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Shyatt urges MW for help in scheduling.
- Thread starter fromolwyoming
- Start date
joshvanklomp
Well-known member
Except Wyoming fans, as evidenced when this year's schedule was released.McPeachy said:
McPeachy
Well-known member
joshvanklomp said:
What about the rest?
And although Montana State does bloweth - they are better than:
Fort Lewis
Bristol University
Indiana State
New Mexico Highlands
Bakersfield
Southern
Omaha
Marshall
San Diego State*
*Kidding - but as far as a dirty douche fanbase - they are it.
BeaverPoke
Well-known member
ragtimejoe1 said:
I disagree.
Why would a middle of the road Pac12 team like... oh let's just say Oregon State want to go to Laramie right now? So they can lose to a team who has made the NCAA Tourney once in the past 12 seasons? Then the fan base is pissed for losing to a low level program and conference. And trust me, those Beav hoops fans think they are far ahead of any MWC school not named SDSU :rofl:
But if the team they were playing was ranked 25th in a down year, Top 5 in a good year, and normally falling somewhere between 10th and 20th, going to Laramie would be looked at as "a great challenge and opportunity for the program".
joshvanklomp
Well-known member
How many teams does Gonzaga get to come to their home gym? How about Boise State in football?BeaverPoke said:
Sustained success doesn't take away the fact that we are still in a G5 conference. P5s simply don't want to schedule those true road games. I'm not even factoring in the difficulty of just getting teams into Laramie.
NowherePoke
Well-known member
joshvanklomp said:
Sustained success would assist scheduling, I don't think there should be any doubt about that. Look at who Gonzaga gets to Spokane (AZ, UCLA, Tenn this year along with SMU, WSU, WVU, Ill, etc. in recent years), plus they are invited to top-tier neutral court tourneys and occasionally one-off neutral court games against marquee opponents.
Sustained success also builds the fan base which builds revenue which allows you to upgrade the type of team you bring in for buy games as well along with covering some of the travel expenses for teams to come to Laramie.
Having said that, it is simply unrealistic to expect that level of success. Those types of programs are outliers. We can dream, but you can't build your scheduling strategy off the hope that we find a miracle.
Along those lines, I think there are a couple of interesting dynamics going on in scheduling. You mentioned earlier that Wyoming fans bitched about the schedule, which is true, but every teams fans bitches about their schedule in basketball every year. In a surprising twist, I am actually one of the ones not bitching about the schedule this year as I was probably one of the more frequent complainers regarding the schedule last year. I have changed my tune for a couple of reasons:
1. Context - We have one senior and a whole bunch of inexperienced freshman. It would be nice to be a NCAA at-large team, but I don't think that is realistic. When you have a young team like this, I think you need to build up wins and confidence. I also think it is important for program momentum not to have a lot of OOC losses. Last year I was upset because we were a senior laden team that should have scheduled like a NCAA at-large team. In the end it didn't matter for multiple reasons (Nance got mono so we didn't do well enough in conference anyway, and we won the MWCT to make it moot), but there is no reason with a senior laden team to basically give up any chance of an at-large before the season even starts due to the poor schedule which is what happened last year.
2. Schedule improvements - I actually think our long term scheduling is improving. We aren't going to get P5 teams to come to Laramie, but a couple of events have helped us. The first is that we are entered into neutral court exempt events for the next 3 years (one of them with the assistance of the MWC, which should be acknowledged). The second is the reintroduction of the MWC/MVC challenge which provides the equivalent of a quality home and home schedule. I also like the NMSU series and hope it continues.
