Auto Bid for CC winner

[Moranis]

There has been a lot more talk about who should get the automatic bid from the traditionally 1 bid conferences.  More and more discussion about removing the auto bid from the conference tournament winner and just going with the best team because if you only get 1 team in you should send your best team.  A team like Navy, for example, went 17-1 during the Patriot league regular season.  They are 26-7 overall after losing by 1 to Bsoton in the conference tournament semis.  They beat Boston twice in the regular season.  Boston was 10-8 in the conference and is 17-16 overall.  Boston plays Lehigh who was 11-7 in conference and is also 17-16 overall.  Boston or Lehigh will represent the Patriot League at 18-16 while 26-7 Navy that dominated the conference all year is at home. 

I get the conference tournaments are on ESPN and bring money to the conference,  but I think they would benefit so much more if their best team was in the big dance as every win there is a lot more money and exposure. 

So with those factors in play, I was thinking about a way for a conference to still have meaning to the conference tournament while still sending their best team to the big dance and came up with a point system.  Every regular season win is worth 1 point while every conference tournament win (in the main bracket) is worth 1.5 points.  So the tournament games are weighted a bit more.  Using that with the Patriot League Navy would have been in before the conference tournament started as they had a 6 point lead on both Colgate and Lehigh.  While a conference like the Colonial Athletic would have been in doubt b/c UNC Wilmington was 15-3, Charleston was 14-4, Hofstra was 12-6, and Monmouth was 11-7.  UNCW and Charleston both lost their 1st game, so points remain 15 and 14.  Hofstra plays Monmouth tonight for the title, both have 2 wins or 3 points, so the winner's 4.5 points would get them the automatic birth.  So because that conference was close and the 2 best teams lost in the quarters without a win, the door was opened. 

Thoughts?

[Celtics2021]

Thoughts are that the school is Boston University, not Boston.   Also, conferences are under no obligation to have conference tournaments.  The Ivy League until relatively recently sent their regular-season champ to the tournament.  The Patriot League could choose to do that if the want, but buzzer beaters like BU the other day are pretty much the only time most anyone remembers the Patriot League exists, so in my opinion they would be wise not to change anything.

Go Terriers!

[Moranis]

Thoughts are that the school is Boston University, not Boston.   Also, conferences are under no obligation to have conference tournaments.  The Ivy League until relatively recently sent their regular-season champ to the tournament.  The Patriot League could choose to do that if the want, but buzzer beaters like BU the other day are pretty much the only time most anyone remembers the Patriot League exists, so in my opinion they would be wise not to change anything.

Go Terriers!

Wouldn't people remember the conference more if Navy goes on a Cinderella run in the big dance?

[Celtics2021]

Thoughts are that the school is Boston University, not Boston.   Also, conferences are under no obligation to have conference tournaments.  The Ivy League until relatively recently sent their regular-season champ to the tournament.  The Patriot League could choose to do that if the want, but buzzer beaters like BU the other day are pretty much the only time most anyone remembers the Patriot League exists, so in my opinion they would be wise not to change anything.

Go Terriers!

Wouldn't people remember the conference more if Navy goes on a Cinderella run in the big dance?

Navy had about as much chance of winning its first-round game as BU or Lehigh.  Its ratings in all of the major rankings the committee uses for seedings is in the 130-150 range.  Any of them would have been 16-seeds.  They played the 361st strongest schedule out of 365 D-1 teams.

Again, if the Patriot League wants to get rid of its conference tourney, it can.  As it stands, they chose to have one, but one that favors the top seeds, as the games are not held at neutral sites, but rather at the home site of the higher seed, and with days off in between games, so as to reduce the chaos of tournaments.

[bdm860]

I think the a tournament invite being on the line makes those low level college tournaments super interesting, it would be a huge mistake to get rid of it.

Also a lot of the past cinderellas either weren't the best team in a non-power conference, or lost their conference tournament, or both.

'06 George Mason, lost in their conference tournament (CAA), then went #11 to Final Four.
'11 VCU, lost in their conference tournament (4th in the CAA), then went First Four to Final Four
'13 Florida Gulf Coast (2nd in the A-Sun), first #15 to go to Sweet 16.
'18 UMBC (2nd in AmEast), first #16 to beat a #1.
'22 Saint Peters (2nd in the MAAC), first #15 to make the Elite Eight
'23 Fairleigh Dickinson (2nd in NEC), second #16 to beat a #1.

[Moranis]

I think the a tournament invite being on the line makes those low level college tournaments super interesting, it would be a huge mistake to get rid of it.

Also a lot of the past cinderellas either weren't the best team in a non-power conference, or lost their conference tournament, or both.

