A CUSA Conference Talk thread is talking about this Statesboro Herald article by the Georgia Southern beat writer that says the Sun Belt Conference is on the verge of adopting a "dyanmic" schedule for its in-conference basketball games that is aimed at assuring that at least two of its members have RPIs and resumes that will get them NCAA tournament bids.

An excerpt relating the gist of the scheme:

Quote:Under the proposed new format, the Sun Belt would split into 6-team East and West divisions. Each team would play home-and-home against the five teams in its division, while playing each team in the opposite division once, with three of those games at home and three on the road.

After those 16 games — around early February — the standings will freeze. The 12 schools will be grouped into four pods of three teams, with the top three comprising one pod, places 4-6 the next pod, and so on. The final four games of each team’s regular season would be a home-and-home series against the other two teams in its pod.

. . .

The teams from the top pod will be guaranteed the top three seeds in the conference tournament, which will only feature 10 teams. ...

In a callback to recent Sun Belt tournaments, the top two seeds will automatically be placed in the semifinals, with the third and fourth seeds sitting in the quarterfinals. The games leading up to the quarterfinals will be played at on-campus sites, hopefully drumming up larger crowds for lower-seeded teams and reducing the cost to the league of playing out an entire week’s worth of games in New Orleans.

. . .

The proposed changes haven’t yet been approved by the Sun Belt, but Adams (*) said that he has received positive feedback after meeting with all 12 member schools.

Then in the last paragraph:

Quote:Conference USA is expected to announce a schedule similar to this structure in the near future,

- - -

>> (*) Mark Adams, an ESPN broadcaster and former collegiate head coach who also runs a consulting business that has taken an interest in benefitting mid-major conferences. <<

Way to goal seek on the the NCAA entry requirements! The whole thing feels dirty to me.

Why do you think it is dirty? I think it is somewhat unfair that a CUSA reg season champ can miss the NCAA if it loses in the tourney, while a .500 team in Big 12 and goes one-n-done in its conference tourney is safely in.

the sun belt approach seems like a creative approach to get more teams in.

And from the broken record/dead horse department, does anyone have an updated view of why and how Texas Southern can schedule 8 Top 25 OOC games on the road, while we schedule 0 to 1?

The first part of this seems like it could easily backfire. 4 RPI games of note would be fine but if you end up splitting those 4 games, it won't help any of those teams' NCAA tournament chances.

I definitely think CUSA should adopt on-campus games for the first round of the conference tournament. The SWAC has done that the last two years now and it's a huge advantage over their previous system. Speaking of the SWAC, TSU can schedule an entire non-conference slate of Michigan States and Kansas on the road because Mike Davis can overcome an 0-12 start to the season when he knows his team can go 16-3 once conference play begins.

In the absence of strong geographic rivalries like we had in the SWC, I think this is a good effort to drum up excitement. It could backfire, but even if it does we're presently a one-bid league anyway. And the one bid is still guaranteed.

A bit disappointed that C-USA is looking to the Sunbelt for innovation and new ways of thinking. Oh well, most of those Sunbelt teams will probably be C-USA in a few years anyway.

This is kind of like what France does with rugby. It does produce considerable excitement around the midseason cutoff date.

The phrase "cleanest dirty shirt" comes to mind when I wrap my mind around the implications from such a scheduling event. God forbid our team ends up in the second half losers bracket and the white flag can be raised a lot earlier than normal.

While I appreciate the attempt at optimization of significant statistics, it seems like more effort could be utilized in making basketball more competitive.

Would be great to see the conference take steps to increase TV revenue or visibility (participation/organization of pre-season tourneys, playing games in odd places like aircraft carriers, etc.) or for individual teams seek out ways to optimize their own RPIs. The idea of skimming the floaters and flushing the sinkers in mid-January doesn't seem to do anyone any favors in the long run. The OOC schedule needs to get tougher, the visibility of the programs needs to be better, and hopefully organic RPI improvement will follow.

Edit: Maybe the FU universities can contribute and we can run a beach basketball tourney in November down in Miami. First round is outdoors on Miami beach and subsequent rounds indoors to make it not so flukey. People and eyeballs would show up for that, and I am sure the athletes would get a kick out of it as well. MTSU got invited to the Bahamas this year, but I am sure the bottom half of CUSA could willingly contribute to participation.

It's all lipstick on a pig.

And it penalizes a team that might get a player back from injury or midyear transfer eligibility (admittedly less likely) that could allow them to close with the flourish. Then again, maybe that's what they want to avoid. A team that had RPI problems early suddenly coming together and making hay of the supposedly top-tier teams.

(05-18-2018 12:32 PM)flash3200 Wrote:  The phrase "cleanest dirty shirt" comes to mind when I wrap my mind around the implications from such a scheduling event. God forbid our team ends up in the second half losers bracket and the white flag can be raised a lot earlier than normal.

While I appreciate the attempt at optimization of significant statistics, it seems like more effort could be utilized in making basketball more competitive.

You should probably read the proposal more closely.
Even the champion of the bottom pod still have a path to the tourney. And if you start, say, 0-12, you might be eliminated under the old format. But under this format every one is still alive with a somewhat fresh slate into the bracket round.

But we’ll be 12-0 in short order anyway so either way I like it.