The Final Sixteen?

[scooter]

Kudos to Utah for playing a tough schedule, but at what exspense did they do that? There is a reason why Notre Dame football schedules a cupcake team here and there. Maybe the Utah scheduler is to blame this year, and next year they will learn from their mistake and not make an impossible schedule. Look at Hofstra this year. They have lost how many one goal games (5 or so) and they dropped out of the top 20. A loss is a loss, allbeit a tough opponent, the scoreboard still is all the same. Sorry Utes.

once again I agree.....they have 2 impressive wins in UCSB and UMD, but other than that they have beaten Illinois, Oregon State and 2 B teams? I just can't see how that resume gets a team into nationals

[Ravaging Beast]

This is the old argument about whether to schedule a lot of tough games and face some possible losses (Utah) or schedule and easy season and win them all (Northeastern). The question is which is better? I believe a tough schedule with a fair amount of losses is more commendable than an easy schedule with few losses. My reasoning...a tough schedule prepares a team for what they are going to face in the post season. Remember back to #2 Auburn in 2001. They were undefeated (i think) and were upset at the tournament. If you want quality lacrosse from all the teams, you must choose the teams with experience.

This brings me to my next point. Experience at Nationals plays a huge role. Whether it is the players or coaches who have been there before. The most successful teams have been there before. BYU (97-06), CSU (98-04, 06), Sonoma St. (99-06), UCSB (97, 01-06), Michigan (99-06), CU (99-01, 03-06), SFU (97-04), Cal (98-02), etc. It takes a couple of years to be successful at nationals. For example, CU couldn't seem to make it that far until last year. Is that experience or just a better team. Oregon has been at nationals three years in a row. I think they might get the hang of it this year. My point is that some of these teams being voted into the bubble positions probably won't do as well if they have not been there before. Players can come and go, but tradition will always stay.

[bullhighutewoozgriffclam]

man i'd like to say i'm done talking (writting) 'cause it's stressful, but i'm sure i'll get some comments and have to respond.

my head hurts and....

All of the bubble talk is meaningless until the conference tournaments are done and we know who has the AQs.

so i'll wait until then.

Parker is turning borderline Gobbler on us.

i'm glad i could entertain.

[ineedmorecowbell]

parker, get a haircut, hippy.

[OldRamAlum83]

univduke21
Rookie



Joined: 16 Feb 2005
Posts: 69


votes: 3
Posted: Tue Apr 24, 2007 2:05 pm Post subject:

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9 Conferences
8 Conferences that have an Automatic Bid
16 teams in the tournament
8 At-Large Bids

At-Large Locks:

Colorado State-RMLC #2, MCLA #2
BYU- #1
Colorado- RMLC #3, MCLA #6
Arizona State- MCLA #4
Sonoma State- MCLA #7
UCSB- MCLA #10

At-Large Bubble:
Arizona
Cal Poly
Northeastern
Minnesota Duluth

Bubble Burst:
Florida State-two quick losses and no SOS hurts Seminoles chances to make it back to Dallas
Florida- Needed to win out
VA Tech- needed to win out
Utah- Two wins in conference tournament even without Conference AB would make tournament

So realistically you are looking at two teams from the "bubble" to make the tournament, assuming that there are NO more upsets in the conference tournaments:

Last two in: Arizona, Minnesota Duluth
Last two out: Northeastern (unless AB), Cal Poly
_________________
Racism is still alive they just be concealin' it

How do you have ASU as a lock in over Arizona who just recently beat them soundly and ASU also losing to UCSB? They will be lucky to be ranked in the top ten after their last two games. Don't get me wrong, I think all three along with Sonoma should be locks on making the tournament but lets face it they can't seem to beat Arizona. Like many of you, I watched Utah play BYU on TV and they have some talent but not only are they are very young, they play like they are very young and not near deep enough to be any threat in the nationals. Minnesota Duluth has without a doubt proven they can play with anyone and also deserves to play at the nationals. Northeastern may be this year's Utah. The odd man or in this case team out.

[bullhighutewoozgriffclam]

once it hits 80 i probably will. my girlie likes my length..........so what can you do?

[Zamboni_Driver]

This is the old argument about whether to schedule a lot of tough games and face some possible losses (Utah) or schedule and easy season and win them all (Northeastern). The question is which is better? .

I don't believe that scheduling should be all 1 way or another (SOS of 1 or SOS of 101). I believe that each program has the responsibility to schedule games that will give pollsters an opportunity to rank them. They especially want to schedule games against opponents that they will be competing with for a spot in the national tournament. I know it is hard to predict sometimes, but there seems to be the same teams competing for the last few spots.

Thus a bubble team last year would have wanted to schedule something that resembles the following:

1. 1 Top 20-25
2. 2 Top 15-20
3. 2 Top 15-10
4. 1 Top 10

6 games against ranked opponents (room for error if a team drops off), leaving 6 more for early prep games and mandatory conference games.

