(02-04-2020 10:36 AM)Go College Sports Wrote:  

(02-04-2020 09:35 AM)RutgersGuy Wrote:  

(02-04-2020 09:31 AM)IWokeUpLikeThis Wrote:  Northwestern got blown out by Radford and D1 call-up Merrimack. Schedules aren't their issue. The issue is Northwestern has no basketball culture or history. Playing in the WCC elevates them from the bottom to the middle but it doesn't increase NCAA bids.

With their current resources they would get more ncaa bids over the last 20 years than they did in the B1G and the Zags more than likely would have gotten less. That’s the whole point of that hypothetical. What conference you play in most certainly matters with how many bids you can get over a period of time.

Another part of this hypothetical is would Few have been able to build the programs reputation while finishing in the middle of the B1G as opposed to the top of the WCC in his early years in Spokane.

There's no reason to believe this. Northwestern would never have been the best team in a Gonzaga-less WCC over that span, including the year they actually made the tournament. Since BYU joined nine years ago, Northwestern would never have even been the second best team. Many years they'd be several spots lower.

Meanwhile Gonzaga has had an at-large quality team every single season under Mark Few.

Playing a WCC schedule. They do not make the NCAA's every single year in the B1G over that 20 year span. Go look back at some of those early years OOC results, some good wins but not nearly as dominant as they have been recently. Also they have tough OOC's because they have a cupcake conference schedule while power conference schools even the bad ones have some tough OOC match ups to go along with a tough conference schedule. It's easier to get up for a few OOC games than it is to deal with the meat grinder of a power conference regular season schedule. Look at the average conference schedule of any team in the B1G, ACC, XII or Big East and you'll see most weeks two tough games and multiple times a year both of those tough games being on the road in that same week.

To go back to what I said earlier about how the Zags would be in the Big East if they were any closer to the east than they currently are. If they were in the Big East today there is a good chance they probably aren't sitting at #2 in the country right now.