The conference home opener has arrived, and by any measure the non-conference signs were not as promising as hoped. Thus far, the NET standings are as seen in the message below. Drake enters Thursday's game at #45, first in the MVC, and Valpo lags last in the conference at #272.
After an offseason when almost every team in the league was decimated by transfers and graduation, most certainly more than Valpo, one would have hoped for a recruiting class and non-conference development that would at least move VU to the middle of the pack. Last season fans gave the coach and the team a benefit of the doubt because of the unusual circumstances. This year, beginning Thursday, there are no excuses if we don't see improvement.
https://twitter.com/hoops_mvc/status/1863590707413274627
Our grade thus far, 5 games into the season, is a C minus. It would have been lower without the blowout win against Eastern Illinois.
As noted above, many of the teams above us were decimated by the transfer bug yet still have been able to compete.
I still have hope for this team but I’m starting to worry…
I really don't get the lack of improvement argument. Net Has both Liberty and DePaul as top 100 teams. Those games were kept competitive in the first half and the only major sore spot has been the shooting. Defense has looked great. Rebounding has looked great, and even FT has looked great. Aside from NIU and DePaul, I have seen many improvements over last year's team.
It is year 2 of a rebuild with a year 1 that didn't have a whole lot of building blocks. The expectation some have had that this team was supposed to be plug n play, absolutely dominate everybody, is really jaded and misguided.
Our defense is certainly improved but is far from great and our rebounding has much room for improvement.I really don't get the lack of improvement argument. Net Has both Liberty and DePaul as top 100 teams. Those games were kept competitive in the first half and the only major sore spot has been the shooting. Defense has looked great. Rebounding has looked great, and even FT has looked great. Aside from NIU and DePaul, I have seen many improvements over last year's team.
It is year 2 of a rebuild with a year 1 that didn't have a whole lot of building blocks. The expectation some have had that this team was supposed to be plug n play, absolutely dominate everybody, is really jaded and misguided.
I have frequently and sometime accurately been called misguided but jaded is a word never thrown at me before. Perhaps that is because most of the folks I interact with can't accurately define it. 
I really don't get the lack of improvement argument. Net Has both Liberty and DePaul as top 100 teams. Those games were kept competitive in the first half and the only major sore spot has been the shooting. Defense has looked great. Rebounding has looked great, and even FT has looked great. Aside from NIU and DePaul, I have seen many improvements over last year's team.
It is year 2 of a rebuild with a year 1 that didn't have a whole lot of building blocks. The expectation some have had that this team was supposed to be plug n play, absolutely dominate everybody, is really jaded and misguided.
You tend to have a bit of a rosy picture of the program but being down by 10+ after 8-9 mins isn't being competitive. DePaul is a plug and play program.
The team appears to be marginally better than last season. That's about all which can be said regarding the situation.
It appears jaded and misguided would be appropriate but maybe for someone other than you think those terms should be applied.
I really don't get the lack of improvement argument. Net Has both Liberty and DePaul as top 100 teams.
Good for Liberty and DePaul. NET also has Valpo holding 12th place in the MVC. My definition of "improvement" would suggest a move up from last place.
Looking at the NET now is like looking at a preseason poll. If you like what it says, great, you still need to win games. If you don't like what it says, great, now you have to prove people wrong. There's so little data at this point that it really doesn't matter.
Looking at the NET now is like looking at a preseason poll. If you like what it says, great, you still need to win games. If you don't like what it says, great, now you have to prove people wrong. There's so little data at this point that it really doesn't matter.
Except there is enough data and historic consistency to serve as a realistic probable indicator that cannot be ignored. I checked the NET last year on this date, and Valpo was listed at 291, 12th in the MVC. The final result in April was a 303 ranking and still last in the MVC, 276 spots behind Indiana State. This season's 272 and last place (almost 100 spots behind the 9th place team and nearly 230 spots behind the first-place team) is not much more promising. Nevertheless, I will watch the games and hope for the best.
I would say the coaching pickup for Drake has been a success, and he brought a boatload of players from his previous job. Sometimes job fit is more important than raw talent.
I watched Drake dismantle Vandy and it was a thing of beauty. If their D II transfers play that well against us then the ARC could turn into a pit of ugliness and despair.
I really don't get the lack of improvement argument. Net Has both Liberty and DePaul as top 100 teams. Those games were kept competitive in the first half
You need to define “competitive.” At the half, Valpo already was down 10 points in one and 13 points in the other.
10 points is more than reasonable for a competitive game at the college level. 15 is where you start to push those boundaries. The fact you don't think a 10 point margin at the half is competitive really shows just how wet your blanket is. Going down by 10 points early in the game is a completely other conversation, but keeping a lead to 10 points before you go into the locker room is still in the realm of competitive.
As for NET rankings, the top 75-100 is really all you really need to care about. Even then the old RPI system is just plain better in almost any way to the NET, but the NET is what the NCAA uses, so I must judge by the NET despite my grievances with the system. Anything past the top 100 is where you get into semantics and brass tacks as to rankings in my opinion. If a team is top 100. There is a reasonable assumption that they should be in the top 100 give or take a few ranking positions. Arguing that a team deserves to be in the 200s or the 300s is like arguing that chocolate is best when it is 70% dark as opposed to 75% dark.
DePaul is a plug n play program, good for them, they won the lottery. The fact of the matter is most teams are not plug n play. Drake
I am not in the business to sit here and be a basketball doom speaker over a loss to a top 100 program. If you are in that business, great, you have every right to feel that way. Frankly I think many here are too fond of the "glory days" to let them go and understand that this is a different world and different Valpo. Transitioning to the MVC and loosing a coach in the process hurt this team in ways that many programs have the luxury of not having to deal with. Any steps foreword for this program should be acknowledged. Not completely disregarded because some people cant let go of the stick. The defense, rebounding, and FT percentages are all much improved from the team last year, and people seem to be bleeding the scoring issues over into these categories when that is simply not an accurate method of analysis. If you want to call that rose tinted glasses. Then fine, all I will say is I disagree with that assessment. This team really just cant do one of the most important parts of basketball. Shoot the ball. And that is an issue that is very concerning and deserves to be highlighted.
Going down by 10 points early in the game is a completely other conversation
Okay. 10 minutes into each of the two games Valpo was already down by 13 and 14 points. Maybe as Monty Python’s Black Knight claimed, “tis just a scratch!” 😉
By no means was the DePaul game competitive. It was apparent very early that Valpo wasn't ready to compete with a team like the Blue Demons.
10 points is more than reasonable for a competitive game at the college level. 15 is where you start to push those boundaries. The fact you don't think a 10 point margin at the half is competitive really shows just how wet your blanket is. Going down by 10 points early in the game is a completely other conversation, but keeping a lead to 10 points before you go into the locker room is still in the realm of competitive.
I wouldn't go around essentially calling people names with this ridiculous opinion.
