(03-04-2024 01:26 PM)GSUALUM17 Wrote:  I'm pretty sure this topic was discussed repeatedly in the past. Looking at the problem from the macro level, we won't have consistent 2nd bid until SBC basketball programs start spending at the A10/WCC level of $4mil per program per year.

Sure, App State finding a way to have a great season with $1.5-$1.6 mil budget range is commendable, is that really sustainable?

I don't think people truly understand how severely underfunded SBC basketball programs are. At the last meeting, Keith Gill warned our ADs about the need to significantly raise our basketball budgets. No one took it seriously. 10 of 14 programs spend less than $2mil/yr.

Your graph shows every conference (I didn't look below the SBC, so at least the top 16 conferences) spent less than in 2019? That isn't believable.

(03-04-2024 05:54 PM)HPCAT Wrote:  

(03-03-2024 10:57 PM)hburg Wrote:  

(03-03-2024 10:04 PM)HPCAT Wrote:  Are you serious ?

They can try not having a pathetic SOS like 339 out of 362 D1 teams for OOC.

If you would have had just an average OOC schedule, you might not have reached 20 wins.

No offense but TXST and the rest of the Sunbelt are part of that weak OOC schedule. And you seem to forget that JMU has an undefeated OOC Road record which includes at Michigan State.

As far as the weak schedule they were dealing with past commitments and from my understanding we are working to make the schedule better.

The same can technically be said of Appalachian State and it would be unfortunate if they made it to the final and lost to JMU and not make the tournament. The Sunbelt really deserves 2 teams this year.

I feel bad now that I assumed anyone from JMU knew what OOC meant....Out Of Conference....say it after me....Out of Conference.....

That means games not in the SBC to simply it for you.

Don't cry me a river about weak SBC, TXST handed ASU their ass in SM. JMU's SBC schedule was far tougher than their OOC, once again games outside of the SBC.

Try playing some P5 teams and maybe even ranked P5 teams. Take charge of what you can control and schedule better OOC, so that Presbyterian College can not brag about having a more difficult schedule. I know it takes years to accomplish this sometimes.

After TXST won back to back titles in 21 and 22, we realized we needed to beef up the schedule and played Houston, Texas, and Oklahoma this year. You probably will not beat them, but I would rather be 8-4 with quality opponent losses than 12-0 with creampuffs.

And obviously so does the NCAA.

This year, Texas State scheduled better.

The years before... atrocious.

Don't forget... it was only last season that Texas State lost to Mary Hardin-Baylor (D3)... and then in 2020 lost to Our Lady of the Lake (NAIA). You don't have much space to be pressing the issue of scheduling tougher, especially after having just one season of scheduling Houston, Texas, and Oklahoma. TXST still scheduled two non-D1 teams despite that.

(03-04-2024 01:26 PM)GSUALUM17 Wrote:  I'm pretty sure this topic was discussed repeatedly in the past. Looking at the problem from the macro level, we won't have consistent 2nd bid until SBC basketball programs start spending at the A10/WCC level of $4mil per program per year.

Sure, App State finding a way to have a great season with $1.5-$1.6 mil budget range is commendable, is that really sustainable?

I don't think people truly understand how severely underfunded SBC basketball programs are. At the last meeting, Keith Gill warned our ADs about the need to significantly raise our basketball budgets. No one took it seriously. 10 of 14 programs spend less than $2mil/yr.

This is old data from 2020-2021.

I'd suspect the budgets in 2024 are quite different.

(03-04-2024 12:31 PM)Dukes94 Wrote:  If every school except App State and maybe Troy didn’t suck out loud, neither JMU nor App State would be in this predicament. So, thanks for a stellar showing, Sun Belt. I honestly thought JMU men’s basketball would be our weak link when we switched conferences.

If the rest of us were better then your record would be worse and you'd be in the same situation. Ironically if App sucked too you'd have a better shot at an at large.

Simply facts:

Overall the SBC is not a good conference in men’s basketball. It doesn’t deserve 2 bids because 2’of the 68 best teams in the country aren’t in this conference.

The only team from the SunBelt that “deserves” anything is the champion, and that’s only because deserves = contractual in this case.

This year the conference has a couple of decent teams, a few okay teams, several not so good teams and several crappy teams. We have no great teams and no really good teams. We don’t have a team that would finish over .500 in any top 5 conference. Anyone that believes otherwise just doesn’t watch a lot of college basketball.

