This is my attempt at helping us to move forward and away from last night's...events. I know that the venting will continue (and should as it needs to) but I for one don't want to keeping logging in and becoming angry by what I read. Right then:
As the banner on the top of the screen indicates, Valparaiso University Men's Basketball is now setting their sights on the NIT post season tournament. In my 5 short years of fandom, this is the highest level of postseason play that a Valpo team has been in, which is exciting! Hopefully, this year's team will get up for the tournament and not write it off as a "PB&J tournament" as one former player from last year dubbed the CIT. So, what kind of seed will VU attain? Who are some potential opponents? Can we win a game or two? What about the whole thing?
Not updated quite yet, but... http://nitology.com/ (http://nitology.com/)
Personally, a 7vs2 at NC State would be cool for me and my Triangle friends!
I think the NIT needs to take a lesson from the NCAA tournament, and especially the play-in games. The NIT should schedule several stadiums around the country for double-headers on Tuesday and Wednesday. The fans in the area would know about the game ahead of time and buy tickets at the right price. Some of the last second home games in the NIT have very sparse crowds. Doesn't the play-in game in Dayton usually sell out? Also, if they have double-headers, they could know ahead of time where to send the broadcast crew, and set up things for potential teams with local hotels, etc.
Yes, let us get behind these guys who have worked so hard for all of Valpo this season. They deserve our support
and best wishes to win a couple (at least)!! Go Valpo!! :thumbsup:
I think we end up against Northwestern or Iowa from the Big10
Northwestern would be a great matchup.
Quote from: sectionee on March 07, 2012, 09:17:47 PMI think we end up against Northwestern or Iowa from the Big10
I'd be up for a trip to either one, actually. Iowa isn't that far off...what about 6 hour drive?
Reposting here as it probably belonged better in an NIT discussion.
As to the NIT, this team needs to learn how to beat a Big 6 conference team to really be prepared for next year. The good thing about the NIT is we will likely have a good match up in that 1st round. Northwestern sits out there, a mediocre ACC (NC State, Va Tech (a Boggs reunion)), Big 12/Pac 10 or Big Least team as well. I believe it was Wichita State who had a tremendous NIT run last year and that set them up for this year. We have been on a 5 year building program, I still think we are one year ahead of that plan. An NCAA bid this year would have had us completing that 5-yr plan. Yet, we have an HL championship, an auto NIT, POY, COY, 1st teamer KVH, and integrated 3 new players. That means we are set up for their senior years very well. We learned about winning the conference, we learned about playing at hostile environs, we competed against Arizona and a half w OSU. But for this team to make the leap for the whole program, it needs a couple big name team wins, and the NIT is the place to go hunting.
Maybe we can get retribution against NC State for canceling the return game against us, or against Iowa for us not being able to capitalize at the end in 2002-2003 :)
Quote from: valpo84 on March 07, 2012, 10:31:05 PM
Reposting here as it probably belonged better in an NIT discussion.
As to the NIT, this team needs to learn how to beat a Big 6 conference team to really be prepared for next year. The good thing about the NIT is we will likely have a good match up in that 1st round. Northwestern sits out there, a mediocre ACC (NC State, Va Tech (a Boggs reunion)), Big 12/Pac 10 or Big Least team as well. I believe it was Wichita State who had a tremendous NIT run last year and that set them up for this year. We have been on a 5 year building program, I still think we are one year ahead of that plan. An NCAA bid this year would have had us completing that 5-yr plan. Yet, we have an HL championship, an auto NIT, POY, COY, 1st teamer KVH, and integrated 3 new players. That means we are set up for their senior years very well. We learned about winning the conference, we learned about playing at hostile environs, we competed against Arizona and a half w OSU. But for this team to make the leap for the whole program, it needs a couple big name team wins, and the NIT is the place to go hunting.
I agree. If we were in the NCAA's, my feeling would glad to be there but not expecting a win. That's just the reality when you are put up against Baylor, or Michigan State, etc. But in the NIT I really think we need to win games. They are much more winnable, and otherwise we would never have an opportunity to play against a middle of the pack power 6 team. They just don't want to play teams like us if they don't have to.
Ole Miss would be interesting.
Haha. Drawing Ole Miss would be quite interesting. I wonder how much the commentators would be talking about the shot.
How about a trip to Illinois for Coach Powell?
Quote from: valpopal on March 08, 2012, 10:15:15 AM
How about a trip to Illinois for Coach Powell?
Illinois? I think it will be too busy making a coaching change.
Quote from: dylanrocks on March 08, 2012, 10:26:47 AM
Quote from: valpopal on March 08, 2012, 10:15:15 AM
How about a trip to Illinois for Coach Powell?
Illinois? I think it will be too busy making a coaching change.
