Meanwhile, Cajuns have the best basketball team in LA

[Policarp]

I’m making all the games
I can regardless if it’s Duke, or Dillard. Attendance should be of very little consequence in scheduling at our level. The primary goal is to play teams that are challenging and improve our RPI for the sole purpose of getting to and advancing in the Big Dance. That matters regardless of the 3 games in March nonsense; which by the way is bush league thinking.

VO is as committed financially as UL. Right now UL isn’t committed to top tier basketball.

[RaginFan2]

I’m making all the games
I can regardless if it’s Duke, or Dillard. Attendance should be of very little consequence in scheduling at our level. The primary goal is to play teams that are challenging and improve our RPI for the sole purpose of getting to and advancing in the Big Dance. That matters regardless of the 3 games in March nonsense; which by the way is bush league thinking.

VO is as committed financially as UL. Right now UL isn’t committed to top tier basketball.

I agree.

[Cajunsmike]

I’m making all the games
I can regardless if it’s Duke, or Dillard. Attendance should be of very little consequence in scheduling at our level. The primary goal is to play teams that are challenging and improve our RPI for the sole purpose of getting to and advancing in the Big Dance. That matters regardless of the 3 games in March nonsense; which by the way is bush league thinking.

VO is as committed financially as UL. Right now UL isn’t committed to top tier basketball.

I disagree that the three games in March view is bush league thinking. No. of mid majors that can earn at large bids under the current system is miniscule. That is a fact whether people want to face that reality or not. Therefore focus on the tournament is not misplaced. Also, I know they hope to be playing their best ball at that point. That means you are constantly trying to improve throughout the season. Of course the regular season is important for RPI purposes and you get to the NIT if you win the regular season. You also get better seeding in the tournament if you do well in the conference regular season. As far as being committed to top tier basketball, I guess we would need to be willing to pay 90 grand plus to get teams similar to us to come to the Dome for a buy in game. I can't comment on the feasibility of doing that as I don't know the financial details. As MAT said earlier, this discussion is moot at this point as nothing can be done about the schedule. Only thing we can do in the short term is support the guys this season.

[CajunEXPRESS]

Well I’m sorry about bush league. What it is Mike is accepting your mediocre status. Nobody is suggesting we can get to the dance without the three games in
March, but have you actually given in and accepting mediocrity? I still have hopes of being very good again. You’re never going to advance purposely scheduling to win instead of getting challenged. Your talent will never improve enough without truly striving to be good enough to deserve an at large even when you’re discriminated against. But we don’t have that argument. Haven’t felt a long time.

[ZoomZoom]

How many times has the SBC gotten an at large since 2000? Past conference history contributes to seeding.

[Crawfish]

OK, we get it Charlie, you don't like the scheduling.

[Cajunsmike]

Well I'm sorry about bush league. What it is Mike is accepting your mediocre status. Nobody is suggesting we can get to the dance without the three games in
March, but have you actually given in and accepting mediocrity? I still have hopes of being very good again. You're never going to advance purposely scheduling to win instead of getting challenged. Your talent will never improve enough without truly striving to be good enough to deserve an at large even when you're discriminated against. But we don't have that argument. Haven't felt a long time.

Who said anything about accepting mediocrity? I just accept reality which a few of you do not. Not just here, but virtually all the mid majors point to their conference tournament as the time to be playing their best ball. I also hope to be very good again (if not great) and perhaps we are making progress. No matter what we do, we won't get an at large in the current system as evidenced by Illinois State and for that matter UTA last year. Therefore, we just have to do it by consistently winning the tournament and having success in the Big Dance. I mentioned several reasons that success in the regular season is important in my previous posts and I stand by those. As far as scheduling goes, we would have to play virtually the entire non conference season on the road to be challenged sufficiently for some. The basketball staff, the great majority of the fan base, and the administration do not want to do that. The few of you that do won't change that policy. In fact there was an article in USA Today taking issue with many schools refusal to play on the road in non-conference. If you don't see that impacts us, you are just denying facts. Impact on academics is one reason we don't want to spend too much time on the road. Also, many thought that the road games and the Caymans tournament would challenge us. So far some of those have not done as well as predicted but it is still to be determined how good those teams will do as we are only 1/3 through the season. This discussion/argument has been around a long time and at this point little good comes from continuing it. Simply put, I KNOW that stronger schools (when I say stronger I don't mean SEC but good mid-majors) refusing to come play here is a problem and a FACT while some of you just choose to deny reality. I will say that the ideas VO had of playing schools like LA Tech twice in the same year and tying basketball games to football with NMSU are good ideas. However, I don't think Tech wants any part of that idea and who knows what NMSU wants. Let's just move on from here and support the team this year.

[MetryCajun]

Great analysis CajunMike! Best basketball post of 2017.

[Boomer]

So you have nothing to contribute here which refutes my assertions regarding scheduling? Not to resort to Boomer isms, but those who have no counter to an argument in a debate resort to attacking the person making the argument. Ad hominum, if you will.

Nowhere have I said we don't have a good team. I have only said that we can't tell whether we are really good or just better than the teams we have beaten; and that if we do have a really good team, our scheduling is doing them a disservice by dooming them to an RPI that will give us a 15 or 16 seed in the tournament if we get in, when minor changes in scheduling philosophy could yield a seeding of 10-12, which in turn gives us a much better chance to make a run in the Dance.

......Vob, my buddy, if you are going to use me as a reference please get the correct Latin......AD Hominem! However,it's use is quite fitting in this instance!!!

[zephyr]

Guys, football may drive the bus, but if we want our bus to take us to the AAC, we damn well better drastically improve our non conference basketball scheduling and dominate this conference that many of you claim is holding us down, because good basketball is important to the AAC.

I am sure Bob Marlin is a great guy, and he recruits great young men, but his record here says he can't or won't raise our basketball program to the level that will make it a positive in realignment. That is a fact that cannot be disputed.

I agree with these statements which is why I've grown as frustrated with Marlin as any here.