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Post by avid 2.0 on Jun 26, 2022 17:51:23 GMT -5
Colorado/Washington v. Illinois/Iowa Is this really an actual event? Or just 4 teams that agreed to play each other? Minnesota/Penn State Oregon/Stanford are in on it too. |
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Post by c4ndlelight on Jun 26, 2022 17:52:20 GMT -5
Is this really an actual event? Or just 4 teams that agreed to play each other? Minnesota/Penn State Oregon/Stanford are in on it too. They're not related. |
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Post by jwvolley on Jun 26, 2022 17:52:30 GMT -5
I miss VERT  hard to ask for a better tournament opening weekend than Florida/Texas/Oregon/Nebraska |
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Post by n00b on Jun 26, 2022 17:54:52 GMT -5
Is this really an actual event? Or just 4 teams that agreed to play each other? Minnesota/Penn State Oregon/Stanford are in on it too. Right. I guess my question (as it relates to Washington’s schedule) is if this is simply those four coaches agreeing to play and slapping the label on it for marketing? Or did Washington actually get stuck in some deal where they have to play an Iowa team that they’d prefer to not play? |
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Post by exit237a on Jun 26, 2022 17:55:33 GMT -5
Colorado/Washington v. Illinois/Iowa Is this really an actual event? Or just 4 teams that agreed to play each other? It's listed as the "Big Ten/Pac 12 challenge". Last season, Illinois hosted the same teams. |
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Post by ay2013 on Jun 26, 2022 17:55:44 GMT -5
The only really big ugh is Northwestern. I don’t have a huge issue with anyone else on the schedule. Boise State loses a lot, but they have talent on the roster and the Mountain West isnt particularly strong next year. Other than Florida and Kentucky, there is nobody in the SEC that Arkansas can’t beat. Pepperdine (Ahrens) will challenge for the WCC title, Poly gets their best player back and will challenge for the Big West title. Montana State returns all their players, North Texas got some solid transfers. Illinois will be fine, Iowa was surely gonna be an RPI drag, but they come with Illinois, which is why inviting Northwestern to Seattle just seems very very stupid. This is surely a schedule that the Huskies can go undefeated in, and, if things shake out alright, Washington can get the scheduling bonus as I’d probably wager that Illinois, Poly, Pepperdine, Arkansas will be in the top 75 RPI and you only need 50% of non conference matches in the top 75 to get that bonus, but sans that, the Huskies aren’t going to give the committee any reason to give them preferential seeding based on the non-conference. Northwestern should be a mega-ugh... could they really not find anyone else? i dont think you can sweet talk yourself into north texas... its gonna be rough without Robinson, Skopal, and Haeussler. I was going to suggest Loyola... but it looks like everyone (Purdue, Tennessee, Michigan, Marquette, Kansas St) are in on that lol Who else they could find to travel to Seattle and play those other three teams that week is anyones guess, but I do know that all three teams would be better off not playing Northwestern at all. The sad part is that Northwestern is by no means actually a bad team - in fact, I’d argue they are a very good team, assuming they return most of their lineup. It’s just a bad RPI team because they will take so many losses to the top half of the Big 10. I’m neutral on North Texas. Those smaller conferences can break a lot of different ways, and if Treyauna Rush is healthy, she’s a dynamic scorer for that league. I don’t expect North Texas to compete with Rice and Western Kentucky (whom they only play once), but they can beat all the rest of the teams in their league and apart from Baylor and Washington, they could best everyone else on their non-conference schedule. I’m not saying they will, just that they can. I think a 20-10 record is doable for North Texas, and that’s certainly not a bad non-conference opponent record to have. |
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Post by c4ndlelight on Jun 26, 2022 18:00:51 GMT -5
Minnesota/Penn State Oregon/Stanford are in on it too. Right. I guess my question (as it relates to Washington’s schedule) is if this is simply those four coaches agreeing to play and slapping the label on it for marketing? Or did Washington actually get stuck in some deal where they have to play an Iowa team that they’d prefer to not play? Washington has not wanted to risk going 0-2 for a weekend. So that's why they originally set it up with Wisconsin/Maryland (and then had to play Maryland/Oklahoma that one year after Wisconsin decided it was a bad look to be paired with Maryland). Then they hooked up with Colorado and Illinois who were free after PSU/Stanford went their own way after that 4-year pairing (I'm not sure whether UW had the opportunity to take Oregon's spot in that tourney). Iowa comes along as the new Maryland. |
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Post by bbg95 on Jun 26, 2022 18:34:09 GMT -5
Minnesota/Penn State Oregon/Stanford are in on it too. Right. I guess my question (as it relates to Washington’s schedule) is if this is simply those four coaches agreeing to play and slapping the label on it for marketing? Or did Washington actually get stuck in some deal where they have to play an Iowa team that they’d prefer to not play? Yeah, it seems like marketing to me, mostly, but I don't know if there is an official agreement between the conferences. When I hear of a challenge like that, I think of the ones in men's basketball (e.g. Big 12/SEC, ACC/Big Ten) that involve a lot more teams. So for the Big Ten and the Pac-12 to have a true challenge, i would expect more matches involving more teams, particularly some of the better teams in the conferences like Wisconsin and Nebraska. But maybe that's just my impression of it being affected since my frame of reference for such challenges is from another sport. I'd call it a couple of mini-challenges. |
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trojansc
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Post by trojansc on Jun 26, 2022 20:23:18 GMT -5
