play a ton of games on the road when it comes to the decent programs. We just spent most of Nov and Dec away from home. Of the schools you all have played they are all in driving distance with the exception of GT and Miami. You can call GW and Georgetown not local but they are all within three hours and easy to get to. We have very schools that are geographically that close that are also "competitive."

In the past three/four years we have played at UCLA, Loyola Marymount, Ole Miss, Florida, Oklahoma St, Ole Miss, and Cincinnati. All of those on the road. We got Ole Miss to do a 1-1-1, which got us a home game, but we also had to play a neutral game just outside their backdoor near Memphis. Our home schedule usually consist of TSU, a SWAC school and some other schools from 20+ ranked leagues because that's all that's around us that doesn't require chartering a flight. Being in a metro is of little consequence scheduling wise if other schools are unwilling to fly into Nashville when these other programs of relevance have tons of options within a couple of hundred miles around them. Take George Washington for example. Good program. Why would they come down here and even bother with a home and home. They won't play a single game that's not a bus ride except for the Hawaii tournament they played in. For that reason, there isn't a single A10 school that will agree to play us, and we've tried to help our RPI. And getting the power conferences is almost impossible. I mentioned Ole Miss, and we've had both UNC and Kansas come to Murfreesboro, but it's a rare feat and these one offs do little to help fill out a 15-game non-conf schedule. So we end up filling out the rest of our schedule with OVC and Atlantic Sun schools just so we can get a home game or two.

We have tried to find other good mid-majors that will do home and home but it's been extremely difficult. Akron is one of the few we have been able to get to play us and that's an eight hour drive. So, we end up with a lot of road games and a crap home schedule. And Kermit knows everyone. He's been around forever and is very well like/respected in college coaching circles so this isn't just a relationship thing. Stop making it to be what it isn't. Geography plays a huge factor in basketball scheduling. And with most of the good basketball played in the northeast and/or mid-Atlantic it's an advantage ODU has most of the league doesn't. Of course that advantage is only useful if you have a good team, so while it wasn't so helpful last year it will be this year cause you guys have such a good team.

GW and Georgetown are 7 hours, without traffic, from Charlotte. Those are flying games. GT is 4 hours, without traffic.

Charlotte isn't much different than MT. None of the good programs around us will play us. Davidson will. That's it and they're like Belmont. Good, but there is no guarantee they will be every season.

Hell, even South Carolina won't play us. They only did this year because we were in the same tournament.

I never said scheduling was easy. It is difficult. You have to be relentless and/or have good relationships.

Nobody expects teams in this conference to fill up the schedule with world beaters, but some of the schedules people put together in this league are an absolute joke.

Even UTEP schedules well and you have to build a space ship, go through 6 months of flight training, bus to the spaceport in Las Cruces, and endure a 3 day space flight just to get there.

Well I was talking more about ODU ' S situation instead of Charlotte but I guess when you are 50-5 at home in your last 55 games is not helping either.

Posted from my mobile device using the CSNbbs App

One thing not being mentioned about ODU's ooc schedule is that a lot of the ooc games are former CAA rivals. VCU, Mason, Richmond, Georgia State and William and Mary were all conference mates at 1 point so we had built in relationships with those schools. Another bonus is that VCU, Richmond and W&M are all 2 hours or less bus rides. These games help our RPI, fill the arena and save on travel expenses. Most schools in this conference do not have those built in advantages for an ooc schedule.

Kind of the same advantage that Southern college baseball teams (esp. those in the deep South) have over teams further North.

I agree with benny (above) that ODU has distinct advantages in scheduling. However, I absolutely reject the notion that any CUSA team should ever play a DII/NAIA team. That's unacceptable for a conference that's trying to build a multi-bid brand. We would be better served if those DII teams were replaced with decent low Mid-Major teams from the Big South, OVC, Southland, ASun, MEAC, etc. It would still be a crap-shoot whether a team from one of those leagues would be good in a given year, but more often than not, some of them would be...and they would look a lot better than a DII win. You also shouldn't have any problem getting a home and home with those teams.

Edit: And I can't believe a lot of our teams couldn't schedule home-and-home games with the Valley, CAA and MAC. I might be naive, but I don't think so. If this conference doesn't improve the scheduling, we're doomed to become the Sun Belt in basketball.

