CSNbbs

Full Version: NOW OFFICIAL: Next NIU Men's Basketball Coach
You're currently viewing a stripped down version of our content. View the full version with proper formatting.
Nice resume and good Chicago roots. A lot of potential at NIU but prolonged success has always seemed elusive, hope he pans out.
If the league could get NIU going in basketball say hello to 2 bids.
Why would the league get any particular program “going in basketball”? And if they could, why haven’t they? The MAC can say hello to two bids when the programs start to invest in basketball like top 25 teams do, which is probably never unless there are major structural and financial changes at MAC schools. Otherwise, the MAC will be as it’s been: every decade or so a program will hit a fortunate combination of coaching and talent and make a 1 or 2 season run into the top 25. Even then, the MAC would only be a two-bid league if that top team lost in the CT.

The MAC aspires to be as good as the MWC, WCC, or MVC who consistently have second place teams with strong at-large credentials, and even occasionally a third team. But, as we have seen forever, in the MAC, it’s an empty aspiration.
(03-08-2021 10:05 AM)axeme Wrote: [ -> ]Why would the league get any particular program “going in basketball”? And if they could, why haven’t they? The MAC can say hello to two bids when the programs start to invest in basketball like top 25 teams do, which is probably never unless there are major structural and financial changes at MAC schools. Otherwise, the MAC will be as it’s been: every decade or so a program will hit a fortunate combination of coaching and talent and make a 1 or 2 season run into the top 25. Even then, the MAC would only be a two-bid league if that top team lost in the CT.

The MAC aspires to be as good as the MWC, WCC, or MVC who consistently have second place teams with strong at-large credentials, and even occasionally a third team. But, as we have seen forever, in the MAC, it’s an empty aspiration.

Unfortunately much won't change as long as FBS keeps costing our schools more and more money (cost of attendance, increasing coaching salaries, etc.). WCC and MVC don't have to worry about the costs of FBS. Do all the WCC schools even play football? I don't know much about the WCC outside of a couple of them being good at basketball.
(03-08-2021 08:14 PM)epasnoopy Wrote: [ -> ]Unfortunately much won't change as long as FBS keeps costing our schools more and more money (cost of attendance, increasing coaching salaries, etc.). WCC and MVC don't have to worry about the costs of FBS. Do all the WCC schools even play football? I don't know much about the WCC outside of a couple of them being good at basketball.

Of the WCC schools only BYU (Independent) and San Diego (FCS Non-Scholarship Pioneer League) have football.
(03-09-2021 08:42 AM)MajorHoople Wrote: [ -> ]
(03-08-2021 08:14 PM)epasnoopy Wrote: [ -> ]Unfortunately much won't change as long as FBS keeps costing our schools more and more money (cost of attendance, increasing coaching salaries, etc.). WCC and MVC don't have to worry about the costs of FBS. Do all the WCC schools even play football? I don't know much about the WCC outside of a couple of them being good at basketball.

Of the WCC schools only BYU (Independent) and San Diego (FCS Non-Scholarship Pioneer League) have football.

Also, the WCC has small enrollment and many private schools (not our peer group). Schools in WCC are about 3K-10K in size with exception being BYU (30K+). Our peer group should really be the MWC.
We need to strive to be on that level.
Even the MWC isn't a great proxy, they're a bunch of flagships or other large public schools in western states with far less competition. Outside of California the strongest in-state university any of them have to deal with is Colorado. It's aspirational to be sure, but there's a limit to what we the MAC can realistically do.
Yep. I think we’ve had enough decades to know what the MAC can do, and the MAC can do and has done some great things. But the limitations are pretty firmly established. It’s position in the world of college athletics hasn’t really changed in modern history. It’s the sub-Big Ten conference and is not going to escape that. There really isn’t a parallel conference elsewhere in the country.
It also doesn't help that the Midwest is losing population. People are migrating West or to the South.

US News just ranked all 50 states. The first MAC state is New York at #21. Illinois is next at #30 and Illinois is not a state that any other states should aspire to be like.

https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/rankings
(03-10-2021 07:43 PM)axeme Wrote: [ -> ]Yep. I think we’ve had enough decades to know what the MAC can do, and the MAC can do and has done some great things. But the limitations are pretty firmly established. It’s position in the world of college athletics hasn’t really changed in modern history. It’s the sub-Big Ten conference and is not going to escape that. There really isn’t a parallel conference elsewhere in the country.

There's probably a potential conference out there made up of a dozen schools in SEC states that could be formed out of C-USA/Sun Belt schools that wouldn't be too far off from us. But really the only way our standing as a conference significantly changes with our current membership is if college athletics fundamentally changes.
(03-10-2021 07:43 PM)axeme Wrote: [ -> ]Yep. I think we’ve had enough decades to know what the MAC can do, and the MAC can do and has done some great things. But the limitations are pretty firmly established. It’s position in the world of college athletics hasn’t really changed in modern history. It’s the sub-Big Ten conference and is not going to escape that. There really isn’t a parallel conference elsewhere in the country.

^ What he said.
(03-08-2021 10:05 AM)axeme Wrote: [ -> ]The MAC aspires to be as good as the MWC, WCC, or MVC who consistently have second place teams with strong at-large credentials, and even occasionally a third team. But, as we have seen forever, in the MAC, it’s an empty aspiration.

To be realistic, the MAC is not even a conference that consistently has a team with strong NIT at-large credentials. For a number of years in the past decade, the best MAC candidate has been left on the outside of the bubble when the dust has settled on regular season champions of lower tier conferences losing the conference tournament and taking the NIT autobid.

Indeed, it's the 16 team, no auto-bid version of the NIT where with a dark horse taking out both the #1 and #2 seeds that the MAC gets two NIT seeds. But even there, all three MAC tournament teams this year will be playing a higher seeded team.
Reference URL's