1977Hawkeye
Well-Known Member
Edit: This is not Joe Lunardi, but rather Eamonn Brennan, as someone else pointed out.
Middle Tennessee [28-5 (19-1), RPI: 29, SOS: 135] As I mentioned in the introduction, after its loss to FIU (Richard Pitino strikes!) in the semifinals of the Sun Belt conference tournament Sunday, Middle Tennessee now becomes one of the most interesting bubble cases in recent memory. On the one hand, MTSU is obviously a good basketball team. You can watch them play -- YouTube is a wonderful thing -- or you can delve into their efficiency statistics; as of this writing, Ken Pomeroy's adjusted efficiency ranks hold Middle up as the 31st-best team in the country. The Blue Raiders went 19-1 in their league, which is admittedly a very bad league, but still -- 19-1. And they pushed themselves, Long Beach State-style, in their scheduling, ending up with a top-10 nonconference SOS and a top 25 RPI for their troubles. Oh, also, one more thing: It would be a real bummer to see this team miss the tournament for the second year in a row. It deserves to go, and conference tournament automatic qualifiers are profoundly stupid. (Why the Sun Belt would prefer to send the winner of a weekend-long crapshoot as opposed to its 19-1 regular-season champ, I'll never know.) But the unfortunate "having said that" part of all this is as follows: Middle has beaten zero top-50 opponents and just two teams in the top 100. All of their other 26 wins came against teams ranked outside the top 100. Yes, you read that right: Of Middle Tennessee's 28 wins, 26 came against teams ranked below the RPI top 100. I utterly loathe the chorus of "who have they beaten, they'd be the 10th-worst team in BCS Conference X herp derp" bleating that comes from fans of high-major bubble schools this time of year. It's gross. But if a Kentucky fan were to ask that about Middle Tennessee, could you really form a cohesive defense? A 3-point home win over Ole Miss is your best shot, and I have no idea whether that will be enough to convince the committee.
Southern Miss [23-8 (12-4), RPI: 36, SOS: 76] Southern Miss! With all due respect to the Golden Eagles, who are a well-coached outfit under first-year man Donnie Tyndall, I kind of can't believe Southern Miss is on the bubble. That win over Denver is really good and only looking better by the day (Joe Scott's boys are a top-30 efficiency squad), but other than that Southern Miss hasn't beaten anyone. Their inclusion in the field would be based solely off some decent computer numbers and the Golden Eagles' willingness to go out and play people in the nonconference (at Arizona, at La. Tech, Wichita State in Wichita). That is an admirable trait, but you have to beat somebody along the way, right?
Seems to me like Lunardi is talking out both sides of his mouth on this one.. In MTSU's case, he talks about how they "pushed themselves" with their schedule, despite 26 of their 28 wins coming from outside the RPI Top 100, and then dismisses (or actually ridicules) the "they haven't beaten anybody" comments that people use against them.
Then in the next paragraph, he turns around and blasts Southern Miss because they haven't beaten anybody. The same argument he is using for MTSU he is essentially using against Southern Miss. Too funny.
Go figure. Regardless, it seems this guy has a love affair with MTSU.. He seems jilted that they didn't get the automatic bid and have to depend on an at-large and feels bad for them because they were left out last year, too.
To steal his own "if they were that good" words he used in reference to Iowa: If MTSU was that good, how come they couldn't win the conference tournament in such a bad league?
Middle Tennessee [28-5 (19-1), RPI: 29, SOS: 135] As I mentioned in the introduction, after its loss to FIU (Richard Pitino strikes!) in the semifinals of the Sun Belt conference tournament Sunday, Middle Tennessee now becomes one of the most interesting bubble cases in recent memory. On the one hand, MTSU is obviously a good basketball team. You can watch them play -- YouTube is a wonderful thing -- or you can delve into their efficiency statistics; as of this writing, Ken Pomeroy's adjusted efficiency ranks hold Middle up as the 31st-best team in the country. The Blue Raiders went 19-1 in their league, which is admittedly a very bad league, but still -- 19-1. And they pushed themselves, Long Beach State-style, in their scheduling, ending up with a top-10 nonconference SOS and a top 25 RPI for their troubles. Oh, also, one more thing: It would be a real bummer to see this team miss the tournament for the second year in a row. It deserves to go, and conference tournament automatic qualifiers are profoundly stupid. (Why the Sun Belt would prefer to send the winner of a weekend-long crapshoot as opposed to its 19-1 regular-season champ, I'll never know.) But the unfortunate "having said that" part of all this is as follows: Middle has beaten zero top-50 opponents and just two teams in the top 100. All of their other 26 wins came against teams ranked outside the top 100. Yes, you read that right: Of Middle Tennessee's 28 wins, 26 came against teams ranked below the RPI top 100. I utterly loathe the chorus of "who have they beaten, they'd be the 10th-worst team in BCS Conference X herp derp" bleating that comes from fans of high-major bubble schools this time of year. It's gross. But if a Kentucky fan were to ask that about Middle Tennessee, could you really form a cohesive defense? A 3-point home win over Ole Miss is your best shot, and I have no idea whether that will be enough to convince the committee.
Southern Miss [23-8 (12-4), RPI: 36, SOS: 76] Southern Miss! With all due respect to the Golden Eagles, who are a well-coached outfit under first-year man Donnie Tyndall, I kind of can't believe Southern Miss is on the bubble. That win over Denver is really good and only looking better by the day (Joe Scott's boys are a top-30 efficiency squad), but other than that Southern Miss hasn't beaten anyone. Their inclusion in the field would be based solely off some decent computer numbers and the Golden Eagles' willingness to go out and play people in the nonconference (at Arizona, at La. Tech, Wichita State in Wichita). That is an admirable trait, but you have to beat somebody along the way, right?
Seems to me like Lunardi is talking out both sides of his mouth on this one.. In MTSU's case, he talks about how they "pushed themselves" with their schedule, despite 26 of their 28 wins coming from outside the RPI Top 100, and then dismisses (or actually ridicules) the "they haven't beaten anybody" comments that people use against them.
Then in the next paragraph, he turns around and blasts Southern Miss because they haven't beaten anybody. The same argument he is using for MTSU he is essentially using against Southern Miss. Too funny.
Go figure. Regardless, it seems this guy has a love affair with MTSU.. He seems jilted that they didn't get the automatic bid and have to depend on an at-large and feels bad for them because they were left out last year, too.
To steal his own "if they were that good" words he used in reference to Iowa: If MTSU was that good, how come they couldn't win the conference tournament in such a bad league?
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