Here We Go Again ... Breathless Media Reports That Buzz Is Leaving For Texas A&M

[Pakuni]

Was there a reason you made it a point to note that UC played Georgetown without Chris Wright but omitted that we played Notre Dame without Carleton Scott? 

Maybe because I'm not foolish enough to suggest Carleton Scott was as important to Notre Dame as Wright was to Georgetown.
ND went 2-3 in Scott's absence (or partial absence), all three games they probably would have lost with him (at Syracuse, at MU, at St. John's). They knocked off UConn and beat St. John's by 15 without Scott.
Georgetown went 0-4 without Wright, losing by an average of 14.5 points. Three of those losses were at home. It's even worse if you consider their NCAA tournament game, in which Wright clearly was far from 100 percent.

I'll grant you that Seton Hall was better than DePaul. 

Great.
now let's assume that instead of losing their last game at Seton Hall, MU gets another matchup with DePaul. Voila, they're 10-8 in conference. Then let's assume that instead of a second game with DePaul, Cincy has to travel to Seton Hall and matchup with a hot team (just ask Steve Lavin). Pretty good chance they're 10-8.
Still think I'm overestimating their difference in the schedule?

My bad on Vaughan.
7 of 9 top scorers back.

[Lennys Tap]

I'm dealing with Lenny.  My fear is that I haven't oversimplified enough yet.  We'll see.

I care not at all about your personal attacks as I consider the source, but don't you find it ironic that someone who whines at the mere hint of an insult would stoop so low? Guess we can add hypocritical to your growing list of endearing attributes.

And by the way you're not just dealing with me. As witnessed by this and any number of other threads, the list of people you drive crazy is a long and distinguished one.

[Marquette84]

Maybe because I'm not foolish enough to suggest Carleton Scott was as important to Notre Dame as Wright was to Georgetown.
ND went 2-3 in Scott's absence (or partial absence), all three games they probably would have lost with him (at Syracuse, at MU, at St. John's).
They knocked off UConn and beat St. John's by 15 without Scott.

He was a starter and their leading rebounder and shot blocker.  With him in the lineup, ND was 12-1 in conference, without him (as you say) 2-3.

I think that disparity is enough to suggest that he may have been almost as important to ND and Wright was to Georgetown.  It was wrong of you to highlight the absence of Wright as a factor but not the absence of Scott.

Georgetown went 0-4 without Wright, losing by an average of 14.5 points. Three of those losses were at home. It's even worse if you consider their NCAA tournament game, in which Wright clearly was far from 100 percent.

Just as you did with ND, I could argue that Georgetown may well have lost those games without Wright anyway.  

now let's assume that instead of losing their last game at Seton Hall, MU gets another matchup with DePaul. Voila, they're 10-8 in conference. Then let's assume that instead of a second game with DePaul, Cincy has to travel to Seton Hall and matchup with a hot team (just ask Steve Lavin). Pretty good chance they're 10-8.
Still think I'm overestimating their difference in the schedule?

You've created a straw man.

Its just as likely that Cincy goes to Seton Hall and beats them as easily as they did in the first matchup, and MU comes out just as flat in the road game against DePaul as they did at Seton Hall.  Pretty good chance that there is no change in the record.

Putting that aside, even if the scenario played out as your straw man suggests, year over year UC would still have improved from 12th to 7th, and we would have still declined from 5th to 7th.  

My bad on Vaughan.
7 of 9 top scorers back.

Thank you.

Do you also agree that our top 3 returning players outperformed UC's top 3 returning players in 2010?  And that our recruiting class was stronger than UC's recruiting class?

[reinko]

Y'all have salaried positions in the working world?

[mu03eng]

And that our recruiting class was stronger than UC's recruiting class?

Glad to see we are treating opinions as facts.

Nobody is going to win these arguments because it is not black and white, none of this took like in a vacuum or Henry Sugar's computer.  The bottom line, do you think we played better or worst than we should have this year....I think we did better than we had right to given the schedule and lack of experience.

[Pakuni]

Its just as likely that Cincy goes to Seton Hall and beats them as easily as they did in the first matchup, and MU comes out just as flat in the road game against DePaul as they did at Seton Hall.  Pretty good chance that there is no change in the record.

1. You clearly have no idea what a straw man is. Stop using terms of which you don't understand the meaning.

2. You're not only suggesting that Cincy is likely to "easily" beat a red-hot Seton Hall on the road (Note 1: Seton Hall was playing without Jeremy Hazell when they lost at Cincy; Note 2: Nobody "easily" beat a complete Seton Hall team at home last season), but that there was "a pretty good chance" Marquette would lose to a DePaul team they'd previously beaten by 30.
These are not reasonable opinions.

