2007 Bracket Buster Talk

[3baller]

I feel this could be a fairly weak BB. Here is my predictions of games for the league.

Drexel (12-3) @ Missouri State (13-3)
Winthrop (12-4) @ Creighton (11-5)
Appalachian State (12-3) @ Indiana State (11-4)
Old Dominion (11-5) @ Wichita State (10-6)
Ohio (11-4) @ Drake (9-7)
Holy Cross (11-6) @ Illinois State (9-7)
Bradley (12-6) @ Marist (12-4)
UNI (13-4) @ Hofstra (10-5)
Souther Illinois (12-4) @ Butler (14-2)
Evansville (9-8) @ Long Beach State (11-4)

Just a guess obviouslu, but these woulod make for some good match ups.

[shocker3]

If we are going to keep playing in this stupid thing, I wish they would at least rename it.

Something like "The Valley vs. the rest of the World challenge" or simply the "Valley Challenge".

It seems like last year we had to play the best the other participating conferences had to offer and the same thing is likely to happen this year.

The name should reflect that.:valley:

[tennis08tarheels]

Sorry Drake, but I think the Valley would go 9-1. Ohio is a really good team this year, and they should win the MAC.

[jaypharmalum]

A month ago I think we would all agree that WSU was going to get their pick of the litter (albeit runts) for the BracketBuster. Now, I'm not sure when the pairings are announced, but I imagine Dana and Co. will have a little more leverage in getting who they want for the party at 11pm in the Qwest this year where 17,500 fans will be waiting.

The problem for the Jays has always been the return game. Hopefully for CU purposes, we get someone on the west coast for added recruiting exposure.

[Mecha_Bulldog]

I doubt Drake gets a league-leading Ohio team. Last year I think Drake was around 120 in the RPI was announced, and they were matched up with a UC-Irvine team around 200. I'd expect something similar this year.

[DoubleJayAlum]

I'll be shocked if a Valley team does not get sent to Reno to face-off with Nevada. SIU/UNI vs. Nevada is a great match-up that would seem to garner attention by ESPN.

[DoubleJayAlum]

I feel this could be a fairly weak BB. Here is my predictions of games for the league.

Drexel (12-3) @ Missouri State (13-3)
Winthrop (12-4) @ Creighton (11-5)
Appalachian State (12-3) @ Indiana State (11-4)
Old Dominion (11-5) @ Wichita State (10-6)
Ohio (11-4) @ Drake (9-7)
Holy Cross (11-6) @ Illinois State (9-7)
Bradley (12-6) @ Marist (12-4)
UNI (13-4) @ Hofstra (10-5)
Souther Illinois (12-4) @ Butler (14-2)
Evansville (9-8) @ Long Beach State (11-4)

Just a guess obviouslu, but these woulod make for some good match ups.

Creighton is trying to get the 11:00pm ESPN game again. If ESPN selects CU for that game, then I suspect the opponent would be a team from the Pacific time zone for Tv ratings purposes. Right now, after checking out RPIs, the best candidate would look to be Utah St. Don't be surprised to see CU lobby for a SoCAl team as they are recruiting SoCal awful hard (this years redshirt frosh Lawson and LOI signer Kenton Walker are both from there).

[isubird3379]

Is it just me or does it seem like all of the Valley teams that play at home have no opponents that will benefit the RPI/chance of getting an at-large?

[DoubleJayAlum]

Is it just me or does it seem like all of the Valley teams that play at home have no opponents that will benefit the RPI/chance of getting an at-large?

Its not just you. Altman and CU's athletic director have said the same thing for years. That's why they want out of the bracketbuster.

[Nyghtewynd]

Is it just me or does it seem like all of the Valley teams that play at home have no opponents that will benefit the RPI/chance of getting an at-large?

*DING*

Why do you think we should have gotten out of this thing?

[ISUMatt]

I would NOT want ILS to play Holy Cross..,.watch them last night and they look pretty good!!

[getreal4]

*DING*

Why do you think we should have gotten out of this thing?

Agreed. Very little upside for the Valley.

[smsandmsuson]

Agreed. Very little upside for the Valley.

I agree with all you about getting out of it but as someone said earlier, we wont as a conference get out until we can seal a good TV deal which I dont think is going to happen anytime soon...

[getreal4]

MVC-Big12 challenge? :valley:

[BMull10]

I'm just hoping we get Nevada or Butler.