If they are worthy of a spot they will win both 1 and 2, split 3, and stay competitive but lose 4. Now if a team plays in a league where their conference schedule gives them 3 or 4 top 10 games, they should not forgo 1 and 2, because what if they lose to all top 10 teams? Then they have to rely on the pollsters to see through the loss and compare scores/dates/weather/how many hot women were on the sidelines. This isn't the pollsters responsibility. Nor should a team with a weaker conference schedule only schedule top 10 OOC games and hope for the best.

Pollsters should look at the body of work

Programs have the responsibility to set up a body of work that is interpretable

[laxdefenseman4]

heres the problem with a lot of the talk on here. Everyone is arguing about what teams should be in those bubble spots (12-16) because they want them to get to nationals. The problem is, everyone seems to just want certain teams to GET to nationals. The whole point of having nationals is not so a team can say they went to nationals but to find the BEST team in the country. Not to find the best 16. The polls try to find the best 16 teams that would have a chance to be the best team in the country. Now, everyone is arguing about how teams such as Utah shouldn't drop out of the top 16 because they have played good teams. The problem is, they have proven they cant be the best team in the country. They've lost too many times to top teams. They very well may be the 8th best team... i don't know... but I do know that they have proved too many times that they cant win against the best teams... and if you cant do that then you need to let teams who have the possibility to win games have a shot. I dunno maybe i'm way off... what do you all think?

p.s. no offense to Utah. I think they have a solid program from what I have seen. They just have shown everyone they aren't going to win nationals so why deny a team that has a chance?

[bullhighutewoozgriffclam]

honestly. no one in the potential bubble teams has much of

a chance to be the best team in the country.

utah has proven they can beat top ten teams (plural). no bubble teams have done that. that should put them in. proven ability over speculated ability. that's the hard part. many of teams in question have proven themselves in a game or two.

obviously no one outside the salt lake valley agrees with me so i must be taking too many crazy pills.

utes are really gonna have to do something special in boulder to gain the faith of it's numerous skeptics.

[wingman3227]

Dig...
I think everyone agrees that Utah is a good team...they have beaten two pretty solid teams in UCSB and Duluth, the problem is their overall resume should not allow them to get into the tourney...they are going to be better than at least four or five of the teams their and have the ability to beat close to ten of them...maybe more...but the thing is the teams they are competing with don't have as many losses...some have half the amount of losses and they also have a loss to a B team...that doesn't look good, then you add in that they have lost most of thier games in the last few weeks, and that looks even worse...ASU is a team that is trying to hold on to a spot after a stellar season and two less than stellar perfomances late in the year...they are 10-4 with two number ones under their belt and they have to hold their breathe and hope that teams like Michigan, Duluth, Oregon don't get upset in their conference tourneys...so what I am saying is not that Utah isn't a good team, but they have played way too inconsistently to earn a trip to the National Championship tourney...

[bullhighutewoozgriffclam]

inconsistency is a valid arguement.

consistently beating medeocre teams is also a valid arguement.

looks like we got ourselves a good ole fashioned stand off.

...ASU is a team that is trying to hold on to a spot after a stellar season and two less than stellar perfomances late in the year...they are 10-4 with two number ones under their belt and they have to hold their breathe and hope that teams like Michigan, Duluth, Oregon don't get upset in their conference tourneys...

good point

[More Cowbell]

inconsistency is a valid arguement.

consistently beating medeocre teams is also a valid arguement.

looks like we got ourselves a good ole fashioned stand off.

...ASU is a team that is trying to hold on to a spot after a stellar season and two less than stellar perfomances late in the year...they are 10-4 with two number ones under their belt and they have to hold their breathe and hope that teams like Michigan, Duluth, Oregon don't get upset in their conference tourneys...

good point

maybe utah should consider scheduling some more "mediocre" teams. If simply having a strong SOS, regardless of wins and losses, can get a team into nationals, the entire system would be absurd.

[bullhighutewoozgriffclam]

there really shouldn't be an arguement i know. it's just that our league doesn't have a difinitive way about it. especially this year. so much disparity with so few teams.

it's like "we did this"

"well we did that better and we did this"

"yeah but you didn't do this"

"touche"

is there this much argueing in the ncaa. i think not. i think there the level of play is established. in our league it really fluxuates.

interesting times.

can't wait to see whos goin.

[wingman3227]

Actually in the NCAA, all divisions, there is a formula that applies for all teams...giving a point system from 1-10 for wins and losses and averaging the total points that the teams have earned...It actually works pretty well, it is used to decide which teams go the the tourney's from each particular region...it is as fool proof as a computer generated system can get...In this case it would work, but I don't have the time nor the attention span to do it for all of the teams involved...it was mentioned once before by someone, but it takes a while to calculate..

[bullhighutewoozgriffclam]

there's gotta be some software somewhere that ncaa would let the mcla use or buy or somethin. sounds like it could be a nice addition. instead of all this banter.

although i do like to banter. (as everyone who visits this website knows by now)