Radical Sun Belt Hoops schedule proposal

[T-Dog]

From the BBS board. Apparently this will.be voted on.

Here's the idea as posted on the Sun Belt message board.

-Divide the 12 teams into East and West divisions, six teams each. Play each division team twice and other division once for 16 games.

-After 16 games divide into pods of three by the standings. 1-3, 4-6, 7-9 and 10-12. For last 4 conference games everyone plays the other 2 teams in your pod home and away (4 total games). So total of 20 conference games.

-Tournament will be 10 teams. Seeds 1-2 bye to semis and seeds 3-4 to quarters.

-Round 1 will be seeds 7 vs 10 and 8-9 on home courts. Winners join the top six in NOLA.

-Round 2 will be the 5 seed vs 8-9 winner and 6 seed vs 7-10 winner.

-Round 3 will be the 3 seed vs 6/7/10 winner and 4 seed vs 5/8/9 winner

-Semifinals will be the 1 seed vs 4/5/8/9 seed and 2 seed vs 3/6/7/10. Winners meet in finals.

-For tournament seeding, teams in pod 1-3 will be guaranteed top 3 seeds regardless of final standings.

-Only 1 team in pod 10-12 will make tourney.

-A committee will rank teams 4-10 based on whole season not necessarily final conference standing.

[NoLongerLurking]

So many words, so few winning records.

[Saint3333]

Let’s try and avoid ever getting an at-large bid.

Let’s go to 16 conference games as the first part suggests and set OOC scheduling standards to maximize RPI.

Sometimes people forget to keep it simple.

[BUTCH1991]

That's just crazy.

[Saint3333]

20 conference games is the lazy way out.

[huskie3]

I like the first part, 16 games in East West format. The rest sounds like middle school scheduling.

[dman4x]

That looks like an RPI disaster and a scheduling nightmare.

[bigCasu]

For the third time, this is dumb.

[NO.2]

I would LOVE to hear Fox's taeks on this one. I can see the forehead veins popping as I type.

[AppGrad78]

When NASCAR adopted its head-scratching formula for determining a race winner and a champion, it lost fans by the millions. Certainly there are other factors influencing NASCAR's decline, but the Sun Belt best heed the folly of others.

Keep it simple, Sun Belt.

[T-Dog]

Update.

The tournament idea in the original post is likely happening per stAte's AD.

He also mentioned a full round-robin schedule for hoops, but that would be 22 league games and is incredibly lazy.

The pod idea apparently was discussed, with an idea of resetting halfway through the league schedule.

Nothing has been finalized yet.

[spacemonkey]

ROUND-ROBIN!!! 22 games against teams that matter. Our OOC schedule is HORRIBLE. We need Rivalries from the conference. It is all headed this way.

We should also sign a CUSA, AAC, MAC crossover weekends contract for our ooc schedules. Should be a yearly event with all three playing our closest crossover team. We should play ODU,Marshall or Charlotte (CUSA) ; East Carolina (AAC). Play highest ranked vs Highest ranked against MAC.

[huskie3]

Appears CUSA is using the same idea. The hope is improved RPI, higher NCAA seed and chance for more than one team getting in.

[T-Dog]

Yep, CUSA is going with the pods in effort to get a second team in the tourney.

http://www.herald-dispatch.com/sports/m ... 8accd.html

[huskie3]

https://www.sbnation.com/2018/5/28/1740 ... ball-ideas

As more conferences are looking at the idea of best teams playing each other near end of season some are looking to extend it to football. I like the idea of FB 'bracket buster' games between conferences (SB - CUSA).

It does concern me that impressing post season tournament selection committee is the driving force behind this. It is like teachers 'teaching to the test'.

[bigCasu]

Conference USA also thought media marketz were the best way to expand into college football. We have seen how that has turned out as well. Playing to this pod idea, and attempting to improve RPI will just lead to new and improved metrics to determine quality at large teams' consideration for the NCAAT. Using RPI is already a pretty flawed system, IMO. All of these conferences still use the conference tournament to determine their NCAA bid. This does not keep a lower seeded team from making a run in their conference tournament and ruining the entire system.

[T-Dog]

It's happening.

http://sunbeltsports.org/news/2018/6/4/ ... -plan.aspx

[NoLongerLurking]

It's happening.

http://sunbeltsports.org/news/2018/6/4/ ... -plan.aspx

T Dog,

Will you simplify this so that those of us with no interest in basketball can understand what is going on? Is this a big deal? Thanks.

[hapapp]

This format will certainly help the regular season champ or Pod 1 winner in their pursuit of a title but I fail to see how this really makes the Belt more than a one bid league.

[T-Dog]

This is a big deal and is fascinating. National pundits like the idea of since the idea in theory is to help the top teams. Hope the league steps up financially to help with the pod schedule travelling as your gonna have some last-minute plane trips.

The tournament idea starting in 2020 is a step forward IMO. I like the Final Four idea since having the whole thing in NOLA has been death.

The non-conference scheduling standard is a good start, but needs to be the first in a series of steps. Leagues that have OOC standards like the A-10 have benefited big time.