(12-22-2014 01:56 PM)Niner National Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-22-2014 01:31 PM)ThreeifbyLightning Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-22-2014 11:44 AM)Niner National Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-22-2014 11:26 AM)ThreeifbyLightning Wrote: [ -> ]

(12-22-2014 09:24 AM)monarchman Wrote: [ -> ]I don't agree with this. Scheduling falls almost entirely on the coach and their ability to put together a quality schedule.
Some of ODU's strongest teams had home and homes with Missouri, Georgetown, and other quality teams; we annually play quality Atlantic 10 teams.

I'm amused at the number of ODU fans who think scheduling quality is just so easy.

One thing you ODU fans are missing is that your school is located in an general geographic area with a heavily concentrated set of good conferences and good basketball schools some of which don't have football and focus almost exclusively on basketball.

I live in the DC area, and the mid-Atlantic is chocked full of good basketball within driving distance to ODU. On the flip side of that take us for example. We have one school in our area that's traditionally a good program (Belmont). We have to go over three hours just to get to the next one in Memphis. Or the only other options for us within three hours are power schools (Louisville, UT). Someone mentioned Louisiana Tech, but they may have even fewer options than us. Most of us in this league don't have a lot good basketball that doesn't require paying for a flight.

And with fewer good basketball options the competition for scheduling is much more intense than it is for ODU.

MT is in a major metro area. You guys shouldn't have problems getting people to come play you. I'm not talking major P5 programs, but respectable opponents from a top 12 conference. It is an easy trip.

Schools like USM, La Tech, and Marshall I will give a pass (although Marshall actually gets a pretty good home slate).

A huge part of scheduling is also relationships your coaches and AD have. For as much grief as Charlotte fans give our AD and coaching staff, they do a nice job getting us into great preseason tournaments and getting a few name team on the schedule every year. Most of those aren't at home, but we usually get 1 good home game each year.

Although Charlotte and ODU have more schools within driving distance of them, most of them won't play us at home. UNC, Duke, and NCSU won't play us at all. Wake Forest has played us in the past, but once away and once at the uptown arena. Maryland did the same. Clemson actually played us in a true home and home and I will always respect them for that.

The only quality school within 3 hours from us that will play us with any regularity is Davidson. ODU gets VCU and Mason (who isn't very good these days) and that's about it. UVA and VT aren't playing ODU in home and home games.

Personally, I think MT would benefit tremendously from a new coach that comes from a solid coaching tree. You have a stale old coach that schedules like crap and mostly recruits JUCOs. You guys can do better IMO.

Look at the best schools on Charlotte's schedule this year:

USC - preseason tournament
Penn State - preseason tournament
Miami - preseason tournament
Miami (2nd time)- not a local game
Davidson - local rivalry
Georgetown - not a local game
Georgia Tech - not a local game
George Washington - not a local game

Our location had NOTHING to do with those games, except the second Miami game since they just rolled it into the Charleston trip since it was only 3 hours away. That said, Miami has played us home and home before.

We gave up home games to go play some name opponents on the road and our AD works the preseason tournaments really well. Why can't MT do the same? All signs point to your coach and AD being bums in the scheduling department. Putting a quality OOC schedule together isn't easy, but it is absolutely do-able and it sometimes requires sacrificing home games. I'll understandably give teams a pass for struggling to bring quality OOC opponents in as home games, but I refuse to give teams a pass on scheduling garbage games away too.

That's just the point. We are scheduling like that. We were in a tournament this season. But to suggest this is easy is absurd. Plus, the outcome is we have to play a ton of games on the road when it comes to the decent programs. We just spent most of Nov and Dec away from home. Of the schools you all have played they are all in driving distance with the exception of GT and Miami. You can call GW and Georgetown not local but they are all within three hours and easy to get to. We have very schools that are geographically that close that are also "competitive."

In the past three/four years we have played at UCLA, Loyola Marymount, Ole Miss, Florida, Oklahoma St, Ole Miss, and Cincinnati. All of those on the road. We got Ole Miss to do a 1-1-1, which got us a home game, but we also had to play a neutral game just outside their backdoor near Memphis. Our home schedule usually consist of TSU, a SWAC school and some other schools from 20+ ranked leagues because that's all that's around us that doesn't require chartering a flight. Being in a metro is of little consequence scheduling wise if other schools are unwilling to fly into Nashville when these other programs of relevance have tons of options within a couple of hundred miles around them. Take George Washington for example. Good program. Why would they come down here and even bother with a home and home. They won't play a single game that's not a bus ride except for the Hawaii tournament they played in. For that reason, there isn't a single A10 school that will agree to play us, and we've tried to help our RPI. And getting the power conferences is almost impossible. I mentioned Ole Miss, and we've had both UNC and Kansas come to Murfreesboro, but it's a rare feat and these one offs do little to help fill out a 15-game non-conf schedule. So we end up filling out the rest of our schedule with OVC and Atlantic Sun schools just so we can get a home game or two.