(03-04-2024 06:28 PM)mturn017 Wrote:  

(03-04-2024 12:31 PM)Dukes94 Wrote:  If every school except App State and maybe Troy didn’t suck out loud, neither JMU nor App State would be in this predicament. So, thanks for a stellar showing, Sun Belt. I honestly thought JMU men’s basketball would be our weak link when we switched conferences.

If the rest of us were better then your record would be worse and you'd be in the same situation. Ironically if App sucked too you'd have a better shot at an at large.

JMU blaming the SBC for a weak SOS when their OOC SOS is weaker than in-conference. They were the Liberty of basketball scheduling this year.

JMU could have scheduled much better and chose not to. Yes, they had some state teams turn them down because JMU was requiring a home & home and would not consider other options. Road guarantee pay games are readily available across the country if you are willing to travel and play on the preferred date of the P6 host. Of course, that means you are going to likely take losses, but it affords the opportunity of getting big wins that move the needle. Plus you get cash. The committee has repeatedly told America that a weak Strength of Schedule is what eliminates teams from consideration for at-large bids. We should not be surprised.

They could have played an OOC schedule like Boise State and played…
Clemson
Va Tech
Washington St.
Butler
St Mary’s
San Fran
VCU
N Texas
All in the top 75

Sure, some of those were a little fortunate to be slightly better than expected, but there was no doubt before the season Boise State knew they built a challenging OOC schedule.

JMU scheduled Michigan State. Great game. Great road win. But that’s it. A few opponents may have been a little worse than expected, but when you fill your slate with Coppin State, Morgan State, Howard, Hampton etc then you get what you deserve.
If it wasn’t for the SBC-MAC challenge, JMU’s SOS would be even worse.
Self-inflicted punishment.

The Dukes have to win the Sun Belt tourney to get a bid.

JMU did all they could do. You play the team in front of you to the best of your ability.

(03-04-2024 06:06 PM)CardinalBlackTrojan Wrote:  

(03-04-2024 05:54 PM)HPCAT Wrote:  

(03-03-2024 10:57 PM)hburg Wrote:  

(03-03-2024 10:04 PM)HPCAT Wrote:  Are you serious ?

They can try not having a pathetic SOS like 339 out of 362 D1 teams for OOC.

If you would have had just an average OOC schedule, you might not have reached 20 wins.

No offense but TXST and the rest of the Sunbelt are part of that weak OOC schedule. And you seem to forget that JMU has an undefeated OOC Road record which includes at Michigan State.

As far as the weak schedule they were dealing with past commitments and from my understanding we are working to make the schedule better.

The same can technically be said of Appalachian State and it would be unfortunate if they made it to the final and lost to JMU and not make the tournament. The Sunbelt really deserves 2 teams this year.

I feel bad now that I assumed anyone from JMU knew what OOC meant....Out Of Conference....say it after me....Out of Conference.....

That means games not in the SBC to simply it for you.

Don't cry me a river about weak SBC, TXST handed ASU their ass in SM. JMU's SBC schedule was far tougher than their OOC, once again games outside of the SBC.

Try playing some P5 teams and maybe even ranked P5 teams. Take charge of what you can control and schedule better OOC, so that Presbyterian College can not brag about having a more difficult schedule. I know it takes years to accomplish this sometimes.

After TXST won back to back titles in 21 and 22, we realized we needed to beef up the schedule and played Houston, Texas, and Oklahoma this year. You probably will not beat them, but I would rather be 8-4 with quality opponent losses than 12-0 with creampuffs.

And obviously so does the NCAA.

This year, Texas State scheduled better.

The years before... atrocious.

Don't forget... it was only last season that Texas State lost to Mary Hardin-Baylor (D3)... and then in 2020 lost to Our Lady of the Lake (NAIA). You don't have much space to be pressing the issue of scheduling tougher, especially after having just one season of scheduling Houston, Texas, and Oklahoma. TXST still scheduled two non-D1 teams despite that.

No doubt, last year TXST OOC schedule was probably the worst in the SBC, almost as bad as JMU this year.

But, we corrected the issue and this year we had a top 50 OOC schedule and the best in the SBC.

Unfortunately we didn't have the team this year to compete with that schedule. I wish we would have had this schedule when we won the SBC titles.

Yeah, I can't go the "its everyone else's fault that JMU and App won't get an at large" theory.

Yes, the SBC needs to schedule better. That's known, but the reality is, what many of the Eastern schools want the Western Schools to do is buy D1 home games for basketball. Money that none of us have because we threw most of it at football.

