2010-2011 Schedule

[TheAsianSensation]

It's funny because I've noticed a trend in the past few years of the selection committee devaluing wins against RPI 51-100 teams, against good but not great teams in upper-major conferences, and the like. It seemed like the true marquee wins were more apt to get rewarded more than a good solid "pocket collection" of wins against decent teams (borrowing my own phrase).

It's becoming increasingly more difficult to find an optimal scheduling path to get an at-large bid.

[squirrelgotdead]

Palm is right, in that, it's not enough to go on the road and play Duke.

I haven't been sold on JL the scheduler the way many others have. I do think last year's schedules and this year's could be by far his best, and deserve commendation.

But playing Florida and Michigan State and losing doesn't do anything for you when you balance it out with SIUE, UMKC, SEMO, Milwaukee, FGCU and go on the road to UIC. In fact that does more damage than the benefit you gained.

So, playing 1-2 of those games is OK, but you can't sacrifice the quality of the rest of your schedule. If you do, then it's not OK.

[MacabreMob]

... with SIUE, UMKC, SEMO, Milwaukee, FGCU and go on the road to UIC.

SIUE mighta been a "gift" for a previous assistant coach.
UMKC was in a holiday tourney.
We gave SEMO a buy game.
Milwaukee was BracketBuster.
FGCU were in holiday tournies.
UIC was a home-n-home series.

[tornado]

Palm is right, in that, it's not enough to go on the road and play Duke.
...

I am not in agreement....I know he's an expert, and he's entitled to his opinion, but let me state mine....
I think one of the main points of that column is to show how far from the mainstream and how far out on a limb Palm is what that theory of his...because Doug Elgin and all the AD's in the MVC are among the MANY who will disagree!

He says......
"I can't think of a single team that missed the NCAA Tournament that would have made it by replacing wins by losing to better teams."

But I sure can....and two of them were in OUR conference!!
Had ISU ended 2009-2010 or 2008-2009 with a SOS in the Top 40, they'd have gotten a bid....but they didn't strictly due to the fact they didn't go on the road to play or beat anyone!!

Palm takes the viewpoint that winning gobs of easy games at home against absolute nobodies is the way to go!
What??? Has he been under a rock the last 3-4 years?? Is he just maybe referring ONLY to teams in BCS conferences that KNOW they are going to be in the upper part of their conference and that they are going to easily secure an NCAA bid anyway?


Intentionally scheduling gobs of softies and cupcakes at home for easy wins, had CLEARLY proven beyond question
to be ABSOLUTE SUICIDE for any mid-major wanting an NCAA bid....just ask any ISU fan!! I'll bet 100% of them wishes they'd gone on the road and played Duke last year....it WOULD have helped BOTH their RPI and SOS!

[TheAsianSensation]

I am not in agreement....and I think one of the main points of that column is to show how far from the mainstream and how far out on a limb Palm is what that theory of his...


Intentionally scheduling gobs of softies and cupcakes at home for easy wins, had CLEARLY proven beyond question
to be ABSOLUTE SUICIDE for any mid-major wanting an NCAA bid....just ask any ISU fan!! I'll bet 100% of them wishes they'd gone on the road and played Duke last year....it WOULD have helped BOTH their RPI and SOS!

I think the point Palm was making was that going on the road to play several Dukes is not good. Also doing what ISU is doing is not good. It's the middle ground, the equilibrium, that he's saying is optimal. He's not saying to pull an ISU.

[squirrelgotdead]

Exactly. It's perfectly ok to play those games, conditionally.

Again, the RPI numbers do not hold up if you counter 2 games against those types of teams with 6 baddies.

It's much better to have better average quality.

Again using 2009 as an example, I would have much rather sacrificed the tournament and Florida (where as Mob points out we had FGCU and UMKC) for a couple home games vs 2 mids that were strong league or NCAA contenders or even middle-pack or also-ran BCS or CUSA type. I'm not saying it would have been easy or even possible, but simply pointing out how that would be a more favorable schedule for the RPI.

And when I see Duke on the schedule, and also a SWAC team, that tells me we're doing something to counter the loss. And that's bad practice.

[bdhove12]

Palm is taking it from a pure numbers perspective. Almost any win will help more than any loss for your RPI. Which is true, but beating Western Illinois at home isn't going to help you with anything.

[MacabreMob]

Exactly. It's perfectly ok to play those games, conditionally.

Again, the RPI numbers do not hold up if you counter 2 games against those types of teams with 6 baddies.

It's much better to have better average quality.

Again using 2009 as an example, I would have much rather sacrificed the tournament and Florida (where as Mob points out we had FGCU and UMKC) for a couple home games vs 2 mids that were strong league or NCAA contenders or even middle-pack or also-ran BCS or CUSA type. I'm not saying it would have been easy or even possible, but simply pointing out how that would be a more favorable schedule for the RPI.

And when I see Duke on the schedule, and also a SWAC team, that tells me we're doing something to counter the loss. And that's bad practice.

I can agree with ya Squirrel.

Here's an example for ya that fits your argument.

Duquesne 2008-09 season
RPI 75
SOS 97

L @ #1 (RPI) Duke
L @ #2 Pitt
L home to #21 W Virginia

W @ #322 St Francis-PA
W home vs #325 High Point
W home vs #332 Furman
W home vs #336 NCCU (NC Central)

Duquesne finished the year 21-12, 9-7 tied for 5th in the A10 (which finished the 8/9th best conference in rpi). In the A10 Tourney, they won 3 games over #152 UMass, #68 URI, and #27 Dayton before losing the title game to #30 Temple. Dayton and Xavier got at-large bids to the NCAA while Duquesne didn't get a sniff (along with URI).

