Expectations Poll

[milanmiracle]

These type of posts--from 78crusader (and similar ones by people like crusadermoe), puzzle me. Yes we played very tight last night, but we WON. As for not having any other good teams in the Horizon, really?  Green Bay--who had beaten a team like Marquette earlier in the year and played Wisconsin very well, losing by 11 on the road, is just one example of a good team in the Horizon.

We have lost a total of three games when having all of our rotation 8 available.  In all losses, we have not been beaten by anyone by more that 13 points.  We will play a New Mexico/St. Louis level team. Five of our seven losses have been on the road.  This will be a neutral site.  We certainly can win this next game and it certainly won't be a beatdown.

I know you're a glass half full kind of guy, and this is certainly the time of year for that feeling...however, Green Bay is a "good team"? Based on what? Beating Marquette? How about losing to 11-19 Nevada? Or 11-17 Idaho? Getting pummeled by 14-17 Drake (56-71)? Going 5-8 out of conference? Having an RPI of 161. I just can't get "good team" out of 17-15. That's their record. Sorry, just can't do it.

This isn't to slam Green Bay, but I think because they are a conference opponent we tend to look at them as being a better team than they really are.

[ValpoHoops]

(Sending from phone so no quote)

There's not a right or wrong, not at all. I understand and respect everything Paul said. That's his opinion and what I said was mine. Nothing more. Paul had been a great contributor here and I just Estes to offer a differing opinion.

[VULB#62]

Get past the past guys.  This discussion should now transition to be about the next 10 days and whether your expectations will continue to be met or if the run stops in game one of the NCAA.  Who cares if UWGB beat who or lost to them.  So what if Detroit was good or not.  Great that WSU put up a super challenge and we responded with a win. That's all beyond us and has been rendered moot by our win last night.  We got where we got.  Was it always pretty and dominant?  No.  Did we get there?  Yes.  To this point, EXPECTATIONS MET.  Period.  Moving forward, what are your expectations for game one?

[milanmiracle]

Get past the past guys.  This discussion should now transition to be about the next 10 days and whether your expectations will continue to be met or if the run stops in game one of the NCAA.  Who cares if UWGB beat who or lost to them.  So what if Detroit was good or not.  Great that WSU put up a super challenge and we responded with a win. That's all beyond us and has been rendered moot by our win last night.  We got where we got.  Was it always pretty and dominant?  No.  Did we get there?  Yes.  To this point, EXPECTATIONS MET.  Period.  Moving forward, what are your expectations for game one?

What do I hope? I hope for a first round win! What do I expect? One and done, I'll name by how much based on an actual opponent.

All that said, it was a nice season and something for the program to build off of.

[wh]

Get past the past guys.  This discussion should now transition to be about the next 10 days and whether your expectations will continue to be met or if the run stops in game one of the NCAA.  Who cares if UWGB beat who or lost to them.  So what if Detroit was good or not.  Great that WSU put up a super challenge and we responded with a win. That's all beyond us and has been rendered moot by our win last night.  We got where we got.  Was it always pretty and dominant?  No.  Did we get there?  Yes.  To this point, EXPECTATIONS MET.  Period.  Moving forward, what are your expectations for game one?

I agree and would add only one thing - take a moment to celebrate what just happened.  It seems like all I've seen since last night's victory are posts about how terrible so and so played, how such a veteran team could play so poorly, and criticism of posters who dare express some happiness or optimism.  From there we go directly into why we're not positioned to win a game in the Tournament.  This is the same type of discussion we have after any old game - how did we do and what's next.  Shouldn't we mix a a little fun and positivity in here somewhere?

[LaPorteAveApostle]

This is a expectaion poll so if that's what his expectations are then so be it...he didn't say it happened he says he expects it to

what he actually said: 

"That is the level I thought this team would get back to."

Grammatically speaking, that's a past subjunctive contrary-to-fact condition, implying that not only hasn't this team gotten to that level, it won't.

But to use a past construction, when the event in question is most assuredly future? It's simply too early to say (in an equivalent statement) that 'this team isn't good enough to lose a first round game by 7', as the 1997s did.

WH is right--you'd think we made the Dance every year the way people are whining about a team that is one of the ten best this school has ever fielded, by any measure, and more likely top 5.  Simply winning our next game would make it top 2.

The same people writing them off already had probably written them off with 7 minutes to play last night.  (If I were 'Saders, I'd suggest profile pics for some of these people.  eeyore.jpg...)  I realize that some people are pessimistic by nature.  In that sense, what they are saying now says more about them than the 2013 Crusaders.  Even so:

If you can't get behind a team ranked in the top sixth of the country...
that has (at least for now) the best RPI we've ever had...
that has the school record for wins...
that just won a conference in the top third of the nation's toughest...
that's going to the tournament like no other team has since Obama was a STATE senator...
(and Bryce was playing in Italy fergodsakes)...
and then our conference included luminaries like Centenary and Chicago St (one is a D3 school now, the other effectively is)...

...what would it take?