trojansc /anyone else who do you think could be a sleeper RPI Gem (like South alabama/miss st/Cuse last year) Those are hard to predict. I like some of the pieces at Grand Canyon, could be an RPI gem, they scheduled a cupcake non-conference (but they don't have any teams it will really matter for, their best non-conf teams are Santa Clara/Northern Iowa/Wyoming, which haven't been relevant lately in terms of at-large but have usually been decent programs). Sometimes RPI really is just a luck game, especially with mid-majors. It's alot easier to 'dominate' those conferences so if one team really gets it together but they historically haven't been a great team to schedule they become an RPI gem because nobody could 'predict' their RPI value. A lot of times teams can get duped into a good W/L record from the year before, but besides the top consistent non-P5 teams (WKU/Creighton/UCF/etc.) there is a ton of movement. North Texas went from sub .500 to 28-3 to back to sub .500 in a three-year span. By the time a mid-major with a good W/L gets 'found out' the gig is already up as they may lose a lot of talent and can't replace it like P5 teams can so easily. I think the Mountain West will be down for example - UNLV and Boise State losing big pieces. That would lead me to think the door is open for Colorado State to put up a gaudy record again. But Colorado State doesn't have a weak non-conference, so I doubt they will be a super good W/L team, even if they take control of the MWC. It's interesting to look at the MAC. The two-best teams in that conference are Ball State/Bowling Green. Ball State was one of the absolute best teams to schedule last year. I thought we might see some big names on their schedule this year, it's okay, but not as tough as Bowling Green's. Ball State scheduled Miss St, Purdue, Dayton. Bowling Green scheduled Miss St, Michigan, Pittsburgh, WKU, Towson, Purdue, and Tennessee. Ball State will probably put up a better W/L than BG even if BG wins the conference. It will be interesting to see who ends up with the better RPI or ends up being the better team to schedule. It could be Ball State just because they scheduled easier. |
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Post by n00b on Jun 26, 2022 21:15:51 GMT -5
trojansc /anyone else who do you think could be a sleeper RPI Gem (like South alabama/miss st/Cuse last year) Those are hard to predict. I like some of the pieces at Grand Canyon, could be an RPI gem, they scheduled a cupcake non-conference (but they don't have any teams it will really matter for, their best non-conf teams are Santa Clara/Northern Iowa/Wyoming, which haven't been relevant lately in terms of at-large but have usually been decent programs). Sometimes RPI really is just a luck game, especially with mid-majors. It's alot easier to 'dominate' those conferences so if one team really gets it together but they historically haven't been a great team to schedule they become an RPI gem because nobody could 'predict' their RPI value. A lot of times teams can get duped into a good W/L record from the year before, but besides the top consistent non-P5 teams (WKU/Creighton/UCF/etc.) there is a ton of movement. North Texas went from sub .500 to 28-3 to back to sub .500 in a three-year span. By the time a mid-major with a good W/L gets 'found out' the gig is already up as they may lose a lot of talent and can't replace it like P5 teams can so easily. I think the Mountain West will be down for example - UNLV and Boise State losing big pieces. That would lead me to think the door is open for Colorado State to put up a gaudy record again. But Colorado State doesn't have a weak non-conference, so I doubt they will be a super good W/L team, even if they take control of the MWC. It's interesting to look at the MAC. The two-best teams in that conference are Ball State/Bowling Green. Ball State was one of the absolute best teams to schedule last year. I thought we might see some big names on their schedule this year, it's okay, but not as tough as Bowling Green's. Ball State scheduled Miss St, Purdue, Dayton. Bowling Green scheduled Miss St, Michigan, Pittsburgh, WKU, Towson, Purdue, and Tennessee. Ball State will probably put up a better W/L than BG even if BG wins the conference. It will be interesting to see who ends up with the better RPI or ends up being the better team to schedule. It could be Ball State just because they scheduled easier. The tier right below Ball State and Bowling Green didn’t lose much either - Toledo, Ohio, Western Michigan. You read it here first, the MAC could be a 3-bid league this fall. |
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trojansc
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Post by trojansc on Jun 26, 2022 21:25:03 GMT -5
The tier right below Ball State and Bowling Green didn’t lose much either - Toledo, Ohio, Western Michigan. You read it here first, the MAC could be a 3-bid league this fall. I'm here for the MACtion. They were a 4-bid league a decade ago.
It's sometimes as simple as winning that one marquee match on your schedule early on in the season (see: Wright State beating Notre Dame and getting an at-large bid out of the Horizon). There were a couple other Horizon teams on the bubble, but, Wright State had the key non-conference win and that's what got them the nod. If BG and BSU are tournament teams, maybe a team like Toledo knocks off WKU and that's enough to get them in this discussion. The easiest path of course is the top 2 getting in via at-large and the 3rd being a bid-stealer in the conference tournament as an AQ. |
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trojansc
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Post by trojansc on Jun 27, 2022 1:14:06 GMT -5
I just realized that the Missouri Valley moved its conference tournament from Thanksgiving weekend!
Boo!!!!
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Post by jayj79 on Jun 27, 2022 8:13:35 GMT -5
I just realized that the Missouri Valley moved its conference tournament from Thanksgiving weekend! Boo!!!! with the conference expanding from 10 teams to 12 teams, they've also expanded the conference tournament from 6 teams to 8 teams and from 3 rounds to 4 rounds (with the top 2 regular season finishers getting a double bye to the semifinals, and the 3rd and 4th place teams getting a bye to the quarters) And for the first time in conference history, the MVC tournament will be hosted by Evansville |
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Post by dragon2owl on Jun 27, 2022 10:12:48 GMT -5
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Post by bbg95 on Jun 27, 2022 10:18:07 GMT -5
I guess Texas doesn't want to risk losing to Rice in a match that counts. |
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hard to ask for a better tournament opening weekend than Florida/Texas/Oregon/Nebraska