3. The CSU problem - CSU went 13-5 in the MWC, won 27 games overall and played a number of solid teams in their OOC including Montana, Georgia State, Mercer, and UTEP. They were left out of the NCAAT. If that is our new reality, that I am not sure we can ever put together a schedule good enough to earn an at-large. A combination of the continued stratification of collegiate athletics (CSU only beat one P5 team in their OOC, so they must not be good..an ignorant POV that should be restricted to casual fans but which is now apparently shared by the NCAA selection committee) and the damage done to the MWC with the inclusion of SJSU (replace SJSU with the worst team from say, the A-10, and CSU ends up with an RPI of between 20 and 22. Would have been much tougher to keep them out in that scenario. Obviously assumes they would have won those games). But, SJSU isn't going anywhere and the ability of the power conference to drive the NCAA will only continue to grow.
NowherePoke
Well-known member
McPeachy said:
Just say no to Southern Utah and Weber State. The others are fine.
DU is a long running series and just makes sense.
UNC is normally not the type of program that I would want to schedule a H&H with (directional Big Sky school, frequent sub 300 rpi, etc.), but the proximity and convenience make it a decent choice.
Utah/BYU aren't coming to Laramie.
MSU is fine, particularly as an opportunity for a neutral court in Billings, Casper, or even Sheridan. I just didn't like us scheduling them twice in one year, particularly last year right after they fired their coach and gutted their roster. I think their new coach is good and they will be a top tier Big Sky team in the near future. I just thought it was bad scheduling last year for a team with designs on the NCAA tourney to schedule 2 games against a team that was almost certain to be near the bottom of the NCAA (and they were).
The only Big Sky schools that we should travel to, IMO, are the two Montana schools and UNC. If the NCAA is going to work this way, where P5 schools won't travel to conferences in the 6-10 range (MWC), than why should schools in the 6-10 conferences travel to schools in the 25-30 range (low major)? I make an exception for UNC due to proximity and to the Montana schools because they aren't really Big Sky schools. They belong in a bigger league but aren't for a variety of reasons. Montana in particular is a program with a lot of success in both revenue sports, a large fanbase, and an academic profile that is closer to a MWC school than to the regional colleges that populate much of the Big Sky. Our fans, and the general College Basketball world recognize that beating Montana is a quality win.
You could make some of the same arguments for Weber that I made for Montana, but as with all schools in the State of Utah, my attitude is "F em".
WestWYOPoke
Well-known member
joshvanklomp said:
With Boise State you have a decent point, but then again this is a talk about basketball where scheduling is a whole different ball game than football. As for the Zags...
Gonzaga home games in the last 5 years:
St. Joseph's
Wasington State
Notre Dame
Michigan State
Butler
Xavier
Oklahoma State
Wake Forest
That is a HELL of a lot better than anyone we've seen in Laramie for OOC in a long time.
joshvanklomp
Well-known member
Haven't a bunch of those been played in Seattle?WestWYOPoke said:
WestWYOPoke
Well-known member
joshvanklomp said:
Nope...every one I listed was played in Spokane. I also missed Illinois in that list. This year they will also play Tennessee, in Seattle though.
Cosmic Cowboy
Well-known member
Since I'm all nostalgic and looking at our old record book a thought popped in my head. Is there any way we can play Utah twice a year in a home and away? I know we're having scheduling problems so why not bring back this old rivalry game? They're close, an old conference foe, and usually pretty good. Even renewing a home and home deal over 2 years would be a win. Can this happen? Why? Why not? It seems like a win-win for both programs and right now both are on the rise. Utah didn't leave the MWC in a way that was sour such as those assholes at BYU. It's a perfect bad blood settled on the court thing for me that would help raise our RPI way more then a double with like a Montana State. How sweet would it be to have a secret old MWC rivalry series just for our fan bases. Probably would be on them cause I'm sure we'd be down for this.
Just thinking all cosmic this morning. Have a good day out there.
Just thinking all cosmic this morning. Have a good day out there.
Cosmic Cowboy
Well-known member
cali2wyo said:
Yeah most likely. Utah doesn't really need us as much as we need them. It would just be sweet if a deal got done though. I bet it would be well attended if we got it back into the dome of doom.
Cowboy Junky
Well-known member
Maybe we should have a challenge with the AAC. That would generate some interest, and get a decent game on the schedule.