If you say, like Paul rightly does, that perhaps such things as have been accomplished should annually be expected, then surely you have to acknowledge that we have to start DOING them annually to be able to raise the level of the program further, and so to complain about actually accomplishing them, or the manner in which they were achieved, is unfair.

And so here we are.  To paraphrase an elsewhere-quoted Solon of Athens, "assess no team before it dies."

[vu72]

This is a expectaion poll so if that's what his expectations are then so be it...he didn't say it happened he says he expects it to

what he actually said: 

"That is the level I thought this team would get back to."

Grammatically speaking, that's a past subjunctive contrary-to-fact condition, implying that not only hasn't this team gotten to that level, it won't.

But to use a past construction, when the event in question is most assuredly future? It's simply too early to say (in an equivalent statement) that 'this team isn't good enough to lose a first round game by 7', as the 1997s did.

WH is right--you'd think we made the Dance every year the way people are whining about a team that is one of the ten best this school has ever fielded, by any measure, and more likely top 5.  Simply winning our next game would make it top 2.

The same people writing them off already had probably written them off with 7 minutes to play last night.  (If I were 'Saders, I'd suggest profile pics for some of these people.  eeyore.jpg...)  I realize that some people are pessimistic by nature.  In that sense, what they are saying now says more about them than the 2013 Crusaders.  Even so:

If you can't get behind a team ranked in the top sixth of the country...
that has (at least for now) the best RPI we've ever had...
that has the school record for wins...
that just won a conference in the top third of the nation's toughest...
that's going to the tournament like no other team has since Obama was a STATE senator...
(and Bryce was playing in Italy fergodsakes)...
and then our conference included luminaries like Centenary and Chicago St (one is a D3 school now, the other effectively is)...

...what would it take?

If you say, like Paul rightly does, that perhaps such things as have been accomplished should annually be expected, then surely you have to acknowledge that we have to start DOING them annually to be able to raise the level of the program further, and so to complain about actually accomplishing them, or the manner in which they were achieved, is unfair.

And so here we are.  To paraphrase an elsewhere-quoted Solon of Athens, "assess no team before it dies."

Brilliantly written.  A Valpo grad no doubt! 

[VUfan]

This Team has met my expactions for the regular Season, this team competes night, in nightout and finds a way to win, (Eric's 22 points, Ryan's Three pointer. Eric you saved the best for last!!!)
This team will compete in the NCAA's and possably win. Lets enjoy a special time!!

[bbtds]

We will play a New Mexico/St. Louis level team. Five of our seven losses have been on the road.  This will be a neutral site.  We certainly can win this next game and it certainly won't be a beatdown.

I certainly agree with this. The difference of these 3/4 seeds playing at home against the 13/14 seeds as compared to a neutral site game is big. This is what leads to many more upsets in the tournament as compared to early season games on the higher ranked teams floor.

[bbtds]

Also it seems we try very hard to change the opinions of the people that don't seem to agree with us. Why is it not sufficient for everyone to state their opinion and leave it at that. This is a board where everyone is allowed to have an opinion and very few get changed. My guess would be 1% to 5% actually change their opinions. Why not state your opinion and then everyone move on.

I am no less guilty of not moving on and my success rate at changing anyone else's opinion is probably zero.

Debate is fine. Answering another's questions about your argument is fine. But the continuous try to change another's opinion seems fruitless. 

[LaPorteAveApostle]

Debate is fine. Answering another's questions about your argument is fine. But the continuous try to change another's opinion seems fruitless.

Really, bbtds?  How very 21st-century-American of you.

What then, pray tell, is debate for, if not to change the opinion of another?

Were we to leave a debate precisely as we entered it, we should be either the victims of very poor debaters, or else quite closed-minded people.  Living things change; dead things stay the same (except for beethoven, who's decomposing).  To quote an Indy (& indie) philosopher:

If I could hang the stars up, I'd hang 'em up one by one, to leave this world with something my hands made.
And when that sun came up, and made 'em all disappear, I'd know my work was real, 'cause nothing real can stay.

Chamberlain - "Until the Day Burns Down"
So let's be 'real', then (that whole album is fantastic, btw):  I'm sure our good STL or others will remember that before the season began I was banging the "at-large bid capability" drum as loudly as though I were Assistant Chief Garber in the pep band.  And yes, winning 3 or 4 more games would have done that.  So in that sense we didn't meet my expectations.

But I refuse to be disappointed in a team that has already achieved heights no Valpo team ever has--especially one whose season story has yet to have its final chapter written.

[bbtds]

Debate is fine. Answering another's questions about your argument is fine. But the continuous try to change another's opinion seems fruitless.

Really, bbtds?  How very 21st-century-American of you.

What then, pray tell, is debate for, if not to change the opinion of another?

Were we to leave a debate precisely as we entered it, we should be either the victims of very poor debaters, or else quite closed-minded people.  Living things change; dead things stay the same (except for beethoven, who's decomposing).  To quote an Indy (& indie) philosopher:

If I could hang the stars up, I'd hang 'em up one by one, to leave this world with something my hands made.
And when that sun came up, and made 'em all disappear, I'd know my work was real, 'cause nothing real can stay.