[LittleBrave]

Palm is taking it from a pure numbers perspective. Almost any win will help more than any loss for your RPI. Which is true, but beating Western Illinois at home is going to help you with anything.

How could beating WIU be helpful?

I think if we play Duke tough and lose, and if Duke stays in Top 10 - people will look us, whereas people will gloss over a 30-pt. win over a cupcake team.

[squirrelgotdead]

Great example Mob. Even if they drop one of those 300+ teams, they would have been on the outside looking in, IMO.

I think one also has to take into account the disparity that has been created by the addition of nearly 40 teams to DI in the last 15 years, as well.

Sure it creates more buy games and cupcakes to fatten up on, but realize those teams at the bottom of the barrel are nearly 20-33% more harmful to your RPI.

That's a dynamic that has just evolved really the last 10 years, and it doesn't get adequate discussion in the RPI convo.

In other words. . .many of the newbies to DI are only too eager to take buy games. So the market is flooded with teams (and leagues) who have overwhelmingly bad records.

And unfortunately, while the BCS types can feast all they want and win 1/3 of the games on their schedule with those schools basically without penalty because all their conference brethren are building up gaudy records too, the MVC, CAA, and A10 see the greatest impact.

The MVC et al. schools are kind of caught in the middle. They need to adopt the same model as the BCS, but given the fact that some of the teams in the conference need to venture out on the road and take some buy games, the W-L % isn't always going to be there.

Secondly, with more teams willing to be bought in the bottom 1/3 of DI, that means more schools are able to do the buying. So where 10-15 years ago the MVC had more scheduling power due to greater buying power, a good deal of that leverage is gone because more teams at and even a little below the MVC level are increasingly less likely to play on the road against a Valley team, and in greater numbers are more willing to be bought by the BCS schools and so therefore the quality of schools that the MVC can schedule has thinned considerably.

[bdhove12]

How could beating WIU be helpful?

I think if we play Duke tough and lose, and if Duke stays in Top 10 - people will look us, whereas people will gloss over a 30-pt. win over a cupcake team.

My bad. Meant to say beating Western Illinois at home isn't going to help you with anything.

[TheAsianSensation]

So the solution, squirrel, is a split of D-1, right? That cuts down the cupcake opportunities and forces the best to bump into each other a bit more often.

Of course, a D-1 split opens up a whole new set of classification problems, namely who would be part of it. But there isn't any other solution to the scheduling problem.

[tornado]

My bad. Meant to say beating Western Illinois at home isn't going to help you with anything.

Then tell me why ALL the BCS schools buy several such home games against the likes of WIU, Longwood, and University of Maryland-Eastern Shore!
They ALL do it and some, like Georgetown and Syracuse have as many as NINE home non-conference games against horribly weak, patsy opponents.

Syracuse, by the way, even having NINE such guarantee games against such biggies as St. Francis of NY, Albany, Columbia,
and Maine still finished with a TOP-5 RPI last season and a TOP-10 SOS!!!

So, clearly, again, the proof is in the pudding and Palm's advice might be right for the 50-60 top teams who cannot afford to go on the road and lose...
but it is WRONG, very wrong in regards to the other 300 or so NCAA D-I teams who simply cannot afford to fill their schedule with cupcakes at home like ISU has done, because, as I have said and shown clearly, it is suicide when it comes to getting an At-Large bid.
If you are sure you're gonna win your conference, or if you are a Syracuse or Georgetown and you figure your league is gonna get 6 bids and so you're a lock, then follow Palm's advice.

But if you are among the other 60-70% of D-I teams, then you'd better schedule tough or go on the road and risk a loss.

[MacabreMob]

Then tell me why ALL the BCS schools buy several such home games against the likes of WIU, Longwood, and University of Maryland-Eastern Shore!
They ALL do it and some, like Georgetown and Syracuse have as many as NINE home non-conference games against horribly weak, patsy opponents.

Syracuse, by the way, even having NINE such guarantee games against such biggies as St. Francis of NY, Albany, Columbia,
and Maine still finished with a TOP-5 RPI last season and a TOP-10 SOS!!!

So, clearly, again, the proof is in the pudding and Palm's advice might be right for the 50-60 top teams who cannot afford to go on the road and lose...
but it is WRONG, very wrong in regards to the other 300 or so NCAA D-I teams who simply cannot afford to fill their schedule with cupcakes at home like ISU has done, because, as I have said and shown clearly, it is suicide when it comes to getting an At-Large bid.
If you are sure you're gonna win your conference, or if you are a Syracuse or Georgetown and you figure your league is gonna get 6 bids and so you're a lock, then follow Palm's advice.

But if you are among the other 60-70% of D-I teams, then you'd better schedule tough or go on the road and risk a loss.

Syracuse played those cupcakes, yes... but they also beat 8 teams in the top 50 RPI (one was on a neutral floor and 2 were on the road - better for rpi to win on the road than at home), Plus, Syracuse went 28-4. That's a great record and 50% of the RPI is your own record. AND.... their 4 losses were to teams in the top 37 of the rpi (#7, #15, and #37 twice). They didn't have any bad losses to knock them down.

[squirrelgotdead]

Syracuse also played:

Robert Morris (NCAA team that went to the wire vs. 'Nova)
California (NCAA 2nd round)
North Carolina (NIT Finalist)
Cornell (NCAA Sweet 16)
Maine (19-11, no postseason)
Oakland (NCAA)
Memphis (NIT)
Florida (NCAA 2nd round)

So they had PLENTY of quality to offset those games.