TheTastyGreek

Not necessarily. What's the best way to get over missing out on a 6'6" guard that ESPN had ranked 53rd and Rivals had ranked 67th in the country in the class of 2009? Could it be bringing in the 6'5" guard that ESPN had ranked 44th and Rivals had 58th the same year? EDIT: Especially when you consider that Player A bailed out just days after swearing he wasn't going anywhere, leaving because he wanted to be a star and leaving his team at the start of the season, while Player B has tried to make the best of a reserve role, hustling hard in every chance he gets on the floor and would only be leaving because his team is practically pushing him out of his scholarship?

That loud clicking sound wasn't rings hitting the railing... Someone should tell Isiah it was the sound of Alonzo Edwards finding his niche on this team. This is a big win. FIU has the best raw talent in the league. Roberts/Ferguson/Legion/Frederick/Gary/Wright is THE strongest first 6 in the conference. Give that roster to Ronnie Arrow, JJ, Steve Shields, Bob Marlin, or Mike Jarvis... They could easily sweep the Sun Belt. If ANYONE ever decides to actually coach that team, they'll be a nightmare. The talent is just too tremendous. We're lucky they didn't out-athlete us tonight. Thank goodness Isiah can't be bothered to watch shootaround or coach his guys on when to foul. If we win the West, we want FIU to finish anywhere but 4th in the East. First, third, or fifth, and they wouldn't play us until the finals. Second, and they'd potentially play us in the semis. But 4th in the east means a win from them puts them in a quarterfinal game against the West champs. I won't speak for anyone else, but I'd rather not play them cold, early in the tournament.

5 weeks long?

Will not happen. If Denver makes the NCAA tournament, I'll buy the tickets for everyone on their basketball forum.

If we're going to start laughing at every disrespected lower tier school that starts thinking their program is taking off and their recruiting is going to explode just because Riley Dodge backs out of a commitment to a bigger program in Texas to come play for them, well... Wait, what?

Now that I've seen a D-1AA message board, it's more critical than ever that we never, ever slip down to that level again.

And don't miss the afterparty, 7:00 the next night at the Super Pit. 24 hours of marathon NT sports celebration. We've got guests coming down from Arkansas just to be a part of it.

Every time this thread gets bumped, it reminds me I need to buy groceries. I hope you all keep hashing this out with each other at least through Saturday afternoon. After that, you can just please stop.

It's true. We're like a semi-feral band of orphans with a very thorough understanding of the Castle Doctrine. Use soft, inviting tones, don't make abrupt moves, and don't show fear. Give it a day or two, scratch CBL behind the ears, and everything will be fine.

Also, for autobids, Lunardi goes with whoever is leading the conference at any given time. We've got a loss on us, FAU is 4-0, and they have the best RPI (which I think is his tiebreaker in those situations).

As GrayEagle's attorney, I would like to plead temporary insanity and appeal to your handsomist, mercifulist nature. And if that doesn't work, I will miss you, GrayEagle. Move over runaway dog and quarterback... The forum may be losing another loved one.

Since last Monday, we lost to MTSU. #8 Drexel went 1-2 with losses to Hofstra and VCU, win against Delaware #10 George Mason went 1-2, losses to Hofstra and Old Dominion, win against Delaware #11 Portland lost to Gonzaga #12 VCU went 2-1, loss to Georgia State and wins against Drexel and UNC Wilmington #13 Coastal Carolina went 2-0, beating Virginia Military and Liberty #14 Montana went 1-1 with a loss to Northern Colorado and a win against Sacramento State Only Coastal Carolina is really primed to make a jump, and we may actually stick around in the top 10.

To be fair, they could just dislike police officers. Or they could be Texas fans. It's been a few weeks since anyone started pointing out without reason or relevance that you're a black guy. Don't just automatically assume racism. Little known historical fact: James Earl Ray just didn't like moustaches on preachers. Like all devout Muslims, Ray believed that a full beard was appropriate. Race had nothing to do with it.

Realtime registered the loss (wrong score, but it's on the record as an overall and conference loss) and we fell to 89. Way better than I was expecting once you pointed out the mistake.

The Montgomery bus system doesn't need quitters.

If I were a congressional republican, I'd be looking out for Robin Hood or Orion at any of my meet-and-greets. I was wondering why CBL had started growing an Errol Flynn moustache...

Agree, agree with all the sentiments you expressed here. +1 BUT... If this guy had been a Muslim, or looked remotely middle eastern...

Also tonight, LSU beat Auburn. Sam Houston State, Texas State, Texas Southern, Grambling, and Jackson State all won. Rice lost to Tulsa, Texas Tech lost to Baylor. UTA had an unhelpful loss to Nicholls State. 6 wins (one effectively gets counted twice thanks to 2 games against Texas State), 2 losses to quality RPI teams, and one game that will hurt us a little bit. Kansas had the night off. We had an RPI of 82 today, and we may actually go up another spot or two again despite another inactive day.

If we finish conference at 13-3 (very possible, even with the bummer loss to MTSU), I think we win the regular season title outright. That guarantees us the NIT bid, a worst-case record (round 1 SBC tourney loss) of 24-6 and a likely 6 seed in the NIT. Courtland is the NITologist, I leave further NIT analysis and speculation to him. If we win the SBC tournament, that would give us a 27-5 record and a minimum 14 seed with a strong shot at a 13 in the NCAA tournament. A strong finish and conference tournament win from us is almost this league's only shot at a spot above the 15 line. Depending on who wins it, we could see the SBC in the 16 line for the first time I know of. I'm pretty sure that no Sun Belt representative (or, as far as I know, current member of the Sun Belt) has ever been a 16 seed. If a non-bye team wins the tournament, or if a team like Denver or FIU wins 10-11 conference games, gets a 2 seed and wins the tournament, a 16 seed is VERY possible.

And if you throw ME some beads, I'll pull SUMG's top up. Also, I'll spring for a pitcher at Lucky's after a game. And I don't drink, so there's no competition to drink it.

USA vs. FIU has one of the worst video feeds in history online at Channelsurfing.

I love you. Welcome back. You are wrong. Last year, we played the tournament with a 6 man rotation. Odufuwa/Tramiel/White/Thompson all played 30-39 minutes each night for three straight nights. Mangrum and Shorter split most of the rest of the minutes. The only person to play more than 5 minutes in any game even once was Cam Spencer. He played 8 minutes in the final against Troy. 16 minutes total in 3 games, and he was the biggest bench contributor by far. Nobody else played more than 10 TOTAL minutes in the entire tournament. So, this year, with everyone in that rotation back but Tramiel and Mangrum, replacing the two of them with Kedrick Hogans and Dom Johnson... We're suddenly not deep enough to win? Even with 9 scholarship players at our disposal, we're deeper in terms of a tournament roster than we were last year. I'm not saying we're a slam dunk to win the thing. But depth is the concern for the tournament? Didn't seem to be a problem last year. And in 2007, I think we went 7 deep with guys who played serious minutes. If someone gets hurt, we're in trouble. But that would have been true last year, too. If everyone else is healthy, we're the toughest out in the tournament, even allowing for home court advantage to the Arkansas team.