'06 George Mason, lost in their conference tournament (CAA), then went #11 to Final Four.
'11 VCU, lost in their conference tournament (4th in the CAA), then went First Four to Final Four
'13 Florida Gulf Coast (2nd in the A-Sun), first #15 to go to Sweet 16.
'18 UMBC (2nd in AmEast), first #16 to beat a #1.
'22 Saint Peters (2nd in the MAAC), first #15 to make the Elite Eight
'23 Fairleigh Dickinson (2nd in NEC), second #16 to beat a #1.

How many minutes of those super interesting conference tournaments have you watched?

[Donoghus]

FWIW, 17 win & 15 loss UMass just knocked off undefeated Miami of Ohio in the quarterfinals of the MAC tournament.

[Moranis]

FWIW, 17 win & 15 loss UMass just knocked off undefeated Miami of Ohio in the quarterfinals of the MAC tournament.

Will be really interesting to see if Maimi makes it in.  Had they lost to Akron in the MAC championship, both would have been in I think. Now there is real doubt.

[Celtics2021]

FWIW, 17 win & 15 loss UMass just knocked off undefeated Miami of Ohio in the quarterfinals of the MAC tournament.

Miami is going to have to do a lot of hoping over the next three days.  I personally don?t think they deserve to be in.  Their schedule was a joke.  Sure, they play in a weak conference, that?s fine.  They scheduled no games against power conference teams.  They scheduled more games against Division 2 opponents (three) than they did against non-conference opponents with winning records.  Aside from whomever comes out of the MAC, they played one opponent that will make the tourney ? #127th-ranked, and certain #16 seed, Wright St.  And entering today, they were one spot lower-ranked than their fellow MAC contender Akron in the NET rankings the committee favors.  There will probably be 10 or so teams with better resumes that are left out of the tourney than Miami.  The only reason Miami was talked about is because the went undefeated, but the only reason they went undefeated is because their schedule was awful, and they should not be rewarded for that.

[Moranis]

As an aside, the MAC has 6 schools from Ohio, this year they were the 6 best teams in the regular season.  I'm sure there is some level of coincidence there, but last year they had the top 5 and 8th and year before they had top 3, 5 of top 6, and 8th.  Maybe the Ohio schools have more NIL money available and it is the new normal and not a coincidence. UMass joined this past season taking the conference to 13 teams overall.

[Moranis]

FWIW, 17 win & 15 loss UMass just knocked off undefeated Miami of Ohio in the quarterfinals of the MAC tournament.

Miami is going to have to do a lot of hoping over the next three days.  I personally don?t think they deserve to be in.  Their schedule was a joke.  Sure, they play in a week conference, that?s fine.  They scheduled no games against power conference teams.  They scheduled more games against Division 2 opponents (three) than they did against non-conference opponents with winning records.  Aside from whomever comes out of the MAC, they played one opponent that will make the tourney ? #127th-ranked, and certain #16 seed, Wright St.  And entering today, they were one spot lower-ranked than their fellow MAC contender Akron.  There will probably be 10 or so teams with better resumes that are left out of the tourney than Miami.  The only reason Miami was talked about is because the went undefeated, but the only reason they went undefeated is because their schedule was awful, and they should not be rewarded for that.

Miami reached out to basically every major conference team and no one would play them.  They were told that those teams only wanted to schedule tier 1 teams or tier 4 teams i.e. teams that would be a good loss if they lost or basically a guaranteed win.   Miami kept several open dates until October in case a team changed their mind and then on the eve of the season added the 3 NAIA games when no one would play them.

If the big schools won't play them, it then isnt fair to hold that against them. 

[Celtics2021]

FWIW, 17 win & 15 loss UMass just knocked off undefeated Miami of Ohio in the quarterfinals of the MAC tournament.

Miami is going to have to do a lot of hoping over the next three days.  I personally don?t think they deserve to be in.  Their schedule was a joke.  Sure, they play in a week conference, that?s fine.  They scheduled no games against power conference teams.  They scheduled more games against Division 2 opponents (three) than they did against non-conference opponents with winning records.  Aside from whomever comes out of the MAC, they played one opponent that will make the tourney ? #127th-ranked, and certain #16 seed, Wright St.  And entering today, they were one spot lower-ranked than their fellow MAC contender Akron.  There will probably be 10 or so teams with better resumes that are left out of the tourney than Miami.  The only reason Miami was talked about is because the went undefeated, but the only reason they went undefeated is because their schedule was awful, and they should not be rewarded for that.

Miami reached out to basically every major conference team and mo one would play them.  They were told that those teams only wanted to schedule tier 1 teams or tier 4 teams i.e. teams that would be a good loss if they lost or basically a guaranteed win.   Miami kept several open dates until October in case a team changed their mind and then on the even of the season added the NAIA games when no one would play them.

If the big schools won't play them, it then isnt fair to hold that against them.

I highly doubt that to be true.  No other team has trouble scheduling a few games.  Akron played Purdue.  South Florida got OK State and Alabama. McNeese played Michigan.  Tulsa played Kansas St.  Those are all mid-majors within 10 spots of Miami in the NET. 

