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So - Just Who IS Going to win the Valley?

tornado

tornado

New member
Will someone step up and show they are capable?
Between the top picks underperforming and/or playing only cupcakes, I am not the least bit sure who is now the favorite.

I hate to be a Debbie Downer with my favorite conference, but here are a few thoughts.......

Here's how the preseason Media Day poll went......with commentary...

School (First-Place Votes) Points
1. Creighton (36) 386 -- they might still be the favorite, but team chemistry issues, an SOS
that's 266, and loss to Arkansas-Little Rock kinda have you wondering if they are ripe to get beat.

2. Southern Illinois (2) 322 -- 3-6 vs. DI, a couple bad
losses, and the fans are getting restless. will continue the trend of getting worse with each passing year that the
Weber/Painter recruits are graduating or being booted.

3. Illinois State (1) 309 -- undefeated but untested. SOS 321,
FIVE single digit wins against hideously cupcakish teams, and despite their schedule filled with RPI 200+ gimmes, they have only
ONE win over a team that's been DI more than a couple seasons and with a winning margin more than 12-13 pts.
I am still not impressed they can win on the road in the Valley....but then nobody has stepped up to lay claim to being any better.

4. Drake 274 -- lose to Stephen F. Austin at home then turn right around and beat a Big Ten
team by 17! Also - only 2 true road games play thus far, and SOS >> 150. But it looks more and more like the guy who picked
Drake to repeat as Valley champs could have a shot by default.

5. Bradley 219 -- nothing but freshman, 1st year guys and 2nd year guys. The long term future
looks brighter than the 3-month outlook.
I am convinced if we had a healthy Warren we would be 7-3 or possibly even 8-2. Still the only home lass is to the #4 RPI team,
so we could still get some decent MVC wins.

6. UNI 186 -- not a lot to be happy about, and now a few player defections are going to ruin chemistry
further. The good news is that the road to playing on Thursday is already really crowded, so UNI might just get pushed off that road by default.

7. Indiana State 137 -- not just bad losses, but bad losses by dobe digits.
Just another team in the mix for a thursday game.

8. Evansville 122 -- surely better than 8th place, but which of their wins is actually a quality win?
Maybe Western Kentucky, but WKU hasn't beaten a team with a higher than 140 RPI!
Anyway, they are just one injury away from disaster, with no experienced backup PG option and no depth to the bench.
After their first two bench players (freshmen Haarsma & Williams) then they have Holmes, Erickson, Hopf....
at the end of a long, tough Valley season, look for them to tail off and look like.......uh....Evansville down the stretch.

9. Wichita State 105 -- some good flashes like beating Siena away from wichita, but barely nipping
Northern Arizona doesn't impress me, and they are one of my book-it's for Thursday.

10. Missouri State 85 -- gotta feel for the fans in Springfield....at least they had Barry to entertain
them when they struggled, which they didn't do too often.
Now they need late game heroics at home to beat Norfolk State. But an 0-4 record against any team whose RPI is better than 114 bodes poorly.
They will easily provide ISU an automatic 1-0 start in the Valley come 12/28.
 
Creighton,Illinois State, and Drake are playing the best basketball right now, the rest of the teams will be fighting to stay out of thur. night games in ST.Louis.
 
rf-- but that's the funny thing....you and I are agreeing that as many as 7 teams in the Valley as "fighting" to stay out of last place!
Did anyone see this coming?
 
No I didn"t as when we put Egolf in the starting lineup down in Florida we looked so much better as a team and I never expected to see Warren still not playing. I don"t remember who it was that said those type of injuries do not heal well and predicted he could be out for a lot longer period was correct.
 
Here's my standings for the MVC this season...

1- Creighton
2- Illinois State
3- Drake
4- Evansville
5- Northern Iowa
6- Missouri State
7- Wichita State
8- Bradley
9- Southern Illinois
10- Indiana State

Jason
 
Interesting that as I review the message boards of all the Big Ten teams, I get the same feeling about the Big Ten that I get about the Valley.
Every Big Ten team has fans who think their team has underperformed and are uneasy, despite their records.

The teams that were picked as the top 3-4 teams have looked shaky at times (MSU, Wisc., and Purdue are all sitting 6th, 7th, and 8th in the Big Ten in RPI), and only 3 Big Ten teams are inside the top 60 in SOS.

Yet there are 4-5 teams who look to be the top Big Tens while the other 6-7 or so look to be battling for for NIT berths.
Yet still most teams (10 of 11 in the Big Ten and 8 of 10 in the MVC) are at or above .500 thus far.
 
real fan said:
No I didn"t as when we put Egolf in the starting lineup down in Florida we looked so much better as a team and I never expected to see Warren still not playing. I don"t remember who it was that said those type of injuries do not heal well and predicted he could be out for a lot longer period was correct.
Click to expand...


That was me and nobody believed me at the time. I am sorry to be right this time.
 
Indiana State and Northern Iowa are "book-it's" for Thursday night.

Illinois State and Creighton will play their first game on Friday in STL.

The other 6 teams will fight to avoid 2 open Thursday night slots.
 
OK, first off, I think Creighton will probably be the #1 seed, after that, who knows, I think it's that up for grabs, and hey, if Creighton gets hit by the injury stick, then they will probably become mortal.....it always seems the Valley regular season is always competitive and has a lot of games that are a lot closer than they should be or outright upsets.

But, since it's that much of a crapshoot, I figured hey, why not just write all the teams down and pick it out of a hat....

10 - Indiana State
9 - Evansville
8 - Creighton (maybe somebody can trick P'Allen to walk under a ladder for me)*
7 - Northern Iowa
6 - Wichita State
5 - Bradley (no Thursday!!!)
4 - Drake
3 - Southern Illinois
2 - Illinois State
1 - Missouri State*

*Flip these two teams, and that could seriously be it I think.
 
BradleyBrave said:
I don't see how our team finishes out of Thursday. We can't score and don't guard. Kind of a bad combo.
Click to expand...

Not sure if this was quoted in any other threads but this is scary ...

BU is second to last in the conference in 3 pt. makes (61) but fifth in attempts (213) - all adds up to last in the conference in 3-pt. percentage. 28 percent ... yikes.
 
Better get used to the idea ISU (red) could win the Valley and/or the Valley tournament. Cupcake schedule or not, they have some good talent ... great shooters (Oguchi & Eldridge), productive, active big men, and some good players coming off the injured list. Plus, they are very well coached. We will be over-matched at every position when we play them. Don't kill the messenger.
 
Hey-- I agree...they are doing OK and have a good shot at winning the Valley.
They have a shallow bench as many MVC teams do and have yet to be tested by tought competition, so those two factors could come into play as they hit a the tougher Valley schedule and if the possibly face some injuries.
 
I haven't watched Creighton yet this season, but Evansville is the best Valley team that I have seen. (Side note: I went to an Indiana State game about a week ago at Hulman Center and that might be the worst Valley team ever)
 
I think the jury is still out on Evansville.
They are playing better than some expected, but they have yet to win away from home, and have played little more than a platter of cupcakes on their home schedule.
They have only two wins (both at home) against teams who are .500 or better.
(Bradley has three with one away from home)

So I still don't know if I am willing to put them in the upper half of the Valley any more than some were putting Indiana State there in 2005-2006 (at this point in the season) when the Sycamores were 8-0.
http://realtimerpi.com/2005-2006/rpi_299_Men.html
(they lost their next 11 and ended up having a dismal year that hurried on the departure of Royce Waltman)
 
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