[Pakuni]

Y'all have salaried positions in the working world?

For a guy who continues to gripe about this thread, you sure spend a lot of time reading and commenting on it.
Just sayin'.

[Marquette84]

According to Pomeroy:

• UC had the easiset conference SOS
• MU had the 2nd hardest

http://kenpom.com/conf.php?c=BE

I think you'd be willing to grant me that the important thing is the SOS number--not necessarily the rank.

MU's SOS was .8727.  Cincinnati's was .8461

Remove one Seton Hall game and replace it with DePaul for MU, and our SOS would have been .8478.
Remove one DePaul game and replace it with Seton Hall for UC, and their SOS would have been  .8710.

In other words, the entire SOS difference between UC and MU amounts to the fact that UC's mirror was DePaul, and ours was Seton Hall.  If it were opposite, we would have had the easiest schedule in the conference, and Cincinnati would have had  

[reinko]

For a guy who continues to gripe about this thread, you sure spend a lot of time reading and commenting on it.
Just sayin'.

Eh, you are right, I feel a gripe for every 2 pages this thread goes on and nothing to show for it is about right.

[Marquette84]

1. You clearly have no idea what a straw man is. Stop using terms of which you don't understand the meaning.

Sorry, but you don't understand the concept.

You created a "strawman" (the hypothetical schedule in which Cincinnati played Seton Hall twice and we played DePaul twice), and then tried to refute my argument by knocking down the fake schedule you invented (see, with that schedule their record is only 10-8, same as ours, therefore they didn't improve more than we did).

Its a textbook example of a straw man.

2. You're not only suggesting that Cincy is likely to "easily" beat a red-hot Seton Hall on the road (Note 1: Seton Hall was playing without Jeremy Hazell when they lost at Cincy; Note 2: Nobody "easily" beat a complete Seton Hall team at home last season), but that there was "a pretty good chance" Marquette would lose to a DePaul team they'd previously beaten by 30.
These are not reasonable opinions.

1.  Who's to say that the game would have been scheduled with Hazell back?  

2.  Even at that, given that Seton Hall was 3-4 in home games after Hazell returned, I hardly think that  constitutes "red hot" performance.   Especially when just 1 of the 3 wins was against a top-half team.

BTW, that supposedly "red hot" team that beat St. Johns turned around and lost to Rutgers two games later.

3.  I didn't say "easily".  I said "likely".  Big difference.

4.  I see its okay for you to propose that Cincy could blow out Seton Hall at home, then lose to them on the road.  But its "not reasonable" if I said the same for MU and DePaul.

[Benny B]

[brewcity77]

So...essentially 84 is saying MU and Cincinnati played the exact sdame conference schedule/mirror oppenents (which did NOT happen)..and that both teams chances for "improvement" were the same yet 1 team finished 5th in 2009 and another 12th in 2009?  Seems the team who finished in 12th could improve 11 spots, whereas the team who finished 5th could only improve 4 spots.  By my logic that says Cincy had a 275% greater chance at improvement than did MU.  Am I missing something??

Everyone plays the Big East schedule. Everyone plays home and away. Maybe not every team played against UConn and ND as their mirror games, but we also played against Seton Hall.

Notre Dame played Pitt, St. John's, and us, a tougher mirror schedule than we did. St. John's played Notre Dame, Cincy, and Georgetown. Louisville played UConn, West Virginia, and Providence, probably about as tough as our mirrors. Cincy played Georgetown, St. John's, and DePaul. So of the teams he listed, all of them had at least two tourney teams in their three mirror games, as we did, and two of them had tourney teams in all three mirror games.

Listen, everyone is glad about the Sweet 16 run, and the END result of the season was our best since 2003. But for anyone to assert we had a better conference season at 9-9 than we did last year at 11-7 just doesn't make sense, especially when it's clear that other teams were able to improve despite playing a very similar conference schedule.

I think the problem is that people have years-long biases on this site. 84's name shows up on the post and he's attacked, even when he's making what is pretty much a bulletproof logical argument. When I think 84 is in the wrong, I'll call him on it and debate. But this isn't one of those cases. We weren't as good in the Big East in 2010-11 as we were in 2009-10. Asserting anything else is simply arguing for arguing's sake.

[brewcity77]

BTW, that supposedly "red hot" team that beat St. Johns turned around and lost to Rutgers two games later.

Anyone calling that St. John's team hot is simply not looking at their body of work around that time.