If Weber is fired after today's game against Iowa, and Illinois was to make a postseason tourney, I could see them naming Wayne McClain as interim coach for the postseason.
my vote's for a game at nd state. and yes, i'm fully aware that it's completely illogical. but hey, an isolated guy can dream, right? :)
OK, With Illinois and Northwestern as the obvious choices (now that the cats lost in OT against Da Gophers)... Let me add another neat option... Bucknell. They Won the Patriot League Regular Season, Lost the Championship game on their home court to a kinda rival (Lehigh), got out-played in the championship game by a guy named "McCullom" (how's that for weird)... they are an academic peer of Valpo. OH, and the obvious reason is that my sister is a Bison Graduate and the smack talk would carry on for YEARS!! I'm liking that as a 4-5 matchup.
Truthfully? I'm hoping it's Northwestern... we could get a nice showing up there on a Tuesday night.
What I really DON'T like is the prospect of going to the Maybe Center in Tulsa; the eagles are pretty good, lost in the semis to the Leathernecks... I saw one matchup with them as a 3 and us getting a 6.
Another one I would not enjoy is taking on the loser of the Kent State / Ohio match-up... on their court.
Valparaiso at Northwestern.
That's where regular-season champion Milwaukee was sent last year.
Unless they're playing a BCS team I'm not to excited. I think this gives Valpo the opportunity to prepare for next year. Since everybody is back you don't have to play for the seniors and can experiment with some different things.
My travel schedule was set up for the NCAA, not the NIT. I may be watching this one on the road too. Maybe they'll wind up somewhere out here in NY or NJ? I just might manage to get there on a Tuesday evening.
I've not looked at past NIT's. Is the seeding more about geography than about performance?
If this was seeded like the NCAA, I'd be wondering if we could get off the eight line.
Savannah State should be comfortably below us. With Bucknell and UT Arlington sort of keeping us company.
The Big West isn't going to help us. Probably the SWAC is our last hope? Looks like we'll probably merit an 8 seed, unless they're more RPI-immune than the NCAA.
I doubt that we get setup with another mid-major team. It usually works out that the power conferences end up with the higher seeds, and the mid-majors are 4 and above.
I notice that Milwaukee last year, with an RPI exactly like ours (94) managed a 5 seed. Above exactly one at-large: Harvard (RPI 40).
So there's at least some precedent for "better than an at-large" seed, even if it's not merited by strict RPI considerations. Of course, this year, with fewer small conference upsets, we might need that "help" to get a 6 or even a 7 seed.
And, the related question: if Cleveland State gets into the NIT, will they get a higher seed than we?
Bucknell would be outstanding. That is quite a program. Beautiful campus and great facility. Smart kids, very similar school to VU.
As mentioned earlier, Northwestern would be great.
lowposter
nitology.com updated.
http://nitology.com/ (http://nitology.com/)
He agrees that we're an 8 seed. In his latest updated Cleveland State gets pushed down to the double (maybe not good enough for NIT), and even Butler's listed there. But, it seems that the NIT rarely does midmajors any favors when considering including a mid vs. a major.
His #1 seeds are Miami, Tennessee, Arizona, and... Iona. Presumably they wouldn't send us to Arizona _again_.
Now, Iona. Not the major we'd like to beat. But, if we play them Tuesday night, I'm totally at the game. Less than 90 minutes from here.
Quote from: agibson on March 10, 2012, 08:13:26 AMnitology.com updated.
Looking at that group, an 8 seed seems appropriate. The bracket they have has us going to Tennessee.
Vermont up 13 over top-seeded Stony Brook in America East title game with 13 to go - that would be big for us, as we're about 40 spots above Stony Brook in RPI. Also want upsets in MEAC/SWAC title games today.
Quote from: vusupporter on March 10, 2012, 11:19:07 AM
Vermont up 13 over top-seeded Stony Brook in America East title game with 13 to go - that would be big for us, as we're about 40 spots above Stony Brook in RPI. Also want upsets in MEAC/SWAC title games today.
MEAC doesn't matter as Savannah State won the regular season and is already out....they will be the bottom of the NIT. We definitely do want Mississippi Valley StaTe to lose in the SWAC.....Stony Brook is making a charge!
Quote from: agibson on March 10, 2012, 08:13:26 AM
nitology.com updated.
http://nitology.com/ (http://nitology.com/)
He agrees that we're an 8 seed. In his latest updated Cleveland State gets pushed down to the double (maybe not good enough for NIT), and even Butler's listed there. But, it seems that the NIT rarely does midmajors any favors when considering including a mid vs. a major.
His #1 seeds are Miami, Tennessee, Arizona, and... Iona. Presumably they wouldn't send us to Arizona _again_.
