Under The Radar: UCF Beats USF

[JavaMan]

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Temple now stands alone in 2nd place.

I think we're gonna see a changing landscape in the AAC. UCF is going to be getting a lot better, I watched their new coach, Coach Abe, when she was up in Albany. Said it before and I'll say it again, she's a player. And...she has Nykesha Sales as an assistant.

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[Hongster]

Wow! Good for UCF!

 

[CMC'72]

Ditto. WOW!

 

[Fairfield Fan]

Is it my imagination? Or is the AAC getting better and better? Is there an objective metric that ranks conferences? South Florida is a tough team. For Central Florida to defeat them is an accomplishment.

 

[veryolddog]

Everywhere UConn goes, everyone gets better. Every coach in the AAC brags about playing UConn on their schedule, so they have a better chance at getting a better recruit.

 

[Ellie]

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Temple now stands alone in 2nd place.

I think we're gonna see a changing landscape in the AAC. UCF is going to be getting a lot better, I watched their new coach, Coach Abe, when she was up in Albany. Said it before and I'll say it again, she's a player. And..she has Nykesha Sales as an assistant.

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Agree with you JavaMan. She did a remarkable job at Albany especially with a Torrington girl, Sarah Royals. Her recruits seem to always get better like another coach we all know!

 

[UcMiami]

Agree that the AAC is getting better quite quickly, but one note of caution regarding USF, they are not last years team. They are still good, but they are not as good. It is a great win for UCF, just not quite as significant as it would have been in the past few years.

 

[JoePgh]

I think South Florida is now questionable to make the NCAA tournament, unfortunately. Creme's latest bracketology had USF as a 7 seed, Temple as an 8, and Tulane among the "first four out". A bad loss like this (their second one in the AAC) may put USF out on the bubble with Tulane.

 

[JavaMan]

Agree that the AAC is getting better quite quickly, but one note of caution regarding USF, they are not last years team. They are still good, but they are not as good. It is a great win for UCF, just not quite as significant as it would have been in the past few years.

I think South Florida is now questionable to make the NCAA tournament, unfortunately. Creme's latest bracketology had USF as a 7 seed, Temple as an 8, and Tulane among the "first four out". A bad loss like this (their second one in the AAC) may put USF out on the bubble with Tulane.

Gee, they've always given us a tough time.

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[oldude]

Absent UConn, the AAC is a very competitive conference top to bottom.

 

[UcMiami]

Agree that the AAC is getting better quite quickly, but one note of caution regarding USF, they are not last years team. They are still good, but they are not as good. It is a great win for UCF, just not quite as significant as it would have been in the past few years.

USF is I think solidly in unless they completely collapse - there are not a lot of teams behind them that are making great cases for themselves to move in front of them, and the at large bid number is pretty large - 32. And of the ranked teams there are going to be the P5 auto bids, plus the AAC and BE and usually one or two mid-majors champions - so around 8-9 out of the 25. That means about 16 unranked teams get at large bids, taking you to around the 40th ranked team and in those 26-40 teams you probably have a few more mid=major championship auto-bids so you may get out to around 45. I think USF should easily land in that universe.

Gee, they've always given us a tough time.

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Yeah ... except when they don't ... 65 MOV anyone?!

 

[Plebe]

I think South Florida is now questionable to make the NCAA tournament, unfortunately. Creme's latest bracketology had USF as a 7 seed, Temple as an 8, and Tulane among the "first four out". A bad loss like this (their second one in the AAC) may put USF out on the bubble with Tulane.

If it were true that USF was a top-28 team prior to the UCF game (as suggested by Creme's projection of a 7-seed), then one loss wouldn't drop them out of the field. However, given the committee's clear emphasis on quality wins and strength of schedule, I'm not as optimistic as Charlie about where USF stood. They now have 3 top-50 wins, and two of them are over a bubble team in Tulane. They also have 3 losses to teams outside the top 100. Their upcoming home game vs. Temple will be big for them.

 

[huskeynut]

Good for UCF.

We were at the UCF/ UConn gme on New Year's Day. UCF was scrappy then and it seems they still are.

 

[oldude]

USF is the epitome of a disciplined European basketball team. They pass, cut, shoot and do a very nice job executing their offense, but they lost Courtney Williams along with some other players who could play physical defense, take defenders off the dribble and challenge good teams.

This year when USF faces a team that will challenge them physically like UConn, or even Temple, they have great difficulty matching up.

 

[tomcat]

Wow from me, too. I was at the UConn-UCF game and liked everything about their coach. Never thought the team would progress to this, so quickly.

 

[JavaMan]

Yeah .. except when they don't .. 65 MOV anyone?!

Yes, that was my point. I was beginning to think that no one would catch that. From out toughest conference MOV to our easiest in one year. Fascinating.

 

[magic]

Good coach. I believe this is an up and coming program.

 

[Carnac]

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[LINK]
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Temple now stands alone in 2nd place.

I think we're gonna see a changing landscape in the AAC. UCF is going to be getting a lot better, I watched their new coach, Coach Abe, when she was up in Albany. Said it before and I'll say it again, she's a player. And..she has Nykesha Sales as an assistant.

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This is just the type of competition we need in the AAC. UCF is on the come. They are currently at 16-9. Five of their losses have been by 6 points or less. They win those 5 games, they're 21-4, and looking for an "at-large" bid in the tournament.

I just checked, Temple is now ranked #25 in the USA Today Colleges polls. Maybe if a few more programs can pull it together, the AAC can have 3-4 teams in the top 25 next year. To have 4 teams in the top 25 would give the conference a little bit more respectability.