How far has the Missouri Valley Conference fallen?

[Da Coach]

Even without playing any games yesterday, the MVC drops to 12th place in RPI (since RPI is partly dependent on the wins & losses of your opponents).

http://warrennolan.com/basketball/2017/conferencerpi

There are 5 conferences very close to one another, so the MVC could rise back to 10th or drop down as far as 14th very easily. It depends heavily on how the MVC teams do in these next couple weeks with their final non-conference games.
Once conference games start, there won't be as much chance of big changes, since for every win by an MVC team, there will also be a loss.

[Stickboy46]

Even without playing any games yesterday, the MVC drops to 12th place in RPI (since RPI is partly dependent on the wins & losses of your opponents).

http://warrennolan.com/basketball/2017/conferencerpi

There are 5 conferences very close to one another, so the MVC could rise back to 10th or drop down as far as 14th very easily. It depends heavily on how the MVC teams do in these next couple weeks with their final non-conference games.
Once conference games start, there won't be as much chance of big changes, since for every win by an MVC team, there will also be a loss.

Since RPI does account for an opponents W/L and an opponents-opponents W/L, there will still be changes based on how our Non-Con opponents do. Just not a lot that is in the MVC teams control.

[Vent]

The Valley has nobody to blame for its demise but itself. Yes the Power 5 conferences have more money and are better. But what about the leagues that aren't Power 5 and have passed us up in quality. We have been passed up by these non Power 5 conferences: Big East, American Athletic, Conference USA, Atlantic 10, Mid America and the Mountain West. The Sun Belt, Southland, Western Athletic and Ohio Valley are right there with us. In fact, we just go to Eastern Illinois (OVC), win in overtime and act like it was a major feat. Thirty years ago we wouldn't even consider playing them at their place. The demise of the Valley has happened gradually over the past 3 or 4 decades. Other leagues have improved themselves and we have gone the opposolite direction. With the exception of Wichita the good teams leave. Wichita may leave before we know it. The Balley needs more pro-active leadership instead of always standing pat.

[Da Coach]

I suspect the Valley is doing what it can. But because the Valley schools are not BCS football schools and it's just a basketball-only conference, it severely restricts what the conference or the schools can do. And recall that just 9 or 10 years ago, the Valley was a Top 5 or 6 conference, ranking ahead of conferences like the Pac 10, MWC, CAA, A 10, CUSA, and Big 12 in either 2006 or 2007. So the dropoff has been in just the last 8-9 years.
Rule changes like the grad-transfer rule have hurt mid-major conferences and turned them into minor leagues for the big boys.
Major sports networks would rather televise meaningless games in the Big 10, PAC 12, or ACC than televise a good matchup in the MVC.
And just when the MVC had "cracked the code" on the RPI as it was called, getting 4 teams in the NCAA Tournament in 2006 and beating some of the Big Boys, suddenly the NCAA decided they really shouldn't pay much attention to RPI in selecting at-large teams any more. The MVC has never gotten more than 2 teams in the tournament since, and often just one.
And the fact that the MVC is made up of smaller schools, from smaller cities, the media finds it easy to ignore them (Loyola being the sole exception, but for some reason, the Chicago media doesn't care about them).
Then combine the unprecedented disastrous effects of the Glasser/Cross administration in dismantling and belittling a great Bradley program, and causing terrible financial losses at the same time all those other factors were happening, and that has created the current situation where there is very little Bradley can do now, except sit back and hope we can salvage the MVC and build it back to a more successful and respectable conference.

[Vent]

I am not as concerned about keeping up with the BCS conferences as much as I am with FCS conferences catching up with and/or passing the Valley. Conferences such as CAA, Sun Belt, Southland, Western Athletic and the Ohio Valley. The Atlantic 10 and Big East are not football schools, although most are in large metropolitan areas and are predominantly private schools that put an emphasis on basketball and has surpassed the Valley. The past administration was bad, but we can't just blame it on them. It has become easy to do that. There has been a scale back on athletics at Bradley as a whole for several years. From dropping tennis, to a "partial" track team, to swimming and even dropping fall baseball and softball. We can point to multiple reasons as to why, but they have still dropped them. Most high school athletes enjoy going to a school that not only has a well rounded curriculum but also a well rounded athletic program in men's and women's sports. It is part of the college experience and I'm afraid at Bradley, that is one more thing we no longer offer. The reason the television networks don't cover the mid-majors as much as the big boys is because the talent isn't as good and the ratings are as good. Television is in it to make money.

