If we are going to continue the 16 team BB conference what would be the best pods of 4 schools that play each other twice a year. If they go with an 18 game conference schedule that would give each team a chance to play the other teams at least once. My groups would be as follows:

Connecticut
Syracuse
Villanova
South Florida

Louisville
Cincinnati
West Virginia
Pittsburgh

St. Johns
Seton Hall
Rutgers
Georgetown

Notre Dame
Marquette
Depaul
Providence

South Florida is going to have to get better real quick. FYI, this is what we have now:


Villanova: UConn (2), Louisville (2), Syracuse (2) // Pittsburgh (0), Providence (0)
UConn: Villanova (2), Louisville (2), Syracuse (2) // DePaul (0), Rutgers (0)
Louisville: Villanova (2), UConn (2), Cincinnati (2) // Georgetown (0), Seton Hall (0)
Syracuse: Villanova (2), UConn (2), Cincinnati (2) // Marquette (0), Providence (0)

Cincinnati: Louisville (2), Syracuse (2), West Virginia (2) // Notre Dame (0), St. John

Frack the pods.....grab Memphis and let's break off into our all sports league: The Eastern 9 or The Great East....or whatever

That will probably come but it is a ways away. As you can tell these groups are pre-configured for a split down the road. In the meantime....

LaRue777 Wrote:If we are going to continue the 16 team BB conference what would be the best pods of 4 schools that play each other twice a year. If they go with an 18 game conference schedule that would give each team a chance to play the other teams at least once. My groups would be as follows:

Connecticut
Syracuse
Villanova
South Florida

Louisville
Cincinnati
West Virginia
Pittsburgh

St. Johns
Seton Hall
Rutgers
Georgetown

Notre Dame
Marquette
Depaul
Providence

I'd swith the pods to something more like this...

Connecticut
Providence
St. Johns
Seton Hall

Georgetown
Rutgers
Syracuse
Villanova

Cincinnati
Louisville
Pittsburgh
West Virginia

Depaul
Marquette
Notre Dame
South Florida

They are a bit more geocentric, with the exception of South Florida, which has a long way to travel no matter how you slice it. Then have everyone within each pod play each other home and home, and 3/4 of the teams in the other 3 pods. Rotate home floors and teams involved so that every 4 years all of the teams in each pod plays every team in the other 3 pods 3 times each, alternating home floors as applicable.

I'm sorry, 16 is just toooooo many! 12 is pushing the maximum and everyone knows it. At 12 you can split into 6 team divisions, play everyone in your half twice and everone on the other side once for 16 games. That's a perfect number for conference play and leaves good room for OOC. Ideally in a 9 team conference you play everybody round robin. I'd rather us go to 9 teams only when we invite Memphis. A few years later I'd like to add three more to round off at 12 if there are worthy applicants.

bitcruncher Wrote:I'd swith the pods to something more like this...

Connecticut
Providence
St. Johns
Seton Hall

Georgetown
Rutgers
Syracuse
Villanova

Cincinnati
Louisville
Pittsburgh
West Virginia

Depaul
Marquette
Notre Dame
South Florida

They are a bit more geocentric, with the exception of South Florida, which has a long way to travel no matter how you slice it. Then have everyone within each pod play each other home and home, and 3/4 of the teams in the other 3 pods. Rotate home floors and teams involved so that every 4 years all of the teams in each pod plays every team in the other 3 pods 3 times each, alternating home floors as applicable.

Still might swap Seton Hall with Syracuse with your lineup but that wouldn't be critical. Until there is some sort of split this setup might work pretty well. Since there is not a balanced schedule I wonder if they are also giving any consideration to two divisions. This would take away a conference regular season champion but that may or may not mean as much anyway considering the various schedules. You could then seed the divisions 1-6 or 8 and match them up against the other division in the tournament.

With your groups I'd put the first 2 groups in one division and the bottom two groups in another division. You'd have fewer teams competing for their tournament seeds so there would be a little less reason to complain and you would play everyone in your division at least once.

i see something a bit more logical, it may have already been suggested because i haven't read the thread. i don't think 4 pods of four will work out well. split it geographically. that map above clearly states what the divisions should be- east and west. play the divison home and away (14) play half the other division home or away and rotate those teams every year (4) for a conference schedule of 18 games.

i realize that its not very fair because you won't play 4 teams at all, but it seems that top to bottom both of those divisions would be fairly equal in any given year.

I would rather just play everyone once a year, that way it fair to all. You rotate home and away every other year. This is not fair compare for example Seton Hall and Cincy's or UL's schedules. Look at who they play twice and who they do not play.

ctkatz Wrote:i don't think 4 pods of four will work out well. split it geographically. that map above clearly states what the divisions should be- east and west. play the divison home and away (14) play half the other division home or away and rotate those teams every year (4) for a conference schedule of 18 games.

These pods are pretty much what we have now. One problem seems to be that these groups need to be better balanced then they are now. I'm not opposed to two completely independent groups as you suggest but I would think there would be trouble deciding who goes where.

Bearcat T Wrote:I would rather just play everyone once a year, that way it fair to all. You rotate home and away every other year. This is not fair compare for example Seton Hall and Cincy's or UL's schedules. Look at who they play twice and who they do not play.

No problem with that but where you play is almost as important as who you play. Still probably better then what we have now.

I'd like to see every team play at least once myself. You could still have 3 teams play home and home, and have an out of conference schedule as well. With NCAA rule changes on tournament limits during the season, teams could play the full slate. Better competition within conference, and better for the RPI. Although if your program is on the slide your coach will sound like Calhoun.

most conferences would rather play sixteen games than eighteen because it gives each team two more chances to collect two more wins. in the big east, that's potentially 32 more total wins. that's much better for the rpi.

i know most won't like this idea, but what about doing what the old wac did when it had sixteen teams?? they had two groups of eight. you played everyone in your division home and home (14 games) and one team from the other division home and home. the top six teams from each division went to the conference tournament.

essentially what this did was create two virtual conferences. they would even schedule ooc games against teams from the other division, but they wouldn't count in the conference standings. it also created much more balance in the conference schedules.

No thanks xubrew, if we are doing that then its long past time for a 100% split.