Ap poll is ridiculous

[PRHusky]

The only way we get a top 3 seed is if we lose less than 3-4 games all year. That's the way the conferences work. Guarantee a 5-6 loss team from the ACC gets a better seed than a 3 loss team from the AAC.

And win the AAC Tournament.

BS. People forget that in the late 90s and early 2000s the BE was not the juggernaut it later became. As an example, in the 2002-2003 season, the BE only had 4 teams (out of 14) invited to the tournament. Rarely did more than 6 BE teams make the tournament before 2006. Yet, our seed or any other good BE team's seed was never affected by this. Heck, the SEC is at best as good as the AAC; do you think UK is concerned about their seed?!?

 

[ASweet3781]

I don't disagree with where we're ranked right now, but I also don't think the Maryland, BC, and Indiana victories are as unimpressive as people are making them out to be. We didn't dominate any of them as convincingly as we may have liked, but those are all teams with BCS talent (besides maybe BC), who we played at neutral sites, and we controlled all of those games from start to finish (specifically the Maryland and BC games, where we were up double digits in the second half). Indiana, BC, and Maryland will all have games this year where they look good, and they'll all have games where they push good teams to the brink. It would be one thing if games against Yale and Eastern Washington were coming down to the wire - whenever you play a team with top 100 talent, especially when UConn is one of the biggest games they'll play all year, you have to expect at least somewhat of a battle.

I think it is dishonest to say we controlled those games from start to finish. Indiana had a 51-46 lead on us and most in the game chat we about to throw in the towel. That is not controlling a game from start to finish.

Somewhat of a battle? We survived by the skin of our teeth in all 3 of them. BC is not a good team and that has been proven. Don't blame the voters if they are not impressed with the whole picture. The good thing is we played close games all of last year and we rose our game for the big opponents. But the voters judge based on scores, and UConn's makeup makes a big blowout almost impossible regardless of opponent. And that 2nd half performance vs Stanford is what is the last image most of the voters saw.

 

[Woof 101]

To be fair, Champs, it was an 11 point lead at the 3;30 mark. EWU was still in the game at that point. We didn't push the lead up to 20 or so till the last 3 minutes of the game and ended up winning by 16. EWU is 5-6 now and was slaughtered by UC Irvine (by 23) and Seton Hall (22). Honestly, a 16 point victory was disappointing to me.

And I'm not sure I buy the "UCONN is the biggest game they play all year" any more than I buy the "Team A just wanted to win more than Team B". Their kids had spent a week on the east coast after getting demolished at Seton Hall. It's not like the game was in Washington in front of their fans in a sold out facility... Just my $.02...

I see nothing wrong with our ranking nor with dropping us. We've had 1 wire to wire smackdown (Detroit) and gutted out a win against a good Florida team. Literally every other game has been far closer than it should have and none were overly impressive in the eyes of the national voters...

So far on this post I would have to follow your tack. Quite frankly (JC term) I was not impressed, EWU was still in it well into the fourth. That and the officials were very obvious of who the home team was. I am not defending the pollsters and understand how some can be upset that a team we beat is ahead of us in the polls.
On the other hand quite frankly they may be looking at the big picture and down the road. By this I mean our conference and I wonder how many teams ranked ahead of us have a point guard as the leading rebounder? The team is working hard but an 11-1 juggernaut they are not...A work in progress I am sure KO would agree. Let's see where they are in Feb when it begins to count.

 

[Hurleyman216]

The December 30th AP Poll has nothing to do with seeding, absolutely nothing. The polls get more accurate as the year goes along.

I disagree we have a top 10 resume, we have one great win and a terrible loss. BC, Maryland, and IU are not what we hoped they would be and we didn't beat any of them impressively.

Keep winning, win the league, and win the conference tournament and our seeding will be just fine.