Chamberlain - "Until the Day Burns Down"
So let's be 'real', then (that whole album is fantastic, btw):  I'm sure our good STL or others will remember that before the season began I was banging the "at-large bid capability" drum as loudly as though I were Assistant Chief Garber in the pep band.  And yes, winning 3 or 4 more games would have done that.  So in that sense we didn't meet my expectations.

But I refuse to be disappointed in a team that has already achieved heights no Valpo team ever has--especially one whose season story has yet to have its final chapter written.

You have the right to that opinion and I don't plan on changing it. 

[LaPorteAveApostle]

Oh, I don't think you could, even if you meant it, any more than I could change the Eeyores around here.

Rather, I'm arguing for the sake of the people who are members but rarely post, or the people who just visit.

It bothers me that there was more angst than joy over this team when I logged on Tuesday post-game--even after the comeback was complete--and I don't want anyone else's impression to be marred, or their joy to be sapped, by people for whom it would apparently take consecutive Final Fours to impress ('dosn't matter. we still should of won the semifinal but b/c of turnovers').

Like Romney vs. Obama (I), the debaters aren't trying to change their opponent's impressions so much as all those who tune in.

[milanmiracle]

Oh, I don't think you could, even if you meant it, any more than I could change the Eeyores around here.

Rather, I'm arguing for the sake of the people who are members but rarely post, or the people who just visit.

It bothers me that there was more angst than joy over this team when I logged on Tuesday post-game--even after the comeback was complete--and I don't want anyone else's impression to be marred, or their joy to be sapped, by people for whom it would apparently take consecutive Final Fours to impress ('dosn't matter. we still should of won the semifinal but b/c of turnovers').

Like Romney vs. Obama (I), the debaters aren't trying to change their opponent's impressions so much as all those who tune in.

I'd say that's fairly accurate, as I am always going to be a glass half empty type of guy wanting something more and better. I think Valpo should make the dance every year, and it should be an anomaly when they don't. You can call me a pessimist, and in a sense I am. In much the same way I am a pessimist, there are some optimist here could find a positive out of anything as long as the name Valpo were on the uniform. Hey, they lost by 80, but did you see that rebound/tackle in the fourth quarter, what a thing of beauty. As for the core group of us, we are what we are and I think we mostly understand each other, or at the very least tolerate each other on this forum.

[truth219]

I was glad this team won the championship. I'm also glad they are going to the ncaa. However, even though the horizon league is the 12th best team in the conferance, its still just an average 1 bid conferance. Its hard for me to be confident that we can win a game in the big dance for a few reasons. First, we had 25 turnovers in the last game of the season with 6 seinors. Second, we haven't played a good 40 mins of basketball against a good team. Sure murray state was a good win, but they aren't that good. Third, turnovers have been our burden all season and its not improved. Forth, our best player was nowhere to be found for 60 our of 80 mins in the horizon league tournament. He made the shots when it counted but it was agaisnt average teams. We won't have that shot in the ncaa. If we get a win in the ncaa, to me, would be a miricle

Btw I use this site from my phone and I'm sure there are typos, no I don't use spell check becaue I'm lazy. If you have a problem with that you can stare at your degree on the wall

[HC]

Those last 2 sentences were fantastic! +1

[vusupporter]

We've had 12 or fewer turnovers in 9 of our last 14 games.  Averaging just 13 turnovers per game over that stretch despite 25 in our last game.

[LaPorteAveApostle]

If you have a problem with that you can stare at your degree on the wall

it's degrees. (none of which are from VU, sorry, '72 ) 

and a poster of oasis!  definitely.

maybe.

[truth219]

Pride cometh before fall

[vu72]

If you have a problem with that you can stare at your degree on the wall

it's degrees. (none of which are from VU, sorry, '72 ) 

and a poster of oasis!  definitely.

maybe.

Let me guess, Fordham?  a D3?   Hey, come on, where's your faithfulness??       You are of course welcome on this board, no Valpo degree required!!.  It's all part of being Lutheran!!

[LaPorteAveApostle]

Pride cometh before fall

maybe even beforeth summer

[LaPorteAveApostle]

a D3 hey come on where's your faithfulness?

yes a D3 for undergrad and one of the grad (both of whom were in the NCAA tourney but lost in the second round).

but i'm not Lutheran either :/

*ducks

[vuweathernerd]

Pride cometh before fall

maybe even beforeth summer

Hehehehehehe. Well played.

[vu72]

a D3 hey come on where's your faithfulness?

yes a D3 for undergrad and one of the grad (both of whom were in the NCAA tourney but lost in the second round).

but i'm not Lutheran either :/

Dude, I thought I was getting forgetful!  I knew that, thus the jab!   

*ducks

[bbtds]

Forth, our best player was nowhere to be found for 60 our of 80 mins in the horizon league tournament. He made the shots when it counted but it was agaisnt average teams. We won't have that shot in the ncaa. If we get a win in the ncaa, to me, would be a miricle

I'd Go Forth!   

Broekhoff doesn't play his best the whole game, Valpo doesn't win.