Now, Iona. Not the major we'd like to beat. But, if we play them Tuesday night, I'm totally at the game. Less than 90 minutes from here.
let's not forget that we just played iona in the post-season last year, and it wasn't pretty at all.
Tennessee? Didn't we beat a Cuonzo Martin team last year? Also remember that the NIT is looking for TV matchups so a Valpo-NW game is better for TV in Chicago. Seedings can be more easily manipulated here. Looking at UConn, who shouldn't be in NCAA, NIT could have some fun and have a rematch of last year's title game -- UConn/Butler. We owe Iona and hopefully, we would take the game a little more seriously this year.
They do explicitly say in their rules that seeds can be adjusted up or down a spot to satisfy other requirements. The main one seems to be regional play: to keep teams reasonably close to home (and, if they get interesting local match-ups, I suppose those don't hurt).
Interesting that the second team from a conference is placed in a _different_ region than the first.
http://i.turner.ncaa.com/dr/ncaa/ncaa/release/sites/default/files/files/NIT_Principles_Procedures.pdf (http://i.turner.ncaa.com/dr/ncaa/ncaa/release/sites/default/files/files/NIT_Principles_Procedures.pdf)
NIT Selection Show is tonight at 8CT on ESPNU.
nitology currently has us as an 8, at #1 Arizona.
I liked it better when it had us as an 8 versus 1 Drexel. Hopefully the NIT is like the NCAA and tries to avoid rematches in the first round...
Their rules tell them to avoid them "when possible".
The nitology guy obviously doesn't think much of the NCAA's announced "first four out" of Oral Roberts, Nevada, Drexel, and Miami. He's got only Miami as a #1 seed.
In any case, it seems that there's a fair chance of a match against a team we've played in the not so distant past. Washington, Arizona, Ole Miss, Northwestern, ORU.
Too bad Iona got the NCAA at-large!
I don't know about Drexel... But I could probably make it down to Seton Hall.
7 seed, playing at miami. wednesday, 730 eastern. game will be on espn u.
cleveland state gets a 6, goes to stanford tuesday night at 11pm edt. another case of puzzling seedings...
Larannaga is a turncoat in the MidMajority community. Let's do this!
How does Cleveland State get a higher seed than us? I guess this really shows the importance of the non-conference schedule. Hopefully we avoid IPFW and IUPUI like the plague from now on.
I'm not surprised by the seeding. It seemed entirely possible that either Cleveland State or Butler would be seeded higher than us, based on non-conference play. The NIT apparently agreed for the case of Cleveland state, at least.
The CIT field seems to be set.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_CollegeInsider.com_Tournament (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_CollegeInsider.com_Tournament)
With no Horizon League reps. (I've not seen an official announcement - it wouldn't be _too_ surprising if wikipedia's wrong here, but most of the match-ups are as reported by one or another press outlet.)
Butler to the CBI? The CBI tweets their bracket will be out soon.
https://twitter.com/# (https://twitter.com/#)!/CBIbyZebraPen
I think Cleveland State received a higher seed because they had that "upset" of Vanderbilt, who won the SEC tourney over #1 Kentucky. That probably played right into CSU's seeding hands.
@ConnorPelton128 is somehow tweeting some CBI info. Evansville, Washington State, San Francisco, Wyoming.... Milwaukee.
Playing at TCU, apparently. Tuesday.
Butler and Milwaukee to the CBI
Butler to host Delaware on Wednesday. 8 PM Eastern on HDNet.
At five, this is the most Horizon League teams ever in the post-season.
So someone explain how CSU gets into the NIT as a 6, one seed better than Valpo.
Quote from: milldew72 on March 12, 2012, 08:57:30 AM
So someone explain how CSU gets into the NIT as a 6, one seed better than Valpo.
Their big win was over Vanderbilt who beat Kentucky in the SEC final. That win looks really big now that Kentucky was named the overall #1 seed in the NCAA tourney.
If you look at the match-ups in the NIT this year they didn't do much at all of trying to match-up teams regionally (Valpo at Northwestern) which seems to be a break from the norm for the NIT.
http://assets.sbnation.com/assets/1000590/NIT_Tournament_Bracket.png (http://assets.sbnation.com/assets/1000590/NIT_Tournament_Bracket.png)
You'd think they'd take head-to-head play pretty seriously. Which makes it tough to rank CSU higher.
But, CSU does have a somewhat better RPI. They have fewer bad losses. They share one of our top-100 wins (Akron). Their other two look pretty good today: Vanderbilt who won the SEC tournament, and St. Bonaventure who won the A10 tournament. They have fewer bad losses, but didn't do as well against the RPI 51-100 (losing to South Florida, Drexel, and us twice).
So, I suppose, avoiding bad losses and getting one blue chip win were more important than head-to-head victories and beating peer teams.
If we'd avoided IPFW, IUPUI, and Wright State losses, would it have been us?