Now if the league office wants to put together a fund to help schools buy home games in basketball, I'm all for it, but until then, we're all going to have to deal with the scheduling being the way it is.

(03-04-2024 08:31 PM)Appst94 Wrote:  JMU did all they could do. You play the team in front of you to the best of your ability.

Maybe the players did all they could do, but the coach and administration could have done so much more with better scheduling and take responsibility for why JMU and ASU will be watching the tourney from the local burger joint just like everyone else if they don't win the SBC tourney.

And I might add rightfully so.

(03-04-2024 09:07 PM)HPCAT Wrote:  

(03-04-2024 08:31 PM)Appst94 Wrote:  JMU did all they could do. You play the team in front of you to the best of your ability.

Maybe the players did all they could do, but the coach and administration could have done so much more with better scheduling and take responsibility for why JMU and ASU will be watching the tourney from the local burger joint just like everyone else if they don't win the SBC tourney.

And I might add rightfully so.

A lot of the P6 don't have strong out of conference schedules. But, they buy a bunch of games at home which pushes them up there. Then they all play each other and their sos and quad 1 wins improves with that.

If JMU had of played several of the top teams at their place. They would have lost several games. Just like the top of the B$0, S$C, and all the others do. When you play away games it's a likely loss. Even more so with their refs.

Don't play the Power conferences game on their court. Play it on yours. Buy games, who cares how weak they are. Everyone in the conference does what JMU did everyone in the conference minus the bottom few like ODU this year would have multiple Quad 1 wins.

Coaching salaries per win shows a very weak correlation. You might get a couple of wins eeked out for every million you spend on a coach. Just spend that money on buying home games which is far more correlated to wins than coaching salary. Not to mention that the teams who can spend millions on coaches probably can get those home games too which further erases the correlation.

I'm glad our AD recognizes the issue isn't going to enough power conference teams gyms just to lose and instead the issue is not enough buy games. The Mountain West has most teams buy a couple at least and they get multiple bids in each year. Now they are predicted to get 6-7 teams in the NCAA tourney this year. When just 8 years ago they had just one. Before they mandated all their teams start buying home games.

This thread is a microcosm of the reason the big schools get away with shutting mid-majors out. The big teams dictate who can play what schedule, and and we are all pointing fingers at each other.

For example, we played UVA; we beat UVA; now we don't play UVA. My guess is that is also why we aren't playing any other ACC teams. Oh, and we probably won't ever play Michigan State again, either.

For the last decade, we (and ODU) had been playing our old rivals in the A10 year-in, year-out, winning a good number. Then, their conference told them they are not allowed to continue the rivalries. JMU and ODU had to play each other in an OOC game this year. Do you think if some combination of VCU, Richmond, GMU, GW, Dayton or even Charlotte had agreed to play the two Sun Belt teams, we would have done that?

Bigger conferences should not be rewarded for ducking quality mid-majors.

(03-04-2024 08:17 PM)Hart Foundation Wrote:  JMU could have scheduled much better and chose not to. Yes, they had some state teams turn them down because JMU was requiring a home & home and would not consider other options. Road guarantee pay games are readily available across the country if you are willing to travel and play on the preferred date of the P6 host. Of course, that means you are going to likely take losses, but it affords the opportunity of getting big wins that move the needle. Plus you get cash. The committee has repeatedly told America that a weak Strength of Schedule is what eliminates teams from consideration for at-large bids. We should not be surprised.

They could have played an OOC schedule like Boise State and played…
Clemson
Va Tech
Washington St.
Butler
St Mary’s
San Fran
VCU
N Texas
All in the top 75

Sure, some of those were a little fortunate to be slightly better than expected, but there was no doubt before the season Boise State knew they built a challenging OOC schedule.

JMU scheduled Michigan State. Great game. Great road win. But that’s it. A few opponents may have been a little worse than expected, but when you fill your slate with Coppin State, Morgan State, Howard, Hampton etc then you get what you deserve.
If it wasn’t for the SBC-MAC challenge, JMU’s SOS would be even worse.
Self-inflicted punishment.

The Dukes have to win the Sun Belt tourney to get a bid.

Dude. You signed a 2 for 1 with ODU. Not even Jason Miyares is gonna back you up on this one.

(03-04-2024 10:05 PM)purplesanman Wrote:  This thread is a microcosm of the reason the big schools get away with shutting mid-majors out. The big teams dictate who can play what schedule, and and we are all pointing fingers at each other.

For example, we played UVA; we beat UVA; now we don't play UVA. My guess is that is also why we aren't playing any other ACC teams. Oh, and we probably won't ever play Michigan State again, either.