Agree to disagree, but I can count at least 7 teams ahead of us with weaker resumes to date including: OK State, Duke, Witchita State (hasn't played anyone with a pulse and doesn't have a SINGLE ranked opponent on their schedule all year), Florida, Louisville, Kentucky (only solid win is a questionable Louisville team) and Kansas. You can sit there and say the polls on Dec. 30th don't matter, but the fact of the matter is that this week's poll affects next weeks poll and so on. So when we continue to get screwed multiple weeks in a row getting knocked back by 4 spots without losing, over time it does have an impact. The press clearly has different rules for different teams. There is a love affair with Duke, Kentucky and Kansas every year and every year Duke gets a favorable seed and then usually gets bounced in the 2nd round. We clearly don't get the love from ESPN that some of the other ACC and bluechip teams get and this does have an impact on public perception and rankings. You can say we don't have a top 10 resume, but then name me 10 or 11 teams that are clearly better than us right now...you can't because they don't exist.

 

[BigErnMcCracken]

On the other hand quite frankly they may be looking at the big picture and down the road. By this I mean our conference and I wonder how many teams ranked ahead of us have a point guard as the leading rebounder?

I think you're giving the people that make these lists entirely too much credit. I would bet a decent number of them can't name a single player on the team, and most of them can't name two.

I'm not really bothered by the ranking, it'll all shake out eventually, but it is a bit strange that they keep falling without losing. I think it's a case of out of sight, out of mind. Wichita State's a good story, so the fact that they have beaten exactly zero good teams doesn't hurt them. They'll be a media darling all year.

 

[champs99and04]

I think it is dishonest to say we controlled those games from start to finish. Indiana had a 51-46 lead on us and most in the game chat we about to throw in the towel. That is not controlling a game from start to finish.

Somewhat of a battle? We survived by the skin of our teeth in all 3 of them. BC is not a good team and that has been proven. Don't blame the voters if they are not impressed with the whole picture. The good thing is we played close games all of last year and we rose our game for the big opponents. But the voters judge based on scores, and UConn's makeup makes a big blowout almost impossible regardless of opponent. And that 2nd half performance vs Stanford is what is the last image most of the voters saw.

Again, read the first sentence of my post - I don't have a problem with the voters ranking us where they did. I realize BC and Maryland are not good teams - we were up 17 on Maryland mid-way through the second half before Napier got called for a bogus technical (which led to him going to the bench with foul trouble) and double digits for most of the game against BC. It's concerning that we let those teams back into the game, but again, both of those teams also give out scholarships and have some pretty talented players on their roster. Look at Ohio State - it took a complete meltdown for them to survive a Notre Dame team that has been pretty mediocre this season. Look at Oklahoma State - they were two Kyle Marshall free throws away from losing to an underwhelming Butler team. Look at Arizona - they almost lost to a terrible UNLV team at home. Point is, the list goes on. It's not easy to beat BCS-caliber teams away from home, regardless of how good they may be. UConn has played six BCS teams this season - Maryland, BC, Indiana, Florida, Stanford, and Washington - with four of those games coming away from home, and won five of those games. I'm pretty sure we all would have signed up for that before the season, even before we knew Maryland, BC, and Washington weren't as good as we thought they'd be. Would the 2004 and 2006 and 2009 UConn teams have won those games more easily? Yes. But we knew coming into the season that this UConn team wasn't as good as those teams. For all the revisionists out there, look at the 2011 team, and the way they struggled with some pretty mediocre opponents - that team struggled with Vermont, struggled with New Hampshire, struggled with South Florida, struggled with Seton Hall. That team, much like the current group, was simply constructed to play close games, regardless of competition level. This team is the same way - we're going to make the tournament, and probably play 50/50 games down to the wire (not unlike the 2011 team, by the way). They can lose to pretty much anybody in the tournament field, but they can also beat anybody - aside from Arizona, and maybe a Kentucky or Kansas team down the road, there's really nobody out there that I won't take my chances against. There just isn't going to be a lot of wire-to-wire stomping's with this UConn team this year - they're not talented enough on the interior and Napier has really been the only consistent offensive performer). Buckle up and get ready for a lot of close games.

 

[Inyatkin]

BS. People forget that in the late 90s and early 2000s the BE was not the juggernaut it later became. As an example, in the 2002-2003 season, the BE only had 4 teams (out of 14) invited to the tournament. Rarely did more than 6 BE teams make the tournament before 2006. Yet, our seed or any other good BE team's seed was never affected by this. Heck, the SEC is at best as good as the AAC; do you think UK is concerned about their seed?!?