Quote from: agibson on March 12, 2012, 09:33:44 AM
You'd think they'd take head-to-head play pretty seriously. Which makes it tough to rank CSU higher.
But, CSU does have a somewhat better RPI. They have fewer bad losses. They share one of our top-100 wins (Akron). Their other two look pretty good today: Vanderbilt who won the SEC tournament, and St. Bonaventure who won the A10 tournament. They have fewer bad losses, but didn't do as well against the RPI 51-100 (losing to South Florida, Drexel, and us twice).
So, I suppose, avoiding bad losses and getting one blue chip win were more important than head-to-head victories and beating peer teams.
If we'd avoided IPFW, IUPUI, and Wright State losses, would it have been us?
If we'd avoided IPFW, IUPUI and Wright State, maybe we would've gotten an at-large to the NCAA's.
Quote from: vuweathernerd on March 11, 2012, 08:14:26 PM
cleveland state gets a 6, goes to stanford tuesday night at 11pm edt. another case of puzzling seedings...
The NIT seedings look like they were done by Dick Vitale...Big Conferences prevail. I know that RPI is only a portion but Marshall was the highest team not selected by the NCAA and they are seeded a 5. ORU was listed by the committee as a final 5 not in and are seeded a 4. All four A10 teams were overseeded. Pretty sad job by the committee. Having said that, other than perhaps being ahead of Cleveland State, we are where we should be.
The NIT, being owned by the NCAA, always looks at the majors as better seeds for the attendance/money purposes. You look at the #1 seeds (Washington, Tennessee, Seton Hall, and Arizona) are all from Big 6 conferences. The NIT, since the evolution of the NCAA Tourney as the National Championship tournament, has been more of a money grab, and used to be a recruiting tool. Now it seems that the NIT is a "slap in the face" compared to when it was the tournament that decided the National Champion.
Quote from: agibson on March 12, 2012, 09:33:44 AMYou'd think they'd take head-to-head play pretty seriously. Which makes it tough to rank CSU higher. But, CSU does have a somewhat better RPI. They have fewer bad losses. They share one of our top-100 wins (Akron). Their other two look pretty good today: Vanderbilt who won the SEC tournament, and St. Bonaventure who won the A10 tournament. They have fewer bad losses, but didn't do as well against the RPI 51-100 (losing to South Florida, Drexel, and us twice). So, I suppose, avoiding bad losses and getting one blue chip win were more important than head-to-head victories and beating peer teams. If we'd avoided IPFW, IUPUI, and Wright State losses, would it have been us?
I don't know man...Unless VU controls its own destiny, we won't get any favors. VU is small and brings in very little fans to whatever NCAA or NIT venue. Its all about money, folks and don't let anything else fool you.
CSU lost to flippin Hofstra and we beat em soundly twice. The SID for CSU says their 2 wins over Detroit helped....ummmm Hello?
Quote from: MattCarter on March 12, 2012, 10:52:18 AMCSU lost to flippin Hofstra and we beat em soundly twice. The SID for CSU says their 2 wins over Detroit helped....ummmm Hello?
Matt, the NIT committee looked at how CSU did against teams in the NCAA tournament. Beating Vanderbilt on the road, seeing Vandy make the NCAA tournament, and beat the overall #1 seed in Kentucky to win the SEC tournament makes a loss to Hofstra null and void. Detroit making the NCAA tournament by beating us helped CSU's seeding as well. Finally, the NIT had to send someone to Stanford, so why not make it a team like CSU, who might have to overspend their budget to make the trip?
Quote from: valporun on March 12, 2012, 11:01:50 AMQuote from: MattCarter on March 12, 2012, 10:52:18 AMCSU lost to flippin Hofstra and we beat em soundly twice. The SID for CSU says their 2 wins over Detroit helped....ummmm Hello?
Matt, the NIT committee looked at how CSU did against teams in the NCAA tournament. Beating Vanderbilt on the road, seeing Vandy make the NCAA tournament, and beat the overall #1 seed in Kentucky to win the SEC tournament makes a loss to Hofstra null and void. Detroit making the NCAA tournament by beating us helped CSU's seeding as well. Finally, the NIT had to send someone to Stanford, so why not make it a team like CSU, who might have to overspend their budget to make the trip?
That makes no sense pally. I know the NIT doesn't consider common sense either... NIT pays travel, so budget has nothing to do with it. CSU has a bigger home venue...if they beat Stanford they can host a bigger 2nd round game if the NIT needs it. I know its all about cash. Im not a moron. I just wish they would come out and say that. "We are sending the schools with a decent enough record that have a large amount of Alumni and students that will attend/watch"
Our post season record this year and past seasons vs CSU's post season record might have something to do with our seed. We can do something about that right now. ;)