davidnark Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 Below is my list of the most important questions/issues facing the program. If anyone has any answers or insights, feel free to share. 1. When will the arena construction begin? Are will still stuck at $10 million in light of Biondi's "accellerated January fundraising"? We haven't really heard any updates since the press conference last month. 2. Has/will Tommie Liddell qualify? We were told at the beginning of the school year that Tommie would be taking a special six months prep course. Had he completed the course? Has he taken the test? Are his grades OK? All accounts indicate that he is working hard. 3. Who is the top target for this year's last scholarship? I have yet to read or hear a single name mentioned. Does Brad really have the courage to roll the dice on a potential transfer? Is Brad closely watching the Mizzou situation? 4. Outside of Kevin Lisch, who are our targets next season? A few names have been thrown around on this board in the past week, how many other names are out there? 5. Is Kevin Lisch a lock for Brad? If so, when will he verbal? 6. Will JJ or Clarke contribute this season? A recent article indicated that JJ's on the verge of cracking the rotation. The prospects look a little more bleak for Darren. 7. Will the four cupcakes on this year's schedule kill this year's NCAA hopes? Will we need to beat Cincy (on the road) or Louisville (at home) to make the NCAA? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shempie Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 and I don't have answers but I will say this. If we finish in the the Top 4 in the conference it will likely mean a 10-6 (or better) conference record and we are playing well at the end of the season and will have beaten some good teams. I will take my chance with that resume. I have said it before,looking around the league, after Louisville and Cincy, why can't we finish 3rd? It won't be easy and we could finish anywhere from 3 to 8, but if we stay healthy, we will win some games. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billiken_roy Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 however, six losses mean we also lost a game or two we shouldnt have and we will be headed to the nit to play missouri. we have to win at least 12 games to be headed to the ncaa to play siu. people here are always talking about raising our standards of thinking, well here is where we start. if we are as good as the second tier teams, then let's expect to be the head of that class. 10-6 is another close but no cigar season. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cheeseman Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 The SOS is a moot issue in my opionion - the 4 weak teams we played won't help but they won't hurt so I see it as wash. For us to get into the NCAA we simply have to keep winning as many games as possible regardless of who we play - victories over anybody on our schedule continues to work in our favor. Obviously wins against higher RPI teams are a real plus. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kwyjibo Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 I don't think 10-6 would get us very close to the NCAA. SLU is currently 90th in RPI rankings (the numbers matter more than the ranking but rankings are easier to talk about). After playing/winning against ECU they will not move up much if at all. So, to say 10-6 gets us into the tournament is saying that a 90th ranked team that goes 6-5 in its last 11 regular season games moves up to 40 or so. That is mathematically impossible (OK nearly impossible). The SOS part will definitely get better playing a lot of sub-100 teams down the stretch (currently the estimate is that will end up going from the 130s now to the mid 70's). However, C-USA is not that balanced this year--so 10-6 may be a good result and in a nice NIT run--but not enough to be NCAA at large. What's that expression about generals always fighting the last war? Every year people need to adjust their expectations based on what is happening that year. Their have been years that 10-6 playing a divisional format would shoot us up the charts. This is not the year partly because of the non-divisional format and partly because we played 250+ teams. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
p diddy Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 a 10-6 conference record would make us 17-10 going into the c-usa tournament. it may not be a lock for the ncaa, but i would like our chances very much of getting to the dance if we accomplished such a league record. it would definitely put us in the top four and our league is pretty good this year and highly rated as well. if we go 10-6 in cusa (a big if may i add) and win a game in the league tournament, i'll throw out hats in the ring for NCAA consideration with full confidence. bad boyz for life Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davidnark Posted January 23, 2004 Author Share Posted January 23, 2004 After we beat Louisville last year, I believe that our RPI jumped like 30 points. That is why I raised the question about whether we need to beat Louisville or Cincy. If we beat either of those teams, our RPI should sky-rocket. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billiken_roy Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 i agree david. to get in with less than 12 conference wins will undoubtedly take wins versus either or maybe both and even then it might not be good enough because that would have meant we also lost to some dogs to still have 5 or more conference losses. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billiken_roy Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 i disagree on the 4 buy games. they wont hurt as bad since we won them all, but they didnt help us much either. not many of the teams ahead of us played 4 bottom 25 teams. so we did lose ground playing them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Quality Is Job 1 Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 The RPI doesn't add any weight based on which team you beat. The Billikens' RPI won't jump that much if they beat Louisville, but the NCAA Selection Committee will consider that an excellent win. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bauman Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 Related to what it will take for us to get a NCAA bid, yesterday on PTI they discussed how weak the Big 10 and Big 12 are this year which should open up more spots for conf. like CUSA this year. I think CUSA gets 4 bids for sure this year and maybe 5, so where we finish in conf. is very important. Was at practice yesterday and JJ looked good and was working hard but the same could be said for Ross. DC is still no where near the first 3 guards and didn't shoot well at all in some of the drills. On a couple of occasions Reggie showed he is a leader of this team by the way he talked to young teammates. Finally, (and I know his dad reads this Board) I've got to tell you that Bryce looks a long way from being able to help at this level-his two critical problems are 1. He can't jump and 2. He can't run. I don't know how much time and weight training can help, but I suspect that he will not be a contributor next year. On the positive side he is a very hard worker who seems to have a great attitude, but he isn't quick enough to rebound unless the ball comes right to him-I noticed that the other bigs would take rebounds away from him solely because he was still standing on the floor while they were in the air. My only hope is that he reminds me of Rich Neimann who became a decent player by his senior year, but back then a 7 footer was much bigger than most of the other frontline players. Now the "centers" are taller and quicker, which eliminates much of the advantage of just being a lot taller. If any of you are comparing him to the 7 ft center at Marquette a few years ago, I'm sorry to tell you that I don't think that Bryce will ever get close to that level. Being a great kid only takes you so far. I hope I'm dead wrong on this issue, but I just don't think any of you should be counting on him to contribute next year or possibly even the year after that. I envision a transfer to a D 2 school as a more likely result. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davidnark Posted January 23, 2004 Author Share Posted January 23, 2004 We have 12 games left. 3 of the games are against sub-100 RPI teams (E. Carolina, Houston, and Tulane). Because we are discussing our NCAA hopes, let's assume we win all three of those games (2 of which are at home). The remaining 9 games are all against teams with RPIs in the top 80, with two of those games against top 20 RPI teams. See http://kenpom.com/rpisked.php?a=263 If we can beat either Cincy or Louisville, then I believe we will definitely get in by going 4-4 in the remaining 8 conference games. We might even get in going 3-5 in those remaining 8 conference games. If we don't beat Cincy or Louisville, then we will have to win at least 5 or 6 of the remaining 7 games to have a chance. That is my best guess at quantifying our NCAA hopes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davidnark Posted January 23, 2004 Author Share Posted January 23, 2004 Our RPI is not affected in any way by who we win or lose to in our remaining 12 games? If we go 1-1 in our next two games, does the RPI care whether we beat Charlotte or E. Carolina? Is all that matters is our final record, our opponents' final record, and our opponents' opponents' final record? This whole RPI thing is giving me a headache. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billiken_roy Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 bauman said, "I think CUSA gets 4 bids for sure this year and maybe 5, so where we finish in conf. is very important." dont be so sure on that. the committee is under no obligation to take teams in the order they finish. if we finish 4th and charlotte and or marquette are right behind us and somehow have a higher rpi, i am betting they will jump over us. we need to finish 3rd as i fear or sos and final rpi isnt going to cut it otherwise. a 3rd place finish will probably carry enough wins to get us to the bubble. again, any wins vs louisville or cincy changes all. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Quality Is Job 1 Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 >Our RPI is not affected in any way by who we win or lose to >in our remaining 12 games? Exactly. If the Billikens go 7-5 in their remaining 12 games, their RPI will end up the same whether the seven wins are over Louisville, Cincinnati, Memphis, UAB, Charlotte (twice), and East Carolina or they are over East Carolina, Charlotte, DePaul (twice), Houston, Marquette, and Tulane. >If we go 1-1 in our next two games, does the RPI care >whether we beat Charlotte or E. Carolina? No. >Is all that matters is our final record, our opponents' >final record, and our opponents' opponents' final record? Yep. >This whole RPI thing is giving me a headache. You mean you aren't used to it by now? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Quality Is Job 1 Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 The NCAA Tournament Selection Committee uses the base RPI rankings as one of its criteria. The RPI rankings are a starting point. They jump off from the base rankings to weigh wins over teams ranked in the Top 50 and Top 100 of the RPI (good wins) and losses to teams ranked below 150 in the RPI (I'm not sure on the ceiling and floor numbers), termed bad losses. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BillikenButch Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 I think we need to start getting some good wins. We have plenty of games to do it. Looking at the schedule we have only one good win: at Dayton. I'd like to see us create a profile with a 18-9 (11-5, check my math!)regular season record, 7-3 in the last ten and wins @Memphis, v Marq. and v Charlotte and one of Cinc/Lousville. That would give us 5 high profile victories. IMO with a victory at Memphis (win over Mizzou not looking so good) or UAB (win over Richmond is looking good now). We will begin to get more consideration for the Dance. Also watch out for DePaul who has already beaten both of these teams in Chicago. I know they get UC twice, but what a great schedule to get Charlotte, Memphis, UAB, and S. Miss at home (and Tulane). And have TCU, ECAR, Houston and S. Fla on the road (and Louisville). That schedule works well for them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Quality Is Job 1 Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 >bauman said, "I think CUSA gets 4 bids for sure this year >and maybe 5, so where we finish in conf. is very important." > >dont be so sure on that. the committee is under no >obligation to take teams in the order they finish. They may not be obligated to do it, but I've read that one of the things the Committee tries to adhere to is conference finish and that they don't typically jump over teams to award an at-large bid. >if we >finish 4th and charlotte and or marquette are right behind >us and somehow have a higher rpi, i am betting they will >jump over us. Okay, but my bet is that if that happens (and the Bills are a full game ahead -- i.e., not tied with them), the Committee will either cut if off at three teams (two at-large berths) or go with five, including SLU. I've read that the Committee will not skip teams for at-large bids, so I think the only way your scenario would occur is if the team below SLU wins the automatic bid. In that case SLU might be excluded and there would be just four C-USA teams in. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Billiken75 Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 I would gladly take the game with Louisville being the game that gets us into the tourney or not.... I like our defense, I like the way Brad can game plan... then it is also up to the fans to show up and make it a hostile environment. What a game it would be... think our seniors would be playing hard? I just hope we need that game and let's all do our part to make it a memorable one for the program. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
slufanskip Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 They skipped us and took Cinci last year for an at large bid. Official Billikens.com sponsor of H. Waldman Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kwyjibo Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 You are absolutely right on your last two points (wins matter and wins over quality teams matter even more) but SOS is not moot. You can divide the 318 teams into 3 groups for any team. 1)"Can't hurt teams" that just playing will boost your RPI win or lose, 2) "Show me teams" that you improve RPI with a win and lower RPI with a loss, 3) and finally "can't help teams" that your RPI goes down by virtue of playing (any addition to RPI for a win is swamped by decreases to SOS part). I can figure out the exact points for each group at the end of the year but I will bet at least 4 figures with anyone that our 4 buy teams are in the "can't help" group. The only way this would not be true is if SLU were to lose a bunch of games and then RPI/SOS really iwould be moot. If SLU finishes around 90 in RPI (goes .500 the rest of the way) EKU, Grambling, Savannah, and NCAT will be safely in the "can't help" range. Note, the size of the three ranges depend what RPI you are at. The "can't help teams" would grow if SLU were to win/lower thier RPI. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Quality Is Job 1 Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 No, they didn't. Cincinnati and SLU tied for fourth place in the conference, so there was no real skipping involved. That's why, in my post, I said a fourth-place SLU needs to be ahead of the fifth-place team by a game. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheBand Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 I like the timing of that L'ville game as well; late in the season, bills just off a big road win with tulane and a close one with cincy. Should be a good time to get a large crowd. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
slufanskip Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 I would bet that Brad has no expectations of much help from Bryce next year ... probably not even a starter the year after. If you look at thim next to Ian he is at least 3-4 inches taller, probably 7'1" maybe 7'2" you can't teach height. Many times it takes a kid that tall a while for his coordination and feet to catch up to his body. IMO we should expect him to be a 2 year starter ... and I am betting a pretty good one at that. He needs to get stronger ... work on a couple of good low post moves, maybe a nice little jump hook. His size alone will alter the opponents game plan on the defensive end. Remember we have the remainder of this year plus 2 full years to work on his strength before his Jr. year. During that year think of this 1 - Polk as a jr with 2 years experience 2 - Lidell with 2 years exp. and DC as a back up 3 - Meyer with 2 years exp. 4 - JJ with 2 more years exp. 5 - Ian and Bryce ... both with 2 more years under their belt. Not even considering new recruits ... maybe Lisch plus who knows ... this gets me really excited. We know Brad will develop these guys and have them playing good defense. Meyer will not need to be that quick. He will have Polk and Lidell driving and creating open looks for him. We know he can shoot. This will easily be the most athletic and talented team we have had in a long while. Also with that line up we would not have to worry about incoming freshmen getting minutes ... They will have to be very good to break in or they will have time to develop and take over when their time comes. I think this is Brad's plan and it really gets me excited ... playing in a new arena a Billiken ticket will be hot property again Official Billikens.com sponsor of H. Waldman Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
slufanskip Posted January 23, 2004 Share Posted January 23, 2004 I guess it depends on how you look at it ... our records were even but we were 4th they were 5th. We got the tourney bye over them. So technically we finished ahead of them. Official Billikens.com sponsor of H. Waldman Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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