@ WVU Loss
v UConn Loss
@ Rutgers Win
v Villanova Loss
@ Marquette Loss
@ Notre Dame Loss
v St. John's Win
v Marquette Win
v Rutgers Loss

Hot? They were 1-5 in the 6 games prior to the SJU win, and that one win was against lowly Rutgers. So beating one team, SJU, made them hot? And they finished the season 3-6 in their last 9 games. At no point do you call that team "hot". The closest to hot they came was a 2-game home winning streak, and then they promptly lost to one of the worst teams in the league.

[Lennys Tap]

Everyone plays the Big East schedule. Everyone plays home and away. Maybe not every team played against UConn and ND as their mirror games, but we also played against Seton Hall.

Notre Dame played Pitt, St. John's, and us, a tougher mirror schedule than we did. St. John's played Notre Dame, Cincy, and Georgetown. Louisville played UConn, West Virginia, and Providence, probably about as tough as our mirrors. Cincy played Georgetown, St. John's, and DePaul. So of the teams he listed, all of them had at least two tourney teams in their three mirror games, as we did, and two of them had tourney teams in all three mirror games.

Listen, everyone is glad about the Sweet 16 run, and the END result of the season was our best since 2003. But for anyone to assert we had a better conference season at 9-9 than we did last year at 11-7 just doesn't make sense, especially when it's clear that other teams were able to improve despite playing a very similar conference schedule.

I think the problem is that people have years-long biases on this site. 84's name shows up on the post and he's attacked, even when he's making what is pretty much a bulletproof logical argument. When I think 84 is in the wrong, I'll call him on it and debate. But this isn't one of those cases. We weren't as good in the Big East in 2010-11 as we were in 2009-10. Asserting anything else is simply arguing for arguing's sake.

I'll only speak for myself. My point was never that we had as good a Big East season last season as in 2009-10. My point was that when all factors are considered - 1. Empty junior and senior classes inherited by Buzz 2. Two Big East tournament wins and 3. Our second sweet 16 in 16 years - that last year did not represent a step backward for our program (which 84 and Chicos insist). Given #1 I think it's remakable we made the tournament and #s 2 and 3 were icing on the cake.

[NersEllenson]

I'll only speak for myself. My point was never that we had as good a Big East season last season as in 2009-10. My point was that when all factors are considered - 1. Empty junior and senior classes inherited by Buzz 2. Two Big East tournament wins and 3. Our second sweet 16 in 16 years - that last year did not represent a step backward for our program (which 84 and Chicos insist). Given #1 I think it's remakable we made the tournament and #s 2 and 3 were icing on the cake.

You can speak for me as well.  Clearly a 9-9 finish vs an 11-7 finish isn't as good of record - but to really suggest the program took a step back last year, and was merely lucky to advance to the Sweet 16 due to favorable matchups - is ridiculous.  (Particularily when measured against Point Number 1.

[Hards Alumni]

Sorry, but you don't understand the concept.

You created a "strawman" (the hypothetical schedule in which Cincinnati played Seton Hall twice and we played DePaul twice), and then tried to refute my argument by knocking down the fake schedule you invented (see, with that schedule their record is only 10-8, same as ours, therefore they didn't improve more than we did).

Its a textbook example of a straw man.

I didn't read your post Lenny, but he seems to understand the straw man just fine.

[brewcity77]

I'll only speak for myself. My point was never that we had as good a Big East season last season as in 2009-10. My point was that when all factors are considered - 1. Empty junior and senior classes inherited by Buzz 2. Two Big East tournament wins and 3. Our second sweet 16 in 16 years - that last year did not represent a step backward for our program (which 84 and Chicos insist). Given #1 I think it's remakable we made the tournament and #s 2 and 3 were icing on the cake.

Regarding 1, I agree that Buzz did a great job with filling those classes.

But the only improvement we made on our season from 2009-10 to 2010-11 was our NCAA play. Non-conference was worse. Conference was worse. BEast Tourney (2) was the same (beat a team we should beat, beat a team we hoped to beat, lost badly) so it can't really be considered an improvement on the year before. All in all, we stepped back more than we stepped forward.

2010-11's Sweet 16 was a great accomplishment. We're all glad for it. But for the season as a whole, two steps back, one step sideways, and one step forward equals steps back. The Sweet 16 leaves a good taste in the mouth, and I think it's clear that Buzz has us pointed in a very favorable direction. But I also am positive that I felt far more aggravation in 2010-11 than I did in 2009-10. There were more things that seemed to go wrong that should have gone right, whereas the year before it seemed things that we expected to go wrong went right, especially as the season progressed.