Yeah everyone forgets how low the Big East got. In the 90s there was Cuse in 96 and us in 99 and that's it for Final Fours. We still got 1s and 2s when we deserved it.
Also, Princeton one year was a top 10 AP team but a 4-seed. They really don't use polls for seeding.

 

[huskiesnyc]

I think Daniels summed it up pretty good

David Borges ‏@DaveBorges1m
DeAndre Daniels on UConn dropping two spots in AP poll despite 1-0 week: "I mean, I guess people don't like UConn. I don't know."

 

[tzznandrew]

Yeah everyone forgets how low the Big East got. In the 90s there was Cuse in 96 and us in 99 and that's it for Final Fours. We still got 1s and 2s when we deserved it.
Also, Princeton one year was a top 10 AP team but a 4-seed. They really don't use polls for seeding.

I forgot about that. They got a 5-seed in the 1998 bracket, beat UNLV and then lost to Michigan State.

 

[CTBasketball]

BS. People forget that in the late 90s and early 2000s the BE was not the juggernaut it later became. As an example, in the 2002-2003 season, the BE only had 4 teams (out of 14) invited to the tournament. Rarely did more than 6 BE teams make the tournament before 2006. Yet, our seed or any other good BE team's seed was never affected by this. Heck, the SEC is at best as good as the AAC; do you think UK is concerned about their seed?!?

Its all about the name and the teams in the conference. The AAC will realistically get 3 teams in this year. SEC will probably get 3-4. And that's one of the worst power conferences there is.

 

[Inyatkin]

I forgot about that. They got a 5-seed in the 1998 bracket, beat UNLV and then lost to Michigan State.

I knew it was a 4-5 game they lost. I think Cleaves hit a big shot to win it.

 

[Inyatkin]

Its all about the name and the teams in the conference. The AAC will realistically get 3 teams in this year. SEC will probably get 3-4. And that's one of the worst power conferences there is.

The AAC will realistically get 3 teams with top-4 seeds. The trouble for the AAC is not this year, it's next year and beyond.
Before the ACC became the greatest conference in the history of organized sports they had years where they sent three teams. The MVC one year sent four and could have had six. I don't like our situation any more than anyone else, but conference affiliation is just one part of the equation.

 

[kelde1wd]

It is still early. We need to keep winning games. If we do that, our rankings will get better and our NCAA seed will reflect that. We do that and everything will take care of themselves. Too early to worry. Last time I checked, seeds are not based off of 12/30 polls.

 

[gtcam]

I think it is dishonest to say we controlled those games from start to finish. Indiana had a 51-46 lead on us and most in the game chat we about to throw in the towel. That is not controlling a game from start to finish.

Somewhat of a battle? We survived by the skin of our teeth in all 3 of them. BC is not a good team and that has been proven. Don't blame the voters if they are not impressed with the whole picture. The good thing is we played close games all of last year and we rose our game for the big opponents. But the voters judge based on scores, and UConn's makeup makes a big blowout almost impossible regardless of opponent. And that 2nd half performance vs Stanford is what is the last image most of the voters saw.

Losing to Stanford on national tv, playing like we did is a killer
nobody gives a rats a## about ewu.
should we be higher? probably not
should we be ranked behind some others?
probably not
UConn needs to take care of business in conference. Louisville just became much weaker-don't be surprised if it came down to cinci/uconn

 

[gtcam]

Its all about the name and the teams in the conference. The AAC will realistically get 3 teams in this year. SEC will probably get 3-4. And that's one of the worst power conferences there is.

Who out of Louisville, Memphis, UConn and Cincinatti will be left out? maybe add SMU in there

 

[UConnDan97]

Who out of Louisville, Memphis, UConn and Cincinatti will be left out? maybe add SMU in there

For what it's worth, teamrankings.com currently has us at about 4 teams in the tourney (3.9), CBSSports has us at 4 teams (the teams you mentioned), and ESPN has us at 3 teams with both Cincy and SMU on the bubble. As it stands today, my money is on 4 teams into the tourney from the AAC...

 

[Huskygamble19]

It's also December 30th. Conference play starts this week. Teams at the top of the rankings will start losing games as they go on the road in conference play. We need to win both games this week on the road against teams we are better than, and continue to build of that going forward. Silly to get too worked up over rankings this time of year. March is a different story.[/quot


Teams that we are better Than? Stanford was ranked 199th in the nation and they beat us.so that means nothing until you actually play that team. We should win the next 2, but they have come out flat before and lost..IE Stanford.. Couldn't buy a 3 to save their life.