[isubird3379]

I do believe that this is beneficial......but not for Valley teams at home. All quality teams outside of the valley are at home.

[LincolnJay]

MVC-Big12 challenge? :valley:

Big 12 and Pac 10 just announced a challenge series so kiss that idea goodbye.

Best we could hope for is a Mountain West challenge. Actually, that wouldn't be the worst thing in the world. A 10 or CUSA wouldn't be horrible but they have too many teams.

[Sir_ShoxAlot]

Just a guess obviouslu, but these woulod make for some good match ups.

Havbing trouuble tyupingg?/:original:

[TheAsianSensation]

Big 12 and Pac 10 just announced a challenge series so kiss that idea goodbye.

Best we could hope for is a Mountain West challenge. Actually, that wouldn't be the worst thing in the world. A 10 or CUSA wouldn't be horrible but they have too many teams.

I think the Mountain West would actually be pretty decent. At least better than the current BracketBuster we're in.

The MVC has basically outgrown BB. When it started, all the talk was about giving these teams a showcase to play meaningful non-con games with a lot of exposure in February, trying to set these teams up for March and to give them a resume boost. These are the things that the MVC can now supply with their normal non-conference schedule.

However, on the other hand, if we continue to participate, we'll surely get a good 5-6 games on TV easy, and get exposure along those lines. Still, I'd opt out of it at this point.

There was a lot of complaints last year, but that was just simply an extremely unlucky draw that all the good teams ended up having home games. Getting a Fresno St team with a RPI in the hundreds sure didn't help Creighton's cause last year. And this system was designed to do just that: help the bubble teams get another good opponent to get the chance to improve their resume. Think Tennessee Tech helped Bradley last year?

[shocker3]

It seems to me that the only team that was really helped by bracket busters last year was George Mason.

WSU was going to the dance in spite of their bb loss, UNI had the big win at LSU, SIU won the Valley tourney, Bradley got in because of their run at the end and making it to the championship game of the Valley tourney (playing a BB game against a weak team with no TV was of no help at all to them). CUs win over Fresno at home was useless. Obviously, the Bears win on the road against UW-Milwaukee was useless because they got left out of the dance even with an rpi of 21.

George Mason was clearly a bubble team and the win at WSU was probably helpful to them making the dance.

I think the Valley would definitely be better off with a VALLEY vs. MOUNTAIN WEST challenge.

[chuckywang]

If they're gonna call it the Bracketbusters, they should include major conference bubble teams as well.

[bcrawf]

The positive side is that we get 5, 6, or 7 of out teams on NATIONAL TV...

[shocker3]

It is more like 4 maybe 5 games on espn2 or espnU.

I would rather we find some other way to get 5 or more national TV games then participate in an event that will probably only hurt our teams.

It is noteworthy that NO MOUNTAIN WEST, A-10 or C-USA teams are participating in the bracket busters and only 1 team, USF, from the WCC is participatiing (Gonzaga's conference).

What we are left with is very few teams that could even possibly help our rpis.:valley:

[MSNSaluki]

We have to align with the Mountain West or Conference USA for a challenge and get out of the Bracketbusters.

It was a very good idea when it first came out but now that so many teams are involved, it's junk. At this moment, I'm not sure SIU, Missouri State, Creighton, UNI or Wichita State needs another statement game. We've all made a statement in one way or the other.

[tennis08tarheels]

MVC/MWC Challenge would look something like this (using KenPom's RPI):

Air Force Academy vs. SIU
UNLV vs. MSU
BYU vs. Creighton
San Diego State vs. Bradley
Colorado State vs. WSU
Wyoming vs. InSU
New Mexico vs. UNI
TCU vs. DU
Utah vs. UE

I'd LOVE to see those first two games, personally.

[smsandmsuson]

MVC/MWC Challenge would look something like this (using KenPom's RPI):

Air Force Academy vs. SIU
UNLV vs. MSU
BYU vs. Creighton
San Diego State vs. Bradley
Colorado State vs. WSU
Wyoming vs. InSU
New Mexico vs. UNI
TCU vs. DU
Utah vs. UE

I'd LOVE to see those first two games, personally.


They would do it based off Preseason Media rankings for the conferences.