And further, there are plenty of quality mid-majors they could have played, but did not.  Air Force went 3-29 this year, but they went 4-28 last year and 9-22 the year before.  I am sure Miami could have found another Mountain West School to play, but I am not so sure they could have beaten more than half of their options.  There were 7 teams from the nearby Missouri Valley Conference that were better than any non-conference opponent Miami played.  5 West Coast Conference teams.  Six A-10 schools.  Five from the American Conference.  There were plenty of quality mid-majors that they could have sought out if truly shut out by the power conferences, which again, is a dubious claim they are making.  That they played 3 Division 2 or NAIA programs is on them.  That they also played #349 (out of 365) Air Force, #339 Maine, #317 Arkansas Pine-Bluff, #292 UNC Greensboro, #291 Eastern Kentucky, and #276 Mercyhurst is also on them.  That is 2 out of their 10 D-1 non-conference games against teams in the bottom 10% of D-1 teams and 6 of 10 coming from the bottom 25%.  No other mid-major had this problem. 

[Redz]

UMASs added a little wrinkle to the bracket makers? quandary. Miami needs to get in with one loss still

[Moranis]

They had a poor schedule, but there are tons of news stories out there about them trying to add some big conference schools that wouldn't add them.  And some of their other games fell off a lot. I mean UNC Greensboro was a 20 win team last year.  UNC Asheville won 21 games the year before.  Wright State won the Horizon this year and Miami beat them on the road. 

One of the teams they reached out to was Wisconsin who on November 7 played Northern Illinois and on December 22 played Central Michigan.  2 MAC schools on dates that Miami left open to play a power team. Wisconsin chose the easier games.  They also reached out to Ohio State, who on November 7 played Purdue Fort Wayne and December 23 played Grambling.  Miami's other NAIA game was December 2.  Ohio State had a bye that week.  Pittsburgh played Longwood on November 7 instead of Miami.  On December 22 Kansas played Davidson. BYU played Holy Cross on November 8, California Baptist on December 3, and Eastern Washington on December 22. 

There are records showing Miami reaching out to those teams about getting on the schedule during times they had openings and in all those instances you see the easier opponent that was selected by those teams. 

[Celtics2021]

They had a poor schedule, but there are tons of news stories out there about them trying to add some big conference schools that wouldn't add them.  And some of their other games fell off a lot. I mean UNC Greensboro was a 20 win team last year.  UNC Asheville won 21 games the year before.  Wright State won the Horizon this year and Miami beat them on the road. 

One of the teams they reached out to was Wisconsin who on November 7 played Northern Illinois and on December 22 played Central Michigan.  2 MAC schools on dates that Miami left open to play a power team. Wisconsin chose the easier games.  They also reached out to Ohio State, who on November 7 played Purdue Fort Wayne and December 23 played Grambling.  Miami's other NAIA game was December 2.  Ohio State had a bye that week.  Pittsburgh played Longwood on November 7 instead of Miami.  On December 22 Kansas played Davidson. BYU played Holy Cross on November 8, California Baptist on December 3, and Eastern Washington on December 22. 

There are records showing Miami reaching out to those teams about getting on the schedule during times they had openings and in all those instances you see the easier opponent that was selected by those teams.

The problem with this argument is that Miami was ranked 151 last year.  Davidson was 152.  Purdue Fort-Wayne was 156.  Cal Baptist 169.  When schools were making their schedules, Miami was not some dangerous mid-major to be avoided.  They were of similar quality to some of the schools other teams chose to play instead, which means that Miami probably did a poor job of negotiating, either in asking for too much money, trying to get a future home or neutral site game, or just jumping in late when the other school was already further down the line in the process. 

And again, Miami seemingly made no effort to schedule against decent mid-majors.  Their top opponent this year, as noted, is 127 in the NET rankings.  But if we look at the ratings from last year, when scheduling was performed, the top NET ranking from last year of any of this year?s opponents was 137, instead of 127, so there is not much in the way of bad luck.  They played only one game against a conference that earned an at-large bid last year (last-place Air Force of the Mountain West).  In fact, only one other conference they scheduled a game against has ever received an at-large bid (Sun Belt, last in 2013).  Even in the generous argument to Miami, they filled up 10 of their 13 non-conference games with teams that were likely to produce no more than one tournament team.  Unlike most of their conference, they did not even participate in an in-season tournament, which offer opportunities to play against mid-majors of similar quality.  Were they not invited or did they turn down an invitation? Given that 9 of the other 12 MAC schools participated in one, I will guess that Miami turned down an invitation.  Miami likes to play the victim, but the schedule is their responsibility, and either through incompetence or an attempt to game the system, they had the weakest scheduled by orders of magnitude over any other bubble team.  That should not be rewarded.