For the last decade, we (and ODU) had been playing our old rivals in the A10 year-in, year-out, winning a good number. Then, their conference told them they are not allowed to continue the rivalries. JMU and ODU had to play each other in an OOC game this year. Do you think if some combination of VCU, Richmond, GMU, GW, Dayton or even Charlotte had agreed to play the two Sun Belt teams, we would have done that?

Bigger conferences should not be rewarded for ducking quality mid-majors.

The point on us having to play ODU as an OOC game tells you all you need to know about our schedule. JMU called many P5 teams for games and got a thanks but no thanks. We’d go on the road and play any ACC team that wants to play. Problem is they won’t play us.

We have same issue in football. I know for a fact we called Texas this offseason for a game in the future and they said hell no. The reason? It’s not worth the risk and they can schedule near guaranteed G5 wins.

(03-04-2024 10:01 PM)Eagleyed Wrote:  

(03-04-2024 09:07 PM)HPCAT Wrote:  

(03-04-2024 08:31 PM)Appst94 Wrote:  JMU did all they could do. You play the team in front of you to the best of your ability.

Maybe the players did all they could do, but the coach and administration could have done so much more with better scheduling and take responsibility for why JMU and ASU will be watching the tourney from the local burger joint just like everyone else if they don't win the SBC tourney.

And I might add rightfully so.

A lot of the P6 don't have strong out of conference schedules. But, they buy a bunch of games at home which pushes them up there. Then they all play each other and their sos and quad 1 wins improves with that.

If JMU had of played several of the top teams at their place. They would have lost several games. Just like the top of the B$0, S$C, and all the others do. When you play away games it's a likely loss. Even more so with their refs.

Don't play the Power conferences game on their court. Play it on yours. Buy games, who cares how weak they are. Everyone in the conference does what JMU did everyone in the conference minus the bottom few like ODU this year would have multiple Quad 1 wins.

Coaching salaries per win shows a very weak correlation. You might get a couple of wins eeked out for every million you spend on a coach. Just spend that money on buying home games which is far more correlated to wins than coaching salary. Not to mention that the teams who can spend millions on coaches probably can get those home games too which further erases the correlation.

I'm glad our AD recognizes the issue isn't going to enough power conference teams gyms just to lose and instead the issue is not enough buy games. The Mountain West has most teams buy a couple at least and they get multiple bids in each year. Now they are predicted to get 6-7 teams in the NCAA tourney this year. When just 8 years ago they had just one. Before they mandated all their teams start buying home games.

2 years ago, our last year in CUSA we got snubbed for a ncaa bid in baseball. Granted our resume was as bublicious as it gets but they made their choices and cited a weak OOC schedule. It doesn’t matter if you’re playing and competing in a top five conference, it’s WHICH top five conference.

(03-04-2024 10:35 PM)jmu98 Wrote:  

(03-04-2024 10:05 PM)purplesanman Wrote:  This thread is a microcosm of the reason the big schools get away with shutting mid-majors out. The big teams dictate who can play what schedule, and and we are all pointing fingers at each other.

For example, we played UVA; we beat UVA; now we don't play UVA. My guess is that is also why we aren't playing any other ACC teams. Oh, and we probably won't ever play Michigan State again, either.

For the last decade, we (and ODU) had been playing our old rivals in the A10 year-in, year-out, winning a good number. Then, their conference told them they are not allowed to continue the rivalries. JMU and ODU had to play each other in an OOC game this year. Do you think if some combination of VCU, Richmond, GMU, GW, Dayton or even Charlotte had agreed to play the two Sun Belt teams, we would have done that?

Bigger conferences should not be rewarded for ducking quality mid-majors.

The point on us having to play ODU as an OOC game tells you all you need to know about our schedule. JMU called many P5 teams for games and got a thanks but no thanks. We’d go on the road and play any ACC team that wants to play. Problem is they won’t play us.

We have same issue in football. I know for a fact we called Texas this offseason for a game in the future and they said hell no. The reason? It’s not worth the risk and they can schedule near guaranteed G5 wins.

For the record, JMU was fulfilling the 2 for 1 contract we’d signed before we were conference mates. You could have bought us out and played a buy game away. Hindsight right?

(03-04-2024 10:45 PM)mturn017 Wrote:  

(03-04-2024 10:35 PM)jmu98 Wrote:  

(03-04-2024 10:05 PM)purplesanman Wrote:  This thread is a microcosm of the reason the big schools get away with shutting mid-majors out. The big teams dictate who can play what schedule, and and we are all pointing fingers at each other.

