Again everyone plays against lower level schools. Everyone.
This is not like years past where we have to win nearly every game to get a sniff at post season.
Based off of last year here is how our noncon finished in NET.
11/8 - Southern- 278
11/11 - Stetson- 157
11/17 - Pepperdine- 201
11/20 - FSU- 220
11/21 - Colorado (76)/Richmond (160)
11/28 - Akron- 105
12/6 - Dayton- 77
12/9 - LMU-111
12/13 - Creighton- 14
12/16 - SMC-11
12/21 - Hofstra -85
12/31 - Carroll College- not ranked- lower division
Now this is based off of last year's rankings and a lot can change.
For instance would you have thought that Florida State would be our second worst game? I didn't. They obviously had a really bad year last year, and the biggest potential to be much much better this year.
Conversely Stetson in the mid 100's is a solid game, especially as one of your bottom 4 "cupcakes". But I believe I read they were senior laden last year. They have the potential for the biggest drop off IMO.
Akron, Hoftsra, LMU are all good mid level games better than they look at first glance.
Creighton and SMC are the big hitters and most likely to be quad 1 games. I think Dayton on the road has a big chance at being quad 1 as well.
No one in the 300's which is big. If your worst games are in the low 200's (+ Southern), then that is better than most years. This is why getting Carroll is smart. It doesn't hurt your rankings.
Fun Fact, University of Houston, the number 1 NET last year played 5 teams in the 300's last year, FIVE!
This schedule is't the sexiest on paper, but it is sneaky good. Racking up wins with this schedule gets us top 20 NET easy.
Of course there are uncontrollable variables within an OOC, you can’t always know how they’ll pan out. But there should be a strong feel and if they perform outside of your expectations, that’s just one of those things … but come on, these guys have a strong feel.
This years OOC schedule, I think, is near what it should be, for the first time in awhile. But you defended all the poor schedules before this as being ok when they were clearly made to tally total wins (fool the fans) while sacrificing opportunity for the NCAAT. Meanwhile, while they may have tallied extra wins with those very poor schedules, only some were fooled, all were bored, no excitement at the Mack, no bodies at the Mack.
This isn’t UNM circa 1998 with a podunk town that offers nothing else and the fans fill the joint regardless while you build a ton of wins, maybe even get a ranking based on record, the fans go crazy only to see the team completely flop against any halfway decent team.
We’ve tried certain things the past 10 years. They haven’t worked in the slightest bit and the gate and postseason show it clearly.
You could look at last season’s OOC and say, 12-0 at best, 11-1 at worst. And still know it wouldn’t prepare us for conference and we wouldn’t get postseason. That means really poor OOC philosophy for that season.
This upcoming season, just superficially perusing it, I think we will lose 3 games in non-conference. If we do that or lose less, we will be in pretty decent position heading into conference season, both with preparedness and by resume. Even if you drop 4, you’ll still have that shot with a stronger conference season. But that’s what I mean by affording yourself some wiggle room with losses.
I do think there’s an art to OOC scheduling and sometimes you’ll gamble wrong. But I’d rather have less gamble and more substance. I do believe that we’ve pretty regularly scheduled scared. This year is more on par.
