Is dunton scheduling wrong?

[LUconn]

I was always under the impression that if you play big time teams, recruits will take a harder look at your school and you'll be more succesful overall. Not to mention the money that we make from that. But look at what Winthrop does:

11/19 at Arkansas L 72-49 0-1
11/20 Troy W 89-80 1-1
11/22 Austin Peay W 52-36 2-1
11/24 at South Carolina L 62-52 2-2
11/27 Weber State W 60-49 3-2
11/30 at Providence W 60-54 4-2
12/2 Barton W 86-57 5-2
12/5 Siena W 67-58 6-2
12/17 at East Carolina W 70-55 7-2
12/20 at Portland L 70-64 7-3
12/22 at Oregon L 71-56 7-4
12/30 Georgia College and W 69-56 8-4
01/2 Ferrum W 90-62 9-4

Now we probably wouldn't have had the same success they've had but all of their opponents were winnable games. Because of that, they're slated for a 14 seed if the season ended today. If they win out, Maybe even higher. What does everybody think? Schedule top teams vs winnable games.

[Formerplayer]

I agree with you 100% LuConn. Some Low major programs figure if they schedule big it will prepare them for conference, and recruits will take a second look at the teams their playing, but with some teams especially young teams, it can mess up the mental make up, and confidence of the team. With that said no division 1 program, high, mid, or low majors should schedule non division 1 opponents in the regular season. I think WU did a great job of scheduling. LU didn't do too bad either, they had some very winable games on the schedule this year Hew hamp., Western Carolina, UNCG, Marist.

[Sly Fox]

I am going to have to lean toward the tough scheduling. Sure, we are going to take our lumps. But I sincerely believe it was those blowout losses to quality opponents that helped prepare us for the Big South. Its sort of like warming up with a donut in the batters box ... once you take it off everything seems easier.

Winthrop's schedule seemed OK until you hit Barton & Georgia College and State University? Suddenly, I'm feeling better about the Shenandoah debacle.

We need to have some name programs on the schedule if we are going to convince better athletes to come to Liberty. Lynchburg is not exactly a dream locale for a 17-year-old on where he wants to move (often thousands of miles in the process). Having the opportunity to play against teams they;'ve heard of makes it all the more enticing.

And if we are ever to start and win some of these higher profile games, we have to have them on the schedule.

As for seeding, RPI has as much to do with slotting as an overall record (unless you do as Prairie View did a few years ago and get killed by non-conference teams and then squeak into the Dance with a shocking run though the SWAC tourney with a losing record). Winthrop's 10-point loss to the Gamecocks helped them more than that 28-point victory over those Florida renegade Baptists a month ago.

[PAmedic]

shoulda called them the "Gamecox" (LOL)

[Sly Fox]

I love this software.

[PAmedic]

Sly can you please change your avitar- it's scaring my kids and the dog.

[Sly Fox]

Your kids probably are familiar with Larry-Boy. My son is a Veggie Maniac who makes me be a villain when we play because as he says, " I am that HERO!"

As for your dog, perhaps you should starting feeding him Mighty Dog.

[Realist]

Unfortunately, WU is almost forced into those non d1 games b/c they can't find anyone to play them. That's the paradox of a low major conference, WU is good enough to beat the big teams, but their RPI is dragged down by the Big South, so the major conference, and even mid-majors won't play them for fear of losing and killing the RPI. Lately, WU has had to go far west to find anyone to play them. Clemson has canceled the series, along with other schools who won't touch them. Marshall hates those games, look what happened the next game after the two non D1's----WU lost to coastal. Playing those teams weakens you more than anything else, it showed in the next game.

[Sly Fox]

We've been through plenty of the last second dumpings ourselves in all sports the past few years. But truth be told, if Winthrop's RPI is up enough then you won't have any trouble scheduling bigger schools.

Heading out west is an expensive yet necessary evil of being a mid-major. The facts of the matter are that there are schools out there who have toruble filling out the schedules. If a mid-major from back east is willing to make the trip, there will always be dates available somewhere.

[Realist]

What you're saying is true for road games, however, WU would basically have no out of conference home games unless they scheduled nond1. LU can still get the UNCG's and Old dominion's b/c they aren't knocking anyone off. WU's winning on the road at major schools, so no one is agreeing to play WU at home except for schools like Siena who are extremely low in the RPI. It's almost better to play a nond1 where it has no effect on the RPI than play a Siena who will only hurt it even with a victory. It doesn't have to do with scheduling an automatic win, it has to do with actually giving the home fans games to watch during the OOC schedule.

[guest]

Guest-Realist said:

WU's winning on the road at major schools,

If thats your reality- please pass around what you're smoking! WHAT DO YO CONSIDER MAJOR?

[LUconn]

Georgia and PC are in major conferences making them majors. Not that they're any good. They're just major teams, much the same way Baylor is.

[eddantes]

First of all, I'm not sure if Dunton does the scheduling, but if it is instead the athletic department.