[Da Coach]

As you have said, along with the points I made above, it looks like the only 2 other non-football conferences that wouldn't be a major step backward for a school like Bradley are the Big East and Atlantic 10. And neither of those two conferences would have the slightest interest in Bradley, especially now that Bradley has fallen so far down.

So as frustrating as it may be to see Creighton leave, and now Wichita State looking at other options, there is nothing the MVC can do but try to hold together and replace any defecting teams with good alternatives. And I don't see any options for Bradley, other than to stay put and hope the MVC doesn't degenerate any further, which I don't see happening.

Even the WSU to the American Athletic Conference rumor seems a little unlikely, IMO. Other than Tulsa, there are no natural rivalries, and the draw of getting into a conference with SMU and Houston doesn't seem to offset all the travel to the other distant schools. And being the only non-football school, they would not share in a dime of football-related money, and I doubt they'd see much of a significant boost in overall revenue from such a move.
Plus, SMU and Houston, along with half the other AAC schools, have made it clear they would like to get out of the AAC and move to other conferences.
So unless someone can give a good explanation how it would benefit them, I don't see WSU leaving the MVC for the AAC.

[tornado]

The Valley has nobody to blame for its demise but itself. ....

yes - but as bad as it might seem at times....there are still 20-25 other DI conferences that wish they were doing as well as the MVC

[Chico]

Yeah, we don't want any coach with a 32-3 record and a win in the first round of the Big Dance hanging around.

[Indy_BB]

The Valley has nobody to blame for its demise but itself. Yes the Power 5 conferences have more money and are better. But what about the leagues that aren't Power 5 and have passed us up in quality. We have been passed up by these non Power 5 conferences: Big East, American Athletic, Conference USA, Atlantic 10, Mid America and the Mountain West. The Sun Belt, Southland, Western Athletic and Ohio Valley are right there with us. In fact, we just go to Eastern Illinois (OVC), win in overtime and act like it was a major feat. Thirty years ago we wouldn't even consider playing them at their place. The demise of the Valley has happened gradually over the past 3 or 4 decades. Other leagues have improved themselves and we have gone the opposolite direction. With the exception of Wichita the good teams leave. Wichita may leave before we know it. The Balley needs more pro-active leadership instead of always standing pat.

The Big East is presently 3rd in the conference rankings after finishing 3rd last year and 2nd the year before (all Pomeroy, RPI is utterly irrelevant right now), has the reigning national champion, and four teams in the Top 20. Not only is the Big East in the "Power 5" they have been, collectively 2nd or 3rd in its 4 year existence.

The SEC has finished ahead of the Big East once in the last decade and a half.

[Vent]

The Big East is not in the Power 5. The Power 5 consists of teams that play football and those conferences are: ACC, SEC, Big 10, Big XXII and the Pac 12.

[algotrader]

Bradley does this absolutely stupid thing where they fire successful coaches who have coached us to March wins. And then they replace them with some wimpy crappy replacement that's a total lap dog.

I'm just going to come out and say it. Bradley is the McCaskey family of college basketball.

I feel like our team is better this year. But ultimately, I don't see recruitment improving much so far. Its far better than Geno, but has yet to really land us a huge difference maker like PoB and the like. Our sports facilities were supposed to give recruitment this huge jump. It might have given recruiting a small bump, but it just doesn't seem to be the big push we needed.

The other problem seems to be culture. Millennial basketball players only want to play for the biggest schools possible. Great talent will ride the bench for 4 years, getting 5 minutes **per year** just to be able to say "Yeah I play basketball at Duke".

They don't give two cares in the world for anything else. This is the biggest problem

[Vent]

My concern is that we can't recruit difference makers to make us competitive in a conference that is rated anywhere from 9th to 14th in the nation. We don't need difference makers that can win in the Big 10. We need difference makers that can win in the Missouri Valley. I am beginning to question the ability of our coaching staff to evaluate talent. Not effort, but talent.

[Chico]

Hard to blame this coaching staff for the condition of Bradley basketball after what they were left with. Give them more time like BU has done with other coaches.

[tornado]

every one of these guys shot at least 50% from the FT line in high school- most shot 60-70%
so it's not lack of talent if we lose games simply because we miss our FTs

if we shot FT's better we'd be 7-4

[Vent]

Bradley's current coaching staff is not responsible for the current condition of the basketball program. They are responsible for improving the condition of the basketball program. That includes getting better players, most notably shooters. It is time to start getting them. Consistently poor to mediocre free throw shooters equate to consistently poor to mediocre basketball teams.