Matt from A700

We had our chances. I won't say the refs cost us the game, but at least let me bitch about FAU. Just like the game in Denton last year, FAU needs to weather a run and they start flopping. Goldin is the worst. They are an incredible basketball team and don't need to resort to that garbage. I even yelled at the refs to be ready for it before the game started but apparently they didn't believe me.

Ball don't lie at the end there. Don't know how Stone was the one called for the foul when he was getting pushed. Then two missed over-the-backs on the free throw miss.

I agree that our crowd mics are either turned down too low or not positioned in the best place.

Less than 10 tickets left in the section behind our bench! But still plenty of $25 seats in the corner 112 section or $10 seats in the second level bleachers.

I saw that and that the Houston alumni chapter had quite a few people show up.

For people at the game, how's the crowd?

If 2023 was Caponi with a playbook and notes, I'd hate to see him starting from scratch...

I would love to see the alignment of major conferences go back to where it was 15 years ago, but I don't know if many of us would want to go back to the Sun Belt?

Memphis, Tulane, and USF do not have the brand names they think they do. All this horrible realignment has not left any more big-name G5's for the Big XII's or ACC's to backfill with. Memphis may have the history but right now I think Boise State is a bigger name than them.

My cubicle's not hidden enough to take the time to look at the past 5-10 years, but last year we only had three. Also, we didn't have a home game over Thanksgiving break either, since we were in the Bahamas.

But then you also have to factor in the small turnouts resulting from FOUR home games over Winter Break + another on the Saturday of Thanksgiving Break vs. a D-I team. I definitely think "the average Pit crowd" increased in size this year. Last year, there were hardly any people that sat behind the far baseline by the UNT bench. Now it seems Sections 123-124 get decently filled. SMU's big crowd may have been a one-off this year, but since Grant's CBI run and outside of Covid, we seem to have had at least one of those nice 6000+ crowds each year.

They should have been frustrated with their own terrible defense.

Gonna try to convince my wife/conservator to let me go to every game at Dickies next week between men's and women's. Can't wait.

I agree. Any growth at a non-power conference school with today's plethora of entertainment options and generation of students who don't care as much about sports is good.

I agree that the Pac-Whatever name would prevail. I know it looks bad to be coming up with an exit plan for a conference we've been in for less than a year and haven't won a championship in, but always have to be looking ahead. Considering the conference has already lost one school since we've joined, and programs like Memphis, Tulane, and USF are trying to escape (probably trying to position themselves to join the ACC if that conference falls apart). The American I think is extremely succeptible of allowing future conference realignment/purging pushing it to look like CUSA 2.0. While this hypothetical Pac-18 wouldn't have the prestige it did with all the schools that just bolted for the B10/B12, I do think there is a bigger sense of pride for the conference you play in when it boasts the name of the region it represents (Pac, SEC, ACC - although ACC is now the Any Coast Conference). The American, like CUSA, has a very random geographic footprint. Also, having institutions that are the University of their state (New Mexico, Hawaii, Nevada, Wyoming), or the State University of their state (CSU, USU, OSU, Wazzou) looks more big-time to me. Meanwhile in The American you've got a random collection of directional schools, schools that are branches of bigger institutions, small-name private schools, etc.)

On a serious note, it is crazy to me that Waco just finished expanding I-35 to eight lanes while it forever for Denton to get to six, and Fort Worth to Denton is still only four. Meanwhile I never have to exit there, but seeing all the development in Argyle and Robson Ranch area makes me mad for the people who have to suffer a two-lane FM 407 everyday.

Have not heard much on the recruiting front. Next year will really tell the tale, a LOT of talent to replace!

I know there are many here who didn't like the idea of joining the MWC because of the travel and late start times, but if the Pac-2 take all 12 MWC teams in this inevitable merger (IMO), add in the three biggest metros in Texas (us, UTSA, Rice) and UTEP and you'd have a solid (better than the AAC) 18-team conference that I believe would be pretty safe from future realignment-caused poaching since most power conferences are based in and eastward of Texas. You would have enough "eastern" teams in this hypothetical to where at worse, a divisional team would be only an hour behind us: Air Force, Colorado State, New Mexico, North Texas, Rice, UTEP, UTSA, Utah State, Wyoming. And all of those schools are not a bad drive to except for USU. That being said, I know the Pac-2 wants to pick-and-choose, so which MWC schools wouldn't make the cut?

