TheTastyGreek

It won't be. The only early round site anywhere close to Texas is Tulsa. The other games are in D.C., Tucson, Denver, Tampa, Cleveland, Charlotte, and Chicago. Looking at what seeds Tulsa hosts, I don't think we'll end up there. And besides... A session ticket for the Tulsa games is $237. A full Sun Belt tournament ticket book costs $90 through North Texas, and four days of accommodations plus tickets will come out to a total of around $230-250, total. For a 4 day trip where every day is like a bowl game, and only two of those days are typical work days. Plus, as great as it was to see us play the tournament game in person... NCAA days are a lot better on TV when you can see all the games and upsets. If I absolutely had to choose between Hot Springs or NCAA tournament, having experienced both... I'd take Hot Springs and watch the NCAAs on TV.

We played 7 of our regular season games against Texas D-1 basketball teams. That's all but 4 of our D-1 non conference schedule and 1/4th of our total schedule.

Don't care, don't care, don't care. Any way we get there is fine with me. We just need to start rehearsing the 1:46 a.m. "I'm Pregnant" speech. This late night hook-up is going to LAST.

DON'T ASK.

He's just using the podcast to audition for your sidekick on Diamond Talk. Remember- If he says anything about how the Rangers need more pitching help... He stole that from ME.

New poll comes out tomorrow... I don't think we'll move up higher than our last spot of 10th. The only team close ahead of us to drop a game was George Mason, and that was a loss to Dayton. They'll probably drop one or two spots from 7th, but not below us. Kent State is going to drop like a rock, but Portland might leapfrog us. They had a great week, wins against Nevada and Utah, and they're 12-3 against a pretty solid schedule. Coastal Carolina won twice to get to 12-2, but they'll almost certainly stay below us. 50/50 between a ranking of 10th or 11th.

As long as you buy your tickets in advance (don't buy as a walk-up every day) you shouldn't have to worry about it. Buying as a walk up could be a problem if UALR and ASU both made decent runs in the tournament, or if either has a strong regular season and looks like a strong contender. Lodgings may be a problem. Hotels, especially walking distance hotels, do fill up early. The team hotels and the ones within a block or two of the arena book up quickly. As you've ready here, some are already telling people they're full up, 2 months in advance. But if you're driving in, you can go with a hotel a little farther out. There's no charge for parking at the arena, so you won't be spending any money there. We did the hotel thing the first year at Hot Springs, and I think we stayed at a Knights Inn about 10 minutes from the arena and bathhouse row. Didn't reserve it until the week before.

If anyone is planning on going with a group of at least 2 or 3 friends or family, let me know if you want help finding a rental house or condo. Last year, we had 6 people in a 2 bedroom 2 bath house that was walking distance to the arena and bathhouse row, and it cost a little less than $95 per person total for all four nights. This year, we've got 11-15 people in a 3 story, 5 bedroom/4.5 bathroom lake house, and it's going to come out to about $140-165 apiece total for all four nights. Theater room, boat slip, pool table... Should be nice. If you travel with a group, it can be very reasonable if you shop around for a rental instead of a hotel. We've done hotels and house rentals, and it's a great time either way. With a hotel, you can check out early if things don't go well for us and you aren't interested in the rest of the event. With a house, it tends to run cheaper and you get the comfort and amenities of a full living space. Whatever anyone does, I strongly encourage everyone to make the trip. Especially this year. ?

We put walkons in with 4 minutes left to play. Ben Knox logged 31 minutes.

I did see 15 or 20 Texas State people at our basketball game last month... That's an additional $140-$240 bucks we made right there, people. Cash paper. FOLDING money. Now we just need to schedule about 350,000 to 525,000 more Texas State basketball games, and we'll have that stadium paid off in no time!