 

[Huskygamble19]

Don't know if you caught it during the EWU game, but a SNY announcer was talking about how difficult it will be to shine in the AAC because conference is very poorly rated.
More evidence of the need for UConn's administration and BOT to work every damn day to get us out of this dumpster fire of a conference.

You mean the All Afterbirth Conference, or the , Turn off the lights after the big boys leave conference? Take your pick.

 

[Jerry1714]

Agree to disagree, but I can count at least 7 teams ahead of us with weaker resumes to date including: OK State, Duke, Witchita State (hasn't played anyone with a pulse and doesn't have a SINGLE ranked opponent on their schedule all year), Florida, Louisville, Kentucky (only solid win is a questionable Louisville team) and Kansas. You can sit there and say the polls on Dec. 30th don't matter, but the fact of the matter is that this week's poll affects next weeks poll and so on. So when we continue to get screwed multiple weeks in a row getting knocked back by 4 spots without losing, over time it does have an impact. The press clearly has different rules for different teams. There is a love affair with Duke, Kentucky and Kansas every year and every year Duke gets a favorable seed and then usually gets bounced in the 2nd round. We clearly don't get the love from ESPN that some of the other ACC and bluechip teams get and this does have an impact on public perception and rankings. You can say we don't have a top 10 resume, but then name me 10 or 11 teams that are clearly better than us right now...you can't because they don't exist.

It would help if you knew what you were talking about, but I will still respond.

Wanna bash Witchita's schedule? Their SOS is 81, ours is 85. They beat Tennessee, St. Louis, and BYU. All three of those teams are rated higher by kempom than BC, IU, or Maryland.

Ok state blew the doors off of Memphis and won AT Colorado, but we have a better resume? Yea okay.

Why is that no one has us ranked in the top 10? Not on any site. Is it because everyone "hates" us and is out to get us? No it is because its reality right now. Wake up. You want 10 better teams? Zona, Cuse, Mich St., Ok State, Witchita, Ohio St., Wisky, Baylor, Oregon and Florida (yes we beat them, but by 1 at home, with their best player in the locker room, can you say with 100% certainty that we beat them on a neutral court?)

And your point about this weeks poll having effect on the one in March, what has an effect is winning games, that is all. Murray State was in the top 10 2 years ago in the last poll and was given a 6 seed, the poll means nothing. Do I think were the 17th best team? No, probably 12-14, but does it matter how were ranked now and do I worry about, not at all. All I care about is where we are ranked in April.

 

[Huskygamble19]

The AAC will realistically get 3 teams with top-4 seeds. The trouble for the AAC is not this year, it's next year and beyond.
Before the ACC became the greatest conference in the history of organized sports they had years where they sent three teams. The MVC one year sent four and could have had six. I don't like our situation any more than anyone else, but conference affiliation is just one part of the equation.[/quote



Becase of the huge step back from the football team the basketball had to suffer.

 

[Hurleyman216]

It would help if you knew what you were talking about, but I will still respond.

Wanna bash Witchita's schedule? Their SOS is 81, ours is 85. They beat Tennessee, St. Louis, and BYU. All three of those teams are rated higher by kempom than BC, IU, or Maryland.

Ok state blew the doors off of Memphis and won AT Colorado, but we have a better resume? Yea okay.

Why is that no one has us ranked in the top 10? Not on any site. Is it because everyone "hates" us and is out to get us? No it is because its reality right now. Wake up. You want 10 better teams? Zona, Cuse, Mich St., Ok State, Witchita, Ohio St., Wisky, Baylor, Oregon and Florida (yes we beat them, but by 1 at home, with their best player in the locker room, can you say with 100% certainty that we beat them on a neutral court?)

And your point about this weeks poll having effect on the one in March, what has an effect is winning games, that is all. Murray State was in the top 10 2 years ago in the last poll and was given a 6 seed, the poll means nothing. Do I think were the 17th best team? No, probably 12-14, but does it matter how were ranked now and do I worry about, not at all. All I care about is where we are ranked in April.