We have tried to find other good mid-majors that will do home and home but it's been extremely difficult. Akron is one of the few we have been able to get to play us and that's an eight hour drive. So, we end up with a lot of road games and a crap home schedule. And Kermit knows everyone. He's been around forever and is very well like/respected in college coaching circles so this isn't just a relationship thing. Stop making it to be what it isn't. Geography plays a huge factor in basketball scheduling. And with most of the good basketball played in the northeast and/or mid-Atlantic it's an advantage ODU has most of the league doesn't. Of course that advantage is only useful if you have a good team, so while it wasn't so helpful last year it will be this year cause you guys have such a good team.

GW and Georgetown are 7 hours, without traffic, from Charlotte. Those are flying games. GT is 4 hours, without traffic.

Charlotte isn't much different than MT. None of the good programs around us will play us. Davidson will. That's it and they're like Belmont. Good, but there is no guarantee they will be every season.

Hell, even South Carolina won't play us. They only did this year because we were in the same tournament.

I never said scheduling was easy. It is difficult. You have to be relentless and/or have good relationships.

Nobody expects teams in this conference to fill up the schedule with world beaters, but some of the schedules people put together in this league are an absolute joke.

Even UTEP schedules well and you have to build a space ship, go through 6 months of flight training, bus to the spaceport in Las Cruces, and endure a 3 day space flight just to get there.

Or simply take Southwest...

(12-22-2014 03:48 PM)Maryland Monarch Wrote: [ -> ]I agree with benny (above) that ODU has distinct advantages in scheduling. However, I absolutely reject the notion that any CUSA team should ever play a DII/NAIA team. That's unacceptable for a conference that's trying to build a multi-bid brand. We would be better served if those DII teams were replaced with decent low Mid-Major teams from the Big South, OVC, Southland, ASun, MEAC, etc. It would still be a crap-shoot whether a team from one of those leagues would be good in a given year, but more often than not, some of them would be...and they would look a lot better than a DII win. You also shouldn't have any problem getting a home and home with those teams.

Edit: And I can't believe a lot of our teams couldn't schedule home-and-home games with the Valley, CAA and MAC. I might be naive, but I don't think so. If this conference doesn't improve the scheduling, we're doomed to become the Sun Belt in basketball.

The reason I primarily disagree with this is because you have to remember that 50% of the RPI formula is opponents win percentage and opponents-opponents win percentage, so if you're playing OVC, SWAC, MEAC schools that has win percentages of 25 to 30% in their OOC schedule those games are going to absolutely kill your RPI even if you beat them. So, it doesn't even matter if you play the best SWAC school in that league. You're going to get wacked everytime that SWAC school plays a conference game (twice because the best team in that type of league usually has an OOC record of below .500 themselves). If you can't find an opponent from a top 15 conference (even if that's a weaker team in that conference) to play then you're better off just scheduling a D2.

This is exactly why we replaced Austin Peay on our schedule with a D2 school. We tried to get some A10 and Missouri Valley schools but they wouldn't play us at our place. We also had another RPI killer that we were able to replace with Chattanooga, so when you can it's certainly better to have a Chattanooga on the schedule instead of a D2 (because they'll probably be top 150 at the end of the year), but if you're down to needing a game and only a couple of months before the season with school like APSU or Florida A&M or someone like that you might as well avoid and just play a game that doesn't count instead of one that's going to hurt you. But even Chattanooga is in a league that has a terrible OOC record, so it's probably a wash on what they can do for you even if they win their league.

And then when the horseshit schools that schedule DII's lose to the only decent DI schools they play, they end up ******* their conference brothers because you cheated yourself of easy DI wins, making your W/L % worse. At least if you play crappy DI teams teams and win the games, it helps your conference brothers out.

What we end up with instead is a bunch of teams selfishly looking out for themselves, which ultimately screws everyone over. DII games allow programs and coaches with no self respect to prop up their W/L record and keep their jobs. Lebo has played this game well at ECU and has parlayed ****** scheduling into an 8 year contract.