The bottom line is that we are moving forward. Despite taking some steps back in 2010-11 I also think that it's more clear that our future is brighter than it was in a 2009-10 season that felt in many ways more magical (from November to early March) than the most recent season did (despite the excellent late March).

The end result is the only thing that was truly better. That's great, but I agree that 15 losses is far too many and that we need to do better in the future. Thankfully, I'm confident that despite quite a few hiccups throughout the past year, Buzz will build on the late-season success and hopefully next year, we'll be able to say that we've improved our non-conference season, our conference play, our Big East Tourney results, and most important, gotten even further in March.

[brewcity77]

nm

[Marquette84]

I'll only speak for myself. My point was never that we had as good a Big East season last season as in 2009-10. My point was that when all factors are considered - 1. Empty junior and senior classes inherited by Buzz 2. Two Big East tournament wins and 3. Our second sweet 16 in 16 years - that last year did not represent a step backward for our program (which 84 and Chicos insist). Given #1 I think it's remakable we made the tournament and #s 2 and 3 were icing on the cake.

As attached as you are with the false notion that Crean left two empty classes--what does your continued effort to blame Crean say about your belief in Buzz's ability to replace those players?

Buzz filled this year's junior and senior class with Butler and Buycks and Otule and Crowder and DJO.   Yet you STILL pine for whomever Crean WOULD have had in this class.  

[Pakuni]

Anyone calling that St. John's team hot is simply not looking at their body of work around that time.

@ WVU Loss
v UConn Loss
@ Rutgers Win
v Villanova Loss
@ Marquette Loss
@ Notre Dame Loss
v St. John's Win
v Marquette Win
v Rutgers Loss

Hot? They were 1-5 in the 6 games prior to the SJU win, and that one win was against lowly Rutgers. So beating one team, SJU, made them hot? And they finished the season 3-6 in their last 9 games. At no point do you call that team "hot". The closest to hot they came was a 2-game home winning streak, and then they promptly lost to one of the worst teams in the league.

In the game against St. John's, Seton Hall shot 64 percent from the floor and 67 percent (12-for-18) from beyond the arc. Then in the first 20 minutes against MU, they knocked down 11 of 18 threes. So, over 60 minutes of basketball, they hit an astounding 23 of 36 threes, or 64 percent.
Yep, ice cold, baby.

[Pakuni]

Never mind. This is getting too dumb for even me to participate any longer.

[Lennys Tap]

I didn't read your post Lenny, but he seems to understand the straw man just fine.

,

That may be Hards, but as I didn't bring up the straw man argument I don't know what it has to do with me.

[Lennys Tap]

Buzz filled this year's junior and senior class with Butler and Buycks and Otule and Crowder and DJO.   Yet you STILL pine for whomever Crean WOULD have had in this class.  

I don't "pine for whomever Crean would have had in this class". I just realize how hard a job both Buzz and Crean faced in the spring /summer of 2008. As you point out, Buzz filled his two empty classes with guys like Butler, Buycks, Crowder and DJO. Crean filled his with Jeremiah Rivers, Verdell Jones III, Tom Pritchard, Matt Roth and Kory Barnett. It's why after total roster turnovers in two years at both MU and IU we made the sweet 16 and they were 3-16 in the Big 10. Just one reason I think Williams did a remarkable job last year.

[Dr. Blackheart]

I think you'd be willing to grant me that the important thing is the SOS number--not necessarily the rank.

MU's SOS was .8727. Cincinnati's was .8461

Remove one Seton Hall game and replace it with DePaul for MU, and our SOS would have been .8478.
Remove one DePaul game and replace it with Seton Hall for UC, and their SOS would have been  .8710.

In other words, the entire SOS difference between UC and MU amounts to the fact that UC's mirror was DePaul, and ours was Seton Hall.  If it were opposite, we would have had the easiest schedule in the conference, and Cincinnati would have had  

Yes, I wil grant you that...so the Seton Hall loss becomes a DePaul win for MU...and a DePaul win becomes a SH loss for UC.  Voila!...same regular season records.  See how that works?

My daddy always taught me the following:  "It is not how you entered a room, but how you left it".  Sweet 16 is a nice "leave" behind.

[ChicosBailBonds]

Listen, everyone is glad about the Sweet 16 run, and the END result of the season was our best since 2003. But for anyone to assert we had a better conference season at 9-9 than we did last year at 11-7 just doesn't make sense, especially when it's clear that other teams were able to improve despite playing a very similar conference schedule.

Thank you for some level headed commentary.  Agree completely.