Jerry I'm wondering if you ever watch basketball or just scour the internet looking at meaningless rankings. In one breath you say essentially "rankings are meaningless" and then you defend your position by using Kenpom rankings which at this point in the season are also meaningless. Tennessee, St. Louis and BYU are garbage teams. Do you think Loiusville is the best team in the country right now? According to Kenpom they are. OK State also LOST to the same Memphis team they blew the doors off, but that doesn't factor in, right? And now our Florida win doesn't count because they got an injured player back? Don't throw out bogus SOS #'s because you have a MUCH higher probability of losing a game playing a combination of a good team and a bad team (i.e. Florida and Maine) than you do playing 2 teams that can't even sniff the top 50 (BYU and Tennessee), but SOS will tell you a different story. There's not a single team in the country that hasn't looked bad in multiple games.

When you have teams like KU jumping over you when they haven't even played a game all week, you know the public perception for UConn is low. If these media guys can't take their jobs seriously when it comes to the rankings, they shouldn't be allowed to vote. In general the rule is you win, you move up or stay the same, you lose, you move back. This is now 2 out of the last 3 weeks where we have "won and moved back" so that some 3 loss teams could jump over us. Not a coincidence. You should turn a game on other than UConn every now and then and actually watch some other teams this year. This is one of the weakest years I can recall in the past 10 years. There is not a single team out there that looks consistently better than anyone else. At this point there are probably 20 or so teams that could win the tournament come March....it's not often that you see that happen.

 

[CTBasketball]

Jerry I'm wondering if you ever watch basketball or just scour the internet looking at meaningless rankings. In one breath you say essentially "rankings are meaningless" and then you defend your position by using Kenpom rankings which at this point in the season are also meaningless. Tennessee, St. Louis and BYU are garbage teams. Do you think Loiusville is the best team in the country right now? According to Kenpom they are. OK State also LOST to the same Memphis team they blew the doors off, but that doesn't factor in, right? And now our Florida win doesn't count because they got an injured player back? Don't throw out bogus SOS #'s because you have a MUCH higher probability of losing a game playing a combination of a good team and a bad team (i.e. Florida and Maine) than you do playing 2 teams that can't even sniff the top 50 (BYU and Tennessee), but SOS will tell you a different story. There's not a single team in the country that hasn't looked bad in multiple games.

When you have teams like KU jumping over you when they haven't even played a game all week, you know the public perception for UConn is low. If these media guys can't take their jobs seriously when it comes to the rankings, they shouldn't be allowed to vote. In general the rule is you win, you move up or stay the same, you lose, you move back. This is now 2 out of the last 3 weeks where we have "won and moved back" so that some 3 loss teams could jump over us. Not a coincidence. You should turn a game on other than UConn every now and then and actually watch some other teams this year. This is one of the weakest years I can recall in the past 10 years. There is not a single team out there that looks consistently better than anyone else. At this point there are probably 20 or so teams that could win the tournament come March....it's not often that you see that happen.

Our Florida win was great, but it isn't a marquee win. They were playing without 2 of their best players and their best player on the floor got injured in the second half. And we barely won. Voters realize this, so does the public. And our wins against BC, Maryland, Indiana are meaningless right now (unless they do work in conference play, which I doubt).

The schedule was built to play good teams out of conference, but that kinda fell through and we have a huge home loss to Stanford. We'd have lose less than 3 or 4 games to get a top 3 seed.

 

[tzznandrew]

Our Florida win was great, but it isn't a marquee win. They were playing without 2 of their best players and their best player on the floor got injured in the second half. And we barely won. Voters realize this, so does the public. And our wins against BC, Maryland, Indiana are meaningless right now (unless they do work in conference play, which I doubt).

The schedule was built to play good teams out of conference, but that kinda fell through and we have a huge home loss to Stanford. We'd have lose less than 3 or 4 games to get a top 3 seed.

Oy. They were playing without one freshman. The other guy won't play. And Wilbekins got injured late (3 minutes remaining) and they scored every time after, so it really didn't affect anything. This whole point is assinine. The same Florida team we beat (exactly the same Florida team, only with 3 extra minutes of Wilbekins) then beat Kansas and Memphis. So, yeah, it's absolutely a marquee win and to pretend otherwise is to change the facts to suit your argument.