CU vs SDSU--Depends where played
SIU vs BYU--SIU
WSU vs Air Force--Depends
MSU vs Utah--MSU
UNI vs New Mexico--Depends
EU vs UNLV--UNLV
Drake vs Colorado St--Drake
Bradley vs Wyoming--Depends
Ill St vs TCU--Ill St

[AcePurple]

They would do it based off Preseason Media rankings for the conferences.

CU vs SDSU--Depends where played
SIU vs BYU--SIU
WSU vs Air Force--Depends
MSU vs Utah--MSU
UNI vs New Mexico--Depends
EU vs UNLV--UNLV
Drake vs Colorado St--Drake
Bradley vs Wyoming--Depends
Ill St vs TCU--Ill St

Why would Elon be participating in this? And you left out UE..... :doh:

[Fetz86]

I was disappointed when I heard about the Pac 10 Big 12 challenge, was hoping for an SEC v Big 12, leaving the Pac 10 for us.

[smsandmsuson]

Why would Elon be participating in this? And you left out UE..... :doh:

Sorry, didnt realize that it was UE

[IowaJay]

I'm not sure that I agree that the Bracket Buster hurts us more than playing an MVC-MWC challenge would.

By playing in a conference challenge format, we'll be playing all teams from the MWC conference meaning 2/3 of their games played will be from MWC conference play and the Valley's 'opponents winning percentage' (50% of the RPI) from those games will be .500.

In the Bracket Buster format, we're usually playing the top teams from other conferences so our 'opponents winning percentage' from those games should be better than .500. The key is to win those games (didn't we split our Bracket Busters last year ?)

As for the conferences who choose not to play in the Bracket Buster, they're all lower conference RPI than the Valley and the Valley has had the Bracket Buster & return games for several years now, so it must not be hurting our RPI that much.

[Myopicraiderfan]

There are too many good home teams and not enough good away teams(outside the Valley) for this bracketbuster. Not that WSU needs another away game but the bracketbuster matchup would be better. I would love to see SIU beat Nevada and UNI beat Butler. Only scrap the BB if we have a challenge against MWC or CUSA or even the WAC. I love the Valley but I would rather not be arrogant and a hypocrite and say that the smaller schools don't deserve their shot when we struggle to say we are worth scheduling for the Big 6.

[shocker3]

There are too many good home teams and not enough good away teams(outside the Valley) for this bracketbuster. Not that WSU needs another away game but the bracketbuster matchup would be better. I would love to see SIU beat Nevada and UNI beat Butler. Only scrap the BB if we have a challenge against MWC or CUSA or even the WAC. I love the Valley but I would rather not be arrogant and a hypocrite and say that the smaller schools don't deserve their shot when we struggle to say we are worth scheduling for the Big 6.

The conferences that aren't participating have better rpis than the other conferences that are participating.

It creates this wierd gap, that really makes the Bracketbusters the Valley vs. the world

The current kenpom rpi rankings: (the bold conferences aren't participating):#

#4-the Valley
#5- Big 10
#6- Big 12
#7-Big East
#8- MWC
#9- WAC
#10- C-USA
#11- A-10
#12- WCC
#13- HORIZON
#14- CAA
#15- MAC
#16+ Everyone else in BB



There is just too big of a gap between the Valley and the other conferences in the BB for this to help us.

I think maybe we could help the MAC and the CAA but I don't see much else good coming out of this.

The MAC from a TV exposure standpoint always seems to come out the best in this thing. They always seem to have many of their teams in the TV games even though their rpis may not warrant that much TV coverage.

For Example, I think both the Valley and MAC had the same number of teams on TV last year in the BB even though the rpis heavily favored the Valley. It meant that someone like Bradley got screwed out of a TV appearance so that another MAC team could be on TV.
:valley:

[TheAsianSensation]

The MAC is usually significantly better than they are this year. They're in decline for whatever reason. 3-4 years ago, a MAC-MVC challenge would've been great.

For me, it comes down to, "Do we NEED it?" Some of these other conferences need the chance at TV exposure and at a quality opponent in case they need it for the resume. These are things that the MVC can get elsewhere currently, so that's why the challenge is bad for us now.

However....it is SOME exposure and we're virtually guaranteed to have our top teams draw all the top overall teams. We either need to get some other conference into it to provide a better draw, or actually suck it up and only let about half the conference play it. The disadvantage comes from having the bottom half of the MVC suffer from weak opponents.