SCHOOL CONF CPCT. OVERALL PCT. HOME AWAY NEUTRAL STREAK South Florida 15-1 .938 22-5 .815 14-2 7-3 1-0 W14 Florida Atlantic 12-4 .750 22-7 .759 12-1 4-5 6-1 W1 Charlotte 11-5 .688 17-11 .607 12-2 4-7 1-2 L3 Memphis 11-6 .647 22-8 .733 13-2 7-5 2-1 W4 UAB 10-6 .625 18-11 .621 11-5 6-5 1-1 L2 SMU 10-6 .625 19-10 .655 13-3 5-6 1-1 L3 North Texas 9-7 .562 16-12 .571 11-3 4-5 1-4 W2 East Carolina 7-9 .438 14-15 .483 11-8 3-6 0-1 L3 Tulsa 6-11 .353 15-14 .517 13-4 2-9 0-1 W1 Rice 5-11 .312 11-18 .379 6-9 5-6 0-3 L2 Wichita State 5-12 .294 13-17 .433 10-5 2-9 1-3 W2 UTSA 5-12 .294 11-19 .367 7-8 4-11 0-0 W3 Tulane 4-12 .250 13-15 .464 10-6 2-7 1-2 L6 Temple 4-12 .250 11-18 .379 5-8 4-7 2-3 L1 Players and coaches lie all the time when they say they don't look at the scores/standings, or care about who they play in the tournament, but as fans we can do what we want. With our win over ECU today, we have clinched no lower than the #7 seed. There are still three teams ahead of us currently that we could finish ahead of (Memphis - we own head-to-head, UAB - they win head-to-head, SMU - split season series), but we do not play any of them in our last two games. Here's what all three of those teams have left: Memphis: 3/9 at FAU UAB: 3/7 at Temple, 3/10 vs. SMU SMU: 3/6 vs. ECU, 3/10 at UAB There could be a great shot that three or four teams tie with 11 conference wins. At that point, I'm not sure what the tiebreaker is. If you haven't seen it yet, here's what the conference tournament schedule would be with the seeding. Like I've talked about for a month now, the 6 or 7 seed would be better for game times to maximize homecourt advantage. #6 could likely avoid FAU until the semifinal. https://theamerican.org/tournaments/?id=294 And if the tournament started today: 2024 American Men's Basketball Championship Schedule Wednesday, March 13 Game 1 – No. 13 Tulane vs. No. 12 UTSA – 1 p.m. ET/Noon CT | ESPN+ Game 2 – No. 14 Temple vs. No. 11 Wichita State – 3 p.m. ET/2 p.m. CT | ESPN+ Thursday, March 14 Game 3 – No. 9 Tulsa vs. No. 8 East Carolina – 12:30 p.m. ET/11:30 a.m. CT | ESPNU Game 4 – Tulane/UTSA vs. No. 5 UAB – 2:30 p.m. ET/1:30 p.m. CT | ESPNU Game 5 – No. 10 Rice vs. No. 7 UNT – 7 p.m. ET/6 p.m. CT | ESPNU Game 6 – Temple/Wichita State vs. No. 6 SMU – 9 p.m. ET/8 p.m. CT | ESPNU Friday, March 15 Game 7 – Tulsa/ECU vs. No. 1 South Florida – 1 p.m. ET/Noon CT | ESPN2 Game 8 – Game 4 winner vs. No. 4 Memphis – 3 p.m. ET/2 p.m. CT | ESPN2 Game 9 – Game 5 winner vs. No. 2 FAU – 7 p.m. ET/6 p.m. CT | ESPNU Game 10 – Game 6 winner vs. No. 3 Charlotte – 9 p.m. ET/8 p.m. CT | ESPNU Saturday, March 16 Game 11 – Semifinal 1, Game 7 winner vs. Game 8 winner – 3 p.m. ET/2 p.m. CT | ESPN2 Game 12 – Semifinal 2, Game 9 winner vs. Game 10 winner – 5 p.m. ET/4 p.m. CT | ESPN2 Sunday, March 17 Game 13 – Championship, Game 11 winner vs. Game 12 winner – 3:15 p.m. ET/2:15 p.m. CT | ESPN

I believe that is correct.

And if I'm mathing correcting, we only need an announced crowd of 2,572 to clinch our first 4,000 season average in a dozen years. And that year we only averaged 4,006, so we need just 2,677 to clinch our best season average in 47 years. It'd be our third-best attendance season in Super Pit history, although from the almanac CMJ shared a link to, there were five seasons early on that they did not have attendance history for.

Dang, it didn't seem that long between their title and NIT game with us. I guess because of Covid there was only one championship between the two mentioned games. I think I'm thinking of their lacrosse team who won national titles on both sides of the Covid year.

I'd like to hear others' thoughts on this, but instead of targeting a bunch of P5 role players/non-scorers in the portal (Allen, though I've loved his play, Walker, Noland, etc.) why don't we look for a couple more of the kids who are used to scoring 15-20ppg at the lower DII, DIII, NJCAA, NAIA levels, like TP and Edwards? Don't get me wrong, I love the guys we brought in, but besides Edwards, none of them were the go-to guys for their previous teams, and too often this year Jason had been virtually all of our offense.

I hate to play the woulda, coulda, shoulda game, but without injuries and if we could finish the last 5 minutes of games out - there was only three games we never played good enough to win (Mississippi State, Charlotte, @ UAB), and I know we had a 10-point lead early in Tupelo.