Your point about how the schedule was built is largely right, though. Indiana, Maryland, and Washington are usually better, and it was supposed to be a borderline NCAA year from BC. It's early, so we'll see if they turn it around, but they could have been better. And the Stanford loss was bad.

 

[aceboon]

the continued devaluation of the Florida win by the usual troll posters on this board is hilarious. by the end of the season when it comes to tourney time they're going to be claiming that UF was nearly forced to forfeit because they didn't have enough players to put on the court.

 

[Jerry1714]

Jerry I'm wondering if you ever watch basketball or just scour the internet looking at meaningless rankings. In one breath you say essentially "rankings are meaningless" and then you defend your position by using Kenpom rankings which at this point in the season are also meaningless. Tennessee, St. Louis and BYU are garbage teams. Do you think Loiusville is the best team in the country right now? According to Kenpom they are. OK State also LOST to the same Memphis team they blew the doors off, but that doesn't factor in, right? And now our Florida win doesn't count because they got an injured player back? Don't throw out bogus SOS #'s because you have a MUCH higher probability of losing a game playing a combination of a good team and a bad team (i.e. Florida and Maine) than you do playing 2 teams that can't even sniff the top 50 (BYU and Tennessee), but SOS will tell you a different story. There's not a single team in the country that hasn't looked bad in multiple games.

When you have teams like KU jumping over you when they haven't even played a game all week, you know the public perception for UConn is low. If these media guys can't take their jobs seriously when it comes to the rankings, they shouldn't be allowed to vote. In general the rule is you win, you move up or stay the same, you lose, you move back. This is now 2 out of the last 3 weeks where we have "won and moved back" so that some 3 loss teams could jump over us. Not a coincidence. You should turn a game on other than UConn every now and then and actually watch some other teams this year. This is one of the weakest years I can recall in the past 10 years. There is not a single team out there that looks consistently better than anyone else. At this point there are probably 20 or so teams that could win the tournament come March....it's not often that you see that happen.

The first paragraph proves you probably got an F in reading comprehension and you know nothing about the sport. BYU isn't great, but they handled Stanford. To say St. Louis is garbage is just plain stupid, my guess is you also didn't see Tenny blow out a solid UVA team last night. Just a little help for you because you clearly need it, 2 real ratings, not the worthless AP poll, the Kenpom, and Sargain, here is Tenn (25, 42), St. Louis (21, 29). Anyone who knows anything uses these ratings in evaluating teams, not the AP Poll, that is for dummies.

You know there was a AP voter who simply resubmitted his same vote from the week before this week? This is the poll you get your panties in a bunch over? One that NO ONE takes seriously.

OK state lost on a neutral to Memphis, you know that right? We lost at home to Stanford, which loss is worse?? I worry about you Ollie.

I am not saying our over Florida doesn't count, I said I can't say we are definitely a better team them then. We won at home on a last second shot. It is still a great marquee win, the only one we have though.

I guess you didn't watch basketball in 2011 if you think this is weakest year in 10 years.

Those "bogus" SOS numbers are much more important for seeding than the AP poll, so if you want to rant and rave about something meaningless, do it about that, because it actually matters

 

[Onions]

Our Florida win was great, but it isn't a marquee win. They were playing without 2 of their best players and their best player on the floor got injured in the second half.

Against UConn Wilbekin played 35 minutes and didn't get hurt till the last 3 minutes of the game. When Casey Hill came back for Florida's big wins against Kansas and Memphis he scored a total of 11 points in both games combined. Meanwhile Wilbekin averaged 35.5 minutes a game in those two wins. Anyone who dismisses UConn's win over Florida in any way is not paying attention.

 

[Hi-Low]

Our Florida win was great, but it isn't a marquee win. They were playing without 2 of their best players and their best player on the floor got injured in the second half. And we barely won. Voters realize this, so does the public. And our wins against BC, Maryland, Indiana are meaningless right now (unless they do work in conference play, which I doubt).

The schedule was built to play good teams out of conference, but that kinda fell through and we have a huge home loss to Stanford. We'd have lose less than 3 or 4 games to get a top 3 seed.

