Bracketology = bcs

[Newsbreaker]

Re: Bracketology = bcs

With your amazing knowledge of college basketball I will have to agree with you. I know it's right up there with your knowledge of college football. You can look it up but 2 years ago when UNI lost to SDSU you and everyone else said the playoff hopes of UNI was over since 3 teams would not go from the pitiful MVFC. I said if they win out they will make it. They were a second away from doing that and making it to the playoffs that year.

I still say MSU is not in the no way deserves a bid category . Will they make it? Probably not but they are still in the discussion.

I will still bow down to your greatness and say this about watching more great big 10 teams play this year like yesterday..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_uxn3...eature=related

None of this makes any sense. I am embarrased for you.

[Chitown Panther]

Re: Bracketology = bcs

wow...now Mich State may not make it...

[UNIChippewa]

Re: Bracketology = bcs

What did Colorado, Alabama, or Michigan St do outside of conference that was so great.

Not to get in the middle of this pissing match, but in regards to Alabama it looks like they might not make it either. Right now Lunardi has them as one of his first four teams out. As for Colorado, yeah, they didn't do much or play anyone in the nonconference, but they did beat Texas and beat Kansas State 3 times, and they will probably only be a 10 or 11 seed anyway.

I really can't feel too bad for Missouri State. They barely beat a bad Southern Illinois game in the first round of our own tournament and needed 11 straight points to do it. They didn't even show up against a decent but hardly great Valparaiso game on national TV; if they win that game maybe they have a chance, but they didn't. They really have no one to blame but themselves.

[TheMacHouse]

Re: Bracketology = bcs

I know MSU doesn't have much of a case. I only brought them up because they were brought up in this thread. My beef is the bcs teams get the benefit almost all the time like this thread title suggest.

Take Harvard for example. They beat Colorado and @ Boston College this year and will be 3-5 against teams in the NCAA tournament (maybe 4-5 if BC makes it). Michigan St (I'm only using them since they have been talked about in this thread) will be 6-13 against teams in the NCAA tournament. Harvard rpi is 35 and Michigan St rpi is 46.

What has Harvard not done this year to make it in?

[TheMacHouse]

Re: Bracketology = bcs

None of this makes any sense. I am embarrased for you.

I'm more embarrased you have no brain. Maybe you have drank too much iowa/big 10 kool-aid.

[Newsbreaker]

Re: Bracketology = bcs

I'm more embarrased you have no brain. Maybe you have drank too much iowa/big 10 kool-aid.

LOL. This certainly helps support your position.

The reason the "BCS" teams get an advantage over the mid-majors is the strength of the leagues in which they play and the difficulty of their regular-season schedules. This isn't complicated at all.

Take a look at the two examples you gave. Harvard only played 9 games against top-flight competition. MSU played 19. Harvard's SOS is 155. MSU's is 146. Michigan State's is 12. The Mo Valley's RPI is 12th (Sagarin ranks it 13th), the Ivy League's RPI is 14 (Sagarin - 15), the Big Ten is 2nd. Like it or not, teams from better leagues can get in with less impressive RPI's (which isn't a terribly reliable indicator) because of the difficulty of their task.

I understand having a problem with the fact that the best programs congregate together, but that is never going to change.

[Chitown Panther]

Re: Bracketology = bcs

CU has burks who is a real talent....

WOW...anyone watch that performance!!!....Kid was on IV too

[Kyle]

Re: Bracketology = bcs

I love this time of year. The BCS conferences always get exposed when they are forced to play the mid major programs on a level playing field.

5 of the 16 teams left in the field are mid majors. According to the seeding, there should only be two.

Performances like VCU's make the talking heads explode.

[CyCarp]

Re: Bracketology = bcs

I love this time of year. The BCS conferences always get exposed when they are forced to play the mid major programs on a level playing field.

5 of the 16 teams left in the field are mid majors. According to the seeding, there should only be two.

Performances like VCU's make the talking heads explode.

Yea, on Sunday one of my buddies was saying that VCU shouldn't even be there. But, fact is that they are, and I think it's safe to say that they've proved that they belong. Shoulda, coulda, woulda...

[95UNIGRAD]

Re: Bracketology = bcs

LOL. This certainly helps support your position.

The reason the "BCS" teams get an advantage over the mid-majors is the strength of the leagues in which they play and the difficulty of their regular-season schedules. This isn't complicated at all.

Take a look at the two examples you gave. Harvard only played 9 games against top-flight competition. MSU played 19. Harvard's SOS is 155. MSU's is 146. Michigan State's is 12. The Mo Valley's RPI is 12th (Sagarin ranks it 13th), the Ivy League's RPI is 14 (Sagarin - 15), the Big Ten is 2nd. Like it or not, teams from better leagues can get in with less impressive RPI's (which isn't a terribly reliable indicator) because of the difficulty of their task.

I understand having a problem with the fact that the best programs congregate together, but that is never going to change.

But the whole problem with what you're saying is that you're dissecting someone's opinion (which I don't agree with wholeheartedly, but I digress), but the "facts" you're quoting are nothing more than subjective opinions themselves. The Big Ten is the 2nd best league? According to who? Did all of the coaches, media, and fans of all of the nation's teams get together and unanimously decide it was so? It's an opinion as well - and - here's the kicker - one based on tradition, and who has been great in the past. We assume that a win over Illinois, for example, means more than one over Wichita State because? The program had some glory in the past? We need to stop this NCAA football way of thinking when it comes to college basketball.

Go ahead and argue that the "little guy" can't compete in football - 95% of the time that is completely true, because they are simply able to recruit bigger, stronger, more complete teams and have MUCH larger budgets. (Yet we still see James Madison and App. St. win)

Basketball, however has only five players on the floor instead of 22. One or two guys CAN and do make a difference, and great coaching matters. We have seen far too many of these "upsets" in the NCAA tournament over the past couple of decades to make this argument anymore, haven't we? If these BCS teams are so superior in skill, they should be eating these "mid-major" teams for lunch in the tourney, but it's not happening. They are, however, superior in "rep". Ask Kansas how that worked out for them in Oklahoma City last year.

[LA_Panther]

Re: Bracketology = bcs

I completely agree with 95UNIGRAD. I'm tired of the BCS schools claiming that they are superior. Much of that is tied to the media. It's almost laughable that the media acts as though a mid-major beating a BCS school is an anomaly. Sadly, they'll probably always think that way, no matter how many times the "little guys" beat the "big guys."

[CyCarp]

Re: Bracketology = bcs

I was thinking about this years bracket, and the controversy with UAB and VCU being picked. It made me wonder if the committee has to, or intentionally made a decision to pick two mid-majors to be in the 11 & 12 seed play in games. I never heard anything about it, but it would make perfect sense. They were two bids that most people thought power conferences deserved, but yet the mid-majors made it.