It should be business as usual for the top 4 or 5 teams in the Belt. 150 or better RPI teams are exempt, so other than no sub-D1 games, not much will change in approach or results. Losing D-2 tuneup games may cost us a win every 2 or 3 years because of having to take a road game or playing a D-1 schedule filler that happens to have a hot night, but otherwise, nothing changes. Since nothing the conference can do will get those bottom teams to win more, the rule will make them hurt everyone else less. The 23 win UALR team from 2008-09 would have probably gotten a postseason bid to the NIT. They finished the year with an RPI of 91, and under the 150 rule they probably would have been in the mid 70's. What it could mean in a year like this would be having some hope for an at-large depending on how the season played out. If (and I'm just talking very hypothetically here) we go something like 14-2 or 15-1 in conference, we'd end the regular season 25-4 or 26-3. Even under that very successful set of circumstances, we'd still need to win the tournament to get in. But if the bottom of the league weren't SO terrible this year, we could conceivably lose in the finals, finish 27-5 or 28-4, and potentially have as good a shot at the at-large as South Alabama did back in 2008. As it is now... It's possible (in imagination land, not actually predicting this) that we could win out through conference play, finish the regular season 27-2, and lose in the finals to whatever the second best RPI team in the league wound up being (FAU? UALR? WKU?). If that happened, we'd end the year 29-3 with losses to at least two NCAA teams (Kansas and whoever won the SBC tournament) and possibly a 3rd if SHSU wins the Southland. And we'd probably be one of those sad teams they show looking dejected after the last bracket is announced in the NCAA selection show, without our name getting called. All because the 0-1-2 win OOC teams at the bottom of the league killed the conference RPI so badly. I wouldn't expect the SBC to turn into annual contenders for at-large bids. But the rule would ensure that an exceptional team could slip up in the tournament and still have a viable shot at an NCAA trip, or a strong 2nd place team wouldn't have to worry about missing out on postseason play entirely because of losing the tournament and not having an NIT auto-bid. Short answer... The 150 rule probably means the conference can get an at-large bid every 3-5 years consistently instead of every 10 years if we're lucky.

Scotto on the UALR forum did the math, and the shift in elevation from sea level to Denver changes the distance on what would be a 20 foot shot at sea level by 11 inches. I'm not a physicist and I don't know how he came to that number, but the UALR people are an older and more intelligent/reserved group than most message board people, so I give him credit for having at least some idea of what he's talking about. Score inside, adjust quickly during warmups, or struggle.

If anyone ever wondered what an argument between Joe Morgan and Michael Sturns would sound like... This is probably a pretty good approximation.

I don't see a league with program budget issues and a misguided overemphasis on football passing up the Missouri Valley conference. The 150 rule isn't going to magically generate revenue or raise the level of give-a-damn at some of the programs that kill our RPI... It will just minimize the damage that they can do. Passing the MVC means passing a conference where everyone treats basketball as the main priority, and everyone takes it seriously. Not likely to happen.

One other semi-rhetorical question... If the particulars of HOW and WHY a kid comes to play at North Texas are so important... If it's absolutely critical that he love us first, most, only, and to the exclusions of all others anywhere and everywhere... If an athlete taking any and all time available to make sure it's the right decision is such a grievous insult to our institutional honor that we ought to withdraw the option to join our football program... Why would we ever take transfers? Or JUCO players at all, for that matter?

I agree we should draw a hard, firm deadline. It should be January 15th. Until then, as long as he's available... We sort of have to hope that he ultimately does decide to follow through and sign with us. The coaching staff has decided (and that's usually an unimpeachable final decision for you) that this kid shouldn't be given an ultimatum. And if there's anyone else out there remotely in his league (or even both potentially interested AND worthy of a D-1 scholarship), they haven't found them or decided it's worth abandoning the hope to settle for Plan B. Again... We sort of went through this with Shavod Atkinson. And I remember back in 1998, there was a huge article (more than half a page) in the Dallas Morning News where Spencer Stack was whining about how we were the only D-1 school to even offer him a scholarship despite his stats and the state championship. Even after he's already committed, he was complaining in print about how nobody else was interested and he felt insulted that we were his only D-1 option. This sort of stuff happens. It has happened in the past, it's happening now, it'll happen in the future. I don't care if we're a last option, so long as the talented guys end up here, play well, and represent the school appropriately. I hope the day comes when immediate starter DTs are trying to elbow each other out of the way to sign LOIs with us. But trying to act like that day is already here does nothing but hurt the team. Fortunately, the coaches don't seem to share that perspective.