For example, we played UVA; we beat UVA; now we don't play UVA. My guess is that is also why we aren't playing any other ACC teams. Oh, and we probably won't ever play Michigan State again, either.

For the last decade, we (and ODU) had been playing our old rivals in the A10 year-in, year-out, winning a good number. Then, their conference told them they are not allowed to continue the rivalries. JMU and ODU had to play each other in an OOC game this year. Do you think if some combination of VCU, Richmond, GMU, GW, Dayton or even Charlotte had agreed to play the two Sun Belt teams, we would have done that?

Bigger conferences should not be rewarded for ducking quality mid-majors.

The point on us having to play ODU as an OOC game tells you all you need to know about our schedule. JMU called many P5 teams for games and got a thanks but no thanks. We’d go on the road and play any ACC team that wants to play. Problem is they won’t play us.

We have same issue in football. I know for a fact we called Texas this offseason for a game in the future and they said hell no. The reason? It’s not worth the risk and they can schedule near guaranteed G5 wins.

For the record, JMU was fulfilling the 2 for 1 contract we’d signed before we were conference mates. You could have bought us out and played a buy game away. Hindsight right?

That's the point; I'm not positive we could have. I think teams were afraid we could beat them, but did not have the name recognition to to make it a good loss.

I also don't think it was the game ODU really wanted to play at that point, and that both our schools would have voided or pushed it had Richmond/VCU/Mason, etc. been willing to continue.

(03-04-2024 11:05 PM)purplesanman Wrote:  

(03-04-2024 10:45 PM)mturn017 Wrote:  

(03-04-2024 10:35 PM)jmu98 Wrote:  

(03-04-2024 10:05 PM)purplesanman Wrote:  This thread is a microcosm of the reason the big schools get away with shutting mid-majors out. The big teams dictate who can play what schedule, and and we are all pointing fingers at each other.

For example, we played UVA; we beat UVA; now we don't play UVA. My guess is that is also why we aren't playing any other ACC teams. Oh, and we probably won't ever play Michigan State again, either.

For the last decade, we (and ODU) had been playing our old rivals in the A10 year-in, year-out, winning a good number. Then, their conference told them they are not allowed to continue the rivalries. JMU and ODU had to play each other in an OOC game this year. Do you think if some combination of VCU, Richmond, GMU, GW, Dayton or even Charlotte had agreed to play the two Sun Belt teams, we would have done that?

Bigger conferences should not be rewarded for ducking quality mid-majors.

The point on us having to play ODU as an OOC game tells you all you need to know about our schedule. JMU called many P5 teams for games and got a thanks but no thanks. We’d go on the road and play any ACC team that wants to play. Problem is they won’t play us.

We have same issue in football. I know for a fact we called Texas this offseason for a game in the future and they said hell no. The reason? It’s not worth the risk and they can schedule near guaranteed G5 wins.

For the record, JMU was fulfilling the 2 for 1 contract we’d signed before we were conference mates. You could have bought us out and played a buy game away. Hindsight right?

That's the point; I'm not positive we could have. I think teams were afraid we could beat them, but did not have the name recognition to to make it a good loss.

I also don't think it was the game ODU really wanted to play at that point, and that both our schools would have voided or pushed it had Richmond/VCU/Mason, etc. been willing to continue.

We had no problem playing a second home game against JMU this year and you could have replaced it with a good buy game if you’d tried. For us it was guaranteed ticket sales and for you it should have been a decent away game a few hours down the road. One of those things was true. It turned out we were a big SOS anchor but that wasn’t predicted. Basketball scheduling is more flexible than football which happens years in advance but still a gamble. Schools aren’t scared of playing JMU on their home court.

Not only do the big teams determine if they’ll play you or not, but most of the time it’ll be a home game for them. South Alabama played a more challenging schedule last year but most games were on the road or a neutral site tournament. Yes we ended up with a decent NET, but Coach Riley said it was incredibly hard on them and he’d never do it again. Aside from Alabama our home slate stunk.
vs Mobile (non-Div I)
@ New Mexico
vs Alabama
@ Oklahoma
Evansville (tournament)
Towson (tournament)
Robert Morris (tournament)
@ Florida Atlantic
@ UAB
@ Alabama A&M
vs Spring Hill (non-Div I)
vs Jacksonville State

Alabama only played us because it was part of a 2 for 1 and the year we hosted coincided with them doing renovations to their arena.