USA Today...Sagarin ratings today

[ChicosBailBonds]

I was at the hotel reading the USA Today and stumbled across the Sagarin ratings.  It had been a while since I had seen them. 

First, there are now 347 DI teams.  Incredible.

Second, I knew our schedule was soft thus far (as it should be considering UW-Madison, UT, Dayton, etc coming up) but I didn't think it was that soft.  343rd out of 347.

There are four Big East teams ranked in the top 11

The conference is ranked 3rd thus far.  Behind the ACC and the Big 12.

[mviale]

Your main man left us scrambling for a schedule.  Not bad considering that Buzz had to contain the 2008 class and continue to recruit for 2009-10.

[ecompt]

Don't understand how the conference could be third when we could have nine teams in the Top 25 next week.

[ChicosBailBonds]

Your main man left us scrambling for a schedule.  Not bad considering that Buzz had to contain the 2008 class and continue to recruit for 2009-10.

My main man?

[coach85]

Wow....Chicos offering doubt to something related to Buzz.......

News ?

NOT

[strobl2]

Does anyone know if we were invited to any tournaments in November?

[MUDPT]

Sagarin ratings mean jack right now.  The ratings are biased until everybody is connected.

[Avenue Commons]

What I object to is not how easy our schedule is, but why we play such random schools. Wouldn't we face the same level of competition (or better, which helps our RPI) by playing schools like Loyola-Chicago, UIC, University of Detroit, etc.?

Also seems to me that there would be more of a regional interest in playing schools like that. My guess is it is cheaper to play these "no-name" schools, but it can't be that much cheaper and we'd sell more tickets to regional competition a la UWM.

[muball]

schedule will be tougher now with Dayton, IPFW who played us tough last year, Wisc, Tenn, and NC State. 

[romey]

Avenue, I agree with you.  I know there are ties to certain schools for coaches, assistant coaches, etc and in a way we're "doing them a favor" by playing a team in their home state or where they went to school, or there may be some tie in, but heck, if you're going to play a D2 school in an exhibition, play a Wisconsin school, or an Illiinois school.

[Marquette84]

Avenue, I agree with you.  I know there are ties to certain schools for coaches, assistant coaches, etc and in a way we're "doing them a favor" by playing a team in their home state or where they went to school, or there may be some tie in, but heck, if you're going to play a D2 school in an exhibition, play a Wisconsin school, or an Illiinois school.

D1 schools from Wisconsin will draw--we already have two of the three on the schedule.

Otherwise:

Houston Baptist drew 13,668
Colorado State - Pueblo (exhibition) - 13,124
Texas Southern drew 12,993
Chicago State drew 12,966

Texas and Colorado are outdrawing Illinois.

[muwarrior87]

that's tickets sold, not butts in seats.

[ChicosBailBonds]

Wow....Chicos offering doubt to something related to Buzz.......

News ?

NOT

It's funny the lack of reading prowess some have these days.  If you read what I said, the schedule thus far is appropriate considering how tough it gets from here on out.  Perhaps you missed that part.  The only thing that surprised me was how low it was ranked this early.   

[Pakuni]

What I object to is not how easy our schedule is, but why we play such random schools. Wouldn't we face the same level of competition (or better, which helps our RPI) by playing schools like Loyola-Chicago, UIC, University of Detroit, etc.?

Also seems to me that there would be more of a regional interest in playing schools like that. My guess is it is cheaper to play these "no-name" schools, but it can't be that much cheaper and we'd sell more tickets to regional competition a la UWM.

Problem is, it's questionable whether those schools would play "buy" games with Marquette.
And it's nearly certain that if they did, the cost of the buy would be larger, perhaps much larger, than what MU is paying the likes of Houston Baptist, Western Carolina and Presbyterian. So, the athletic department has to weigh the additional costs of that buy against whatever additional ticket sales might be generated.
I suspect they've come to the conclusion that non season-ticket holders will not flock to MU vs. Loyola at significantly higher numbers than they would MU vs. Western Carolina. At least not enough to outweigh the additional costs of the buy.

[nola03]

Your main man left us scrambling for a schedule.  Not bad considering that Buzz had to contain the 2008 class and continue to recruit for 2009-10.

Laughable. 

There was plenty of time to work on the schedule as evidenced by the addition of the NC State series.

[wiscwarrior]

Buzz indicated during a TV interview with Dennis Krause that the only game he had any influence on in this year's schedule was the NC State game and even in that one he just signed off on it. He did not initiate the scheduling.

He went on to say that he will schedule according to what will help the team most in conference play. In years when the team is inexperienced he will schedule one way and when it has experience he will schedule another. Always with preparation for the conference season in mind.