If you look at the champions the last three years - Liberty, UNC Asheville and Winthrop, they all played in big games during the conference season.

THree years ago, Winthrop won against Clemson, two years it was UNC Ash taking lumps early season against Kansas, and Liberty got beaten up against Duke and Arizona before making its championship run.

In basketball, it's important to play at a high level of quality because it improves your team over the course of the season.

In football, you can't do that, because the season is too short, and we have to pad Karcher's winning percentage.

[eddantes]

Oh, I forgot to mention that I think there is an RPI for schedule strength that your school has to shoot for in the Big South.

[Realist]

Winthrop has beaten Mizzou, Clemson, Providence, Georgia and taken a ranked Maryland to OT and a ranked UNC to the last minute. Those are all major schools. I wasn't just talking about this season, one season does not a reputation make.

And while that may be true that Providence, Clemson, and Georgia are/were bottom of the conference teams in their respective conferences, no one else in this league has done it.

[eddantes]

"one season does not a reputation make"

Odd sentence structure there, Yoda.

[SCAR]

It is true that Winthrop has had a few quality non conference wins over the past few years (Marshall era). There is no denying that he has done a great job and has been on many people's short list for major programs. No one has hired him yet but he is a great coach. My former coach Jeff Meyer worked with him after he left Liberty before going on to Butler and now Missouri. Marshall actually played in that old Mason Dixon Confernence that Sly has spoken of in the past. However it is still not going to happen in the Big South. That applies to Winthrop as much as it applies to Liberty. People just don't respect this conference. As far as scheduling is concerned, the head coach usually lets his assistants schedule with strict instructions as to what kind of games they want and who they want to play. The Head coach always has the final word. I know what Winthrop is going through trying to schedule. That may have been the single hardest thing I have ever been tasked to do in my life after we were 23-9 in 1997. None of the majors wanted to play us for money games and the mid to low majors wanted home games without a return date to Lynchburg. Lefty Dreisell (spelling) at JMU told me that he wouldn't play us as long as we had "that big Nigerian" so it was really hard. Winthrop does have a bit of a reputation amongst division 1 coaches but as far as being a household name, I don't think they are as far as they would like to believe. Just a humble opinion.

[Sly Fox]

So Meyer is on Quin's staff right now? I hope he wasn't in the midst of all that mess the past couple of years.

And I believe you are absolutely correct that Marshall isn't long for Winthrop. He's exactly the kind of coach some of the higher profile mid-majors are looking for. But I wouldn't be surprised to see him land a job in C-USA or even at somewhere like Clemson if the right scenario plays out.

It seems like most of the good head coaching jobs are going to guys who take an assistant gig at one of the power conference schools that succeeds at recruiting.

[SCAR]

Sly,

you are right about the way coaches are getting jobs these days. Ron Bradley from Radford took an assistants job at JMU, Randy Peele at Winthrop was once a head coach at Greensboro, of course Jeff Meyer has been a head coach just like those other guys and now they are taking assistants jobs at good schools in hopes of getting another head coaching job at a higher level. thingy Vitale wrote an article about this trend before the season started and mentioned Coach Meyer specifically. Don't worry, Jeff was not in the cheating scandal at Missouri. In fact he got his job because they let those 2 coaches go. He and Melvin Watkins (UNC Charlotte) were hired this summer. I did know one of the guys that was involved in the cheating, Tony Harvey. I met him in Hawaii when he was a coach at Eastern Michigan and they were a top 25 team with Earl Boykins (5-7 guard from the Denver Nuggets). He seemed pretty cool but he got a nice buyout from Mizzu. I think 200k if I remember correctly. It might be hard for him to get another job but he will bounce back. FYI, Aluma hit a Christian Laetner like shot at the buzzer to beat #23 Eastern Michigan that year but the shot was ruled no good because the clock keeper started the clock while the ball was in the air! We were hot but what could we do. That was in 1997 when we were 23-9 and didn't get any post season consideration. We were the only 20 game winner that year that didn't participate in post season play. Ahhh, the Big South is great!

[Sly Fox]

I didn't suspect Jeff was there when all the misdeeds went down at Mizzou. But I do have to question his decision-making going to work for such a sleazy guy as Quin. I hear all kinds of horror stories about Snyder on the recruiting trail down here in Texas. But he always seems to escape unscathed from one scandal after another. Unfortunately for Jeff, he tends to use his assistants as scapegoats. Perhaps Jeff can get a gig out of Columbia before the next Snyder scandal hits. (Do you get the idea I am not a fan of Quin's?).

Getting shunned by the NIT is not just a Big South problem. A year ago, Rice had a similar record to LU in '97 with some impressive victories on their resume (and a couple of nailbiting losses to Stanford & UConn) and they still didn't get the time of day. This year, they left behind the MOuntain West for C-USA so they're odds of getting an at-large increased tremendously.