Aaaahhhh....Florida not a marquee win?? Wilbekin missing the last 3 mins of the game was akin to fouling out...happens in almost EVERY game. Florida scored on every possession after Wilbekin "fouled out"...Young was killing us. You can't say they were "missing" 2 of their best players...Florida's best players were in the game...remember Dickie V saying how Ater Majok was the 2nd coming before he ever stepped on the court? Florida is a title contender and it WAS a marquee win.

Indiana was also a "resume" win on a neutral floor, beating Washington on the road was a good win, BU could be a tourney team...win doesn't hurt, BC & MD wins don't seem great but one of them could surprise once ACC starts. Stanford loss not a killer, they could end up making the Tourney.

The Harvard game is Big as are the 2 L'ville, Memphis, Cincy, SMU games...at least 9 "Quality" games left....hopefully we get 6+ wins out of the bunch and take care of business with the rest of the schedule. If we deserve a top 3 seed we'll get it, if not we'll get what we deserve....don't care really as long as we are in.

 

[caw]

It would help if you knew what you were talking about, but I will still respond.

Wanna bash Witchita's schedule? Their SOS is 81, ours is 85. They beat Tennessee, St. Louis, and BYU. All three of those teams are rated higher by kempom than BC, IU, or Maryland.

Ok state blew the doors off of Memphis and won AT Colorado, but we have a better resume? Yea okay.

Why is that no one has us ranked in the top 10? Not on any site. Is it because everyone "hates" us and is out to get us? No it is because its reality right now. Wake up. You want 10 better teams? Zona, Cuse, Mich St., Ok State, Witchita, Ohio St., Wisky, Baylor, Oregon and Florida (yes we beat them, but by 1 at home, with their best player in the locker room, can you say with 100% certainty that we beat them on a neutral court?)

And your point about this weeks poll having effect on the one in March, what has an effect is winning games, that is all. Murray State was in the top 10 2 years ago in the last poll and was given a 6 seed, the poll means nothing. Do I think were the 17th best team? No, probably 12-14, but does it matter how were ranked now and do I worry about, not at all. All I care about is where we are ranked in April.

Wichita State is proving that SOS can be gamed. They are playing a bunch of decent to mediocre teams but nobody dreadful and nobody great. That is how they keep a high SOS. They have no marque wins. Could they be great, yes, but they haven't played a single team as good as Florida (even as constituted against UConn).

OKSt does have a better resume than UConn.

Can you say with 100% certainty that any of the top ten you mentioned would beat UConn on a neutral court? That is a very poor argument to make.

I personally don't think UConn should be in the top ten right now but there are a few teams in the top 16 that should not be ahead of UConn. UK, UL, KU really shouldn't be. Wichita State is arguable until they play another top 25 team. Florida shouldn't be yet, though if their super freshman is as good as many say, I can understand the jump. Of course he may be more Ajou Ajou than Luol, if you get my meaning.

Not to you but, Florida is a top 15 team without their freshmen, top 12 with their freshman PG and maybe a top 10 or higher with Walker. It's a marquee win regardless. Any top 15 win is. It may not be as impressive as it would have been if Florida had its freshmen, but that's not the same as not being a marquee win.

 

[freescooter]

Where's the Dislike button again?

To be fair, Champs, it was an 11 point lead at the 3;30 mark. EWU was still in the game at that point. We didn't push the lead up to 20 or so till the last 3 minutes of the game and ended up winning by 16. EWU is 5-6 now and was slaughtered by UC Irvine (by 23) and Seton Hall (22). Honestly, a 16 point victory was disappointing to me.

And I'm not sure I buy the "UCONN is the biggest game they play all year" any more than I buy the "Team A just wanted to win more than Team B". Their kids had spent a week on the east coast after getting demolished at Seton Hall. It's not like the game was in Washington in front of their fans in a sold out facility... Just my $.02...

I see nothing wrong with our ranking nor with dropping us. We've had 1 wire to wire smackdown (Detroit) and gutted out a win against a good Florida team. Literally every other game has been far closer than it should have and none were overly impressive in the eyes of the national voters...

This team has a very disturbing tendency to play to the level of its competition. Against Stanford it came back and bit us on the . Either that or UConn is just not that good. I think we're a legitimate Top 20, who could probably beat most top 10 teams on a given night but could also lose to most Top 25 teams on a given night.

 

[intlzncster]

Where's the Dislike button again?

Come on man, that was a highly original thought.