This year's team is not close to one of our best ever. Not even close. Its a solid team who is fun to watch with good chemistry and is certainly one of the most complete teams we've had in the last 15 years or so but this team isn't even as good as the Tiras Wade, Orien Greene and Dwayne Mitchell team in 05 I believe.
UL would have been the 4th best RPI team on LSU's non conference schedule this year, behind Michigan, Houston and Marquette; and the RPI boost from playing LSU would likely have pushed UL ahead of Marquette. Playing UL in Lafayette, assuming the Tigers won, would have been a quadrant 1 win. So there is a significant upside to playing UL instead of Alcorn or Samford or Tennessee Martin, and that would have been true every year for the last 5 years, though this would have been the best of those years.
Went check it out. UL's worst RPI in the last 5 years was 145, LSU's worst was 195. LSU had a better RPI than UL 3 out of the 5 years. I would consider games between the two beneficial to both teams every year in the last 5.
None. Look, there's banter going on but UL does not have as many good wins as LSU. I will not deny that one bit. LSU, when looking back earlier at their schedule for this year, surprised me with some of the wins they've had during the season. I remember seeing the Houston game on TV. I also remember seeing them beat Michigan although that was not the same Michigan team at that time but nonetheless, they beat them and should get credit. BUT, LSU with all these good wins has also ____ the bed numerous times this season and that really tells me they've been inconsistent. UL has not. That is what I'm hoping to see on Wednesday. LSU stumble a bit and us play like we did pretty much the entire conference season.
Note, the 2014 team with two NBA players on it from Louisiana finished in the Top 100. I understand the reluctance of LSU to come here. However, in recent years they have refused to even play us in Baton Rouge. That was the decision of Coach Jones and I don't know what Coach Wade will think of this going forward. Maybe we play more often in Baton Rouge going forward. Perhaps they are reluctant to give us that payday for some reason and would prefer the guarantee goes to a school like Nicholls. Coach Marlin thought LSU opening the refurbished CajunDome in December 2016 with funds going towards the flooding relief would have been great for both schools. Apparently the Tigers seriously considered this but never followed through. Perhaps it was because Coach Jones knew he was on the hot seat. Overall, I think LSU would benefit by playing more true out of conference road games as that would help prepare them for SEC play. This year they played only ONE of those. I have a hard time giving complete respect to schools that don't play true out of conference road games (LSU is only one of dozens of those). The Cajuns do have a good recruiting class coming in so they may be more consistently competitive in future years and playing in such an environment would be a low cost way to prepare the Tigers for conference play. That is the benefit of such a game for LSU. No you don't owe us anything and I understand your administration does things they believe is of benefit only to you as that is their job.
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