Agreed. AGREED. The MWC spends more, succeeds at a higher level, and carries more national respect than C-USA. Don't get me wrong... I'd definitely take C-USA over the Sun Belt. But too many people here still get their dick hard fantasizing about potentially hobnobbing with the butt-scraping bottom of the old SWC and a bunch of private schools. Even the "regional" advantages are blown way out of proportion. I can't help but laugh a little every time I read about how being in a conference with other Texas schools like UTEP makes C-USA such a great fit for us. Because El Paso is the same road trip as Mobile, Alabama, just in the opposite direction. So much of the griping and complaining about or athletics programs centers on either a perceived disrespect from other institutions or perceived inferiority complexes among our leadership and alumni. So why are so many people here hoping dreaming wishing pining for a chance to maybe beg our way into a league with a bunch of do nothing shitsacks (and Memphis) who will see us as a tagalong lesser program, instead of hoping we can JUMP OVER ALL OF THEM to a better conference affiliation altogether? Even with the TCU/Utah/BYU departures, the Mountain West is DRAMATICALLY better in both football and basketball than Conference USA. If there's any way to get in there, we ought to be trying to batter down the door day and night.

I could see either of these games going either way. CBL thinks Lafayette is going to jump up significantly now that conference play has started, but they have to travel to Denver. Then again, Denver has sucked, home and away, and that home court advantage may not be what it was in years past. And ASU/USA are both desperate. We talked a lot about this one and the two teams in it in this week's podcast, but we didn't make any predictions. I think CBL probably favors South Alabama, but I think it's a toss-up. The ULL/Denver game is interesting, but the ASU/USA game is the one I really wish I could watch or listen to. It's nice to have three home games this week, but it sucks to not get to follow this game, too. There's a one hour stagger start relative to our game... So if one of you out-of-towners wants to share stream of game thoughts if you happen to watch or listen, that would be greatly appreciated.

When has Troy ever been worthy of a top 25 ranking? I've asked this before when you talk about MAC voting coalitions, but when specifically has a worthy Sun Belt team been left out of the Top 25?

There's a minimal threshold that seems to be critical for success, at least in basketball. 30 at large bids have gone to 23 non-BCS teams in the past 5 NCAA tournaments. Before that, you have realignment issues like Cincinnati being a C-USA team that make this year's numbers irrelevant to the situation at the time. Of those 30 at-larges, only six have gone to programs that spend less than $2 million on basketball. Three of those six went to Butler, and another went to Saint Mary's, which is just $32,017 below the $2 million mark. The other two went to South Alabama and Northern Iowa, both of which spend over $1.5 million. So out of 23 at-large teams from the past half decade, only 4 spent even a dollar less than $2 million and none of them were below $1.5 million. 11 of them went to "mid majors" that spend between just under $3 million to as much as $4.6 million on basketball. Half of the 30 went to teams that spend more than double what we do on basketball.

Really? I think if there actually were a flood of viable college DTs ready, willing, and able to sign with North Texas... We wouldn't be in this situation.

It's the start of a critical 16 game stretch...

Duke spent $13 million on the sport and won a national championship. Texas Southern spent under $700k and didn't even win the SWAC. I don't see the point. Profit may not be of any relevance, but expenditures is a VERY meaningful figure.

The healthiest relationships always start with waffling and sharp ultimatums.

The way I remember it, they had interest, but their class was full with verbals and they were wanting him only if one of their commits fell through on signing day. He committed to us, they came sniffing around, and he ultimately signed on with us but not until after going silent for a while. I remember a thread from signing day 2009 where we were tracking the West Virginia signings to see if any of their scholarships opened up at the last minute. EDIT: Looked back at Vito's old blogs and the threads... Atkinson told Vito he had an offer from them, but they didn't have a scholarship that was actually available. Then he went from being Vito's "favorite recruit" because of immediate responses to going very, very quiet. The only ship WVU had open up on signing day wound up getting shifted to a guy who had been an Ohio commit, and Shavod faxed in his LOI with us right around the time that the Ohio kid got that one free scholarship.