Catholic 7 12th member

[Aughnanure]

1. Umm...you do realize that St. Louis had to win ZERO games to make their 2 Sweet 16s, right? The field was only 16 in 1952, so every team that got a bid was in the "Sweet 16", and the field was 23 in 1957 and they didn't play the first round. Not exactly an accomplishment.

2. Don't be obtuse. VCU had more NCAA wins than GW, Winthrop, and Valpo combined over that span, even if you don't include the Final Four run. Some actually mentioned Siena, but all they had were a couple good years under McCaffrey. Shown no ability outside of that to hire a competent coach in the past decade.

3. For Catholics it won't. For some non-Catholics, it will.

4. But it's NOT team #5! You don't deliberately recruit a bad team because it's the last spot. It's like Buzz's recruiting philosophy, you recruit everyone in hopes that they will show the desire to start. I don't want us to bring in teams that don't have the ability to win this league. VCU has shown they can compete at a high level. St. Louis has not.

5. Yes, and they have been good a lot more than St. Louis has, not just over the past 10 years, but over the past 30.

1. Yeah. Still counts.

2. VCU, again, has ONE NCAA tourney run that makes up nearly all their NCAA wins. OONNNEEEEEEEE, and that gets you so excited.

3. No, it won't.  

4. If you really don't see that at #5, our picks are getting slim I don't know what to tell you. They are #5 and not every choice is a #1 like Xavier. Also, SLU is neither a bad team nor a bad program. Oh and VCU has only proven they can compete in the CAA. You're making quite a bit of assumptions in grading VCU so highly.

5. Who cares about the last 30 years? Be honest, they've been slightly to moderately better at best and you're acting like VCU has been freaking elite.

[brewcity77]

1. And somehow, VCU's greater success than SLU doesn't in your eyes.

2. Can you read? I have said numerous times, IF YOU IGNORE THE FINAL FOUR RUN, LEAVE IT OUT, PRETEND IT DIDN'T HAPPEN, VCU still has more NCAA wins than GW, Winthrop, and Valpo. They have won 3 NCAA games NOT INCLUDING THE FINAL FOUR RUN. So if they didn't make the tournament in the year they made their great run, they would STILL be more valuable than St. Louis or any of the other teams you are mentioning based on recent NCAA success.

3. Agree to disagree. There are parts of this country that are still pretty anti-Catholic.

4. On average, St. Louis is a sub-100 RPI team. When it comes to Selection Sunday, that is classified as a bad loss. On average, VCU is a top-50 RPI team. When it comes to Selection Sunday, that is classified as a good win. What conference you do it in is irrelevant. On the court and in the eyes of the college basketball world over the past decade, St. Louis does not compare to VCU.

5. You don't care about the past 10 years. You don't care about the past 30. Yet you care about 2 Sweet 16 appearances that required absolutely ZERO wins to obtain in over 50 years ago? Duuuuuuuuude...... 

[dwaderoy2004]

Augh has dug in his heels on SLU.  Up to you if you want to keep arguing Brew...I'm just gonna call it a stalemate, move on, and hope that VCU gets added and that SLU doesn't ever sniff the new league.

[brewcity77]

I think I get it. Augie doesn't like that VCU made the Final Four. And I agree with that. They weren't tourney-worthy that year. They absolutely did not deserve a bid. Jay Bilas was right when he decried their inclusion, but he was dead wrong when he said later "they proved they deserved to be here" as they made it to the Final Four. You don't prove your worth in March. You prove your worth in the months leading up to it. They shouldn't have made the Final Four. That was a NIT team that made a miraculous run.

But the reality is it happened. It made Shaka Smart into a budding star. That's what we need in this league. Young, exciting coaches that can drive their programs to success. And if they leave, we need administrations with a proven track record of making good coaching hires. VCU has both. They have the coach, and if he goes, they have shown the ability to replace him.

Yes, they got to the Final Four in a year they shouldn't have got to the Tourney in the first place. That's absolutely true. But what's done is done. Now is the time to take the teams with proven recent success and legitimate future upside. That is exactly what VCU has, and exactly what SLU does not.

[Aughnanure]

1. And somehow, VCU's greater success than SLU doesn't in your eyes.

2. Can you read? I have said numerous times, IF YOU IGNORE THE FINAL FOUR RUN, LEAVE IT OUT, PRETEND IT DIDN'T HAPPEN, VCU still has more NCAA wins than GW, Winthrop, and Valpo. They have won 3 NCAA games NOT INCLUDING THE FINAL FOUR RUN. So if they didn't make the tournament in the year they made their great run, they would STILL be more valuable than St. Louis or any of the other teams you are mentioning based on recent NCAA success.

3. Agree to disagree. There are parts of this country that are still pretty anti-Catholic.

4. On average, St. Louis is a sub-100 RPI team. When it comes to Selection Sunday, that is classified as a bad loss. On average, VCU is a top-50 RPI team. When it comes to Selection Sunday, that is classified as a good win. What conference you do it in is irrelevant. On the court and in the eyes of the college basketball world over the past decade, St. Louis does not compare to VCU.

5. You don't care about the past 10 years. You don't care about the past 30. Yet you care about 2 Sweet 16 appearances that required absolutely ZERO wins to obtain in over 50 years ago? Duuuuuuuuude...... 

1. No, in your eyes...recent tourney success is the ONLY thing that should be considered and we're just going to make the assumption that such fluke success will continue into the foreseeable future because "if you're bad now, you'll be bad in perpetuity and if you're good now you'll be good in perpetuity" thinking. They have not built up that brand needed to survive one bad coaching hire.

2. And that, again, is the ONLY thing that you consider in deciding. The "they won more the most recently than any other teams I can think of" analysis.

3. It's not an issue if we don't make it an issue. Some of you seem hell-bent on making it one.

4. Oh, so now we're making 50 year decisions based on who helps our recent RPI numbers the most?

5. And all YOU care about it one year. I just wish some of you would admit that. Play around with appearances all you want, but that's is what it is coming down to.

6. I like such organized arguments.

[Aughnanure]

Augh has dug in his heels on SLU.  Up to you if you want to keep arguing Brew...I'm just gonna call it a stalemate, move on, and hope that VCU gets added and that SLU doesn't ever sniff the new league.

More anti-VCU than pro-SLU. I'd simply don't think VCU's recent moderate success is enough to make them the lone southeastern, large public state university in a market that is likely covered by Georgetown.

[Aughnanure]

I think I get it. Augie doesn't like that VCU made the Final Four. And I agree with that. They weren't tourney-worthy that year. They absolutely did not deserve a bid. Jay Bilas was right when he decried their inclusion, but he was dead wrong when he said later "they proved they deserved to be here" as they made it to the Final Four. You don't prove your worth in March. You prove your worth in the months leading up to it. They shouldn't have made the Final Four. That was a NIT team that made a miraculous run.

But the reality is it happened. It made Shaka Smart into a budding star. That's what we need in this league. Young, exciting coaches that can drive their programs to success. And if they leave, we need administrations with a proven track record of making good coaching hires. VCU has both. They have the coach, and if he goes, they have shown the ability to replace him.

Yes, they got to the Final Four in a year they shouldn't have got to the Tourney in the first place. That's absolutely true. But what's done is done. Now is the time to take the teams with proven recent success and legitimate future upside. That is exactly what VCU has, and exactly what SLU does not.

This is what scares me. Let's make 50+ year decisions based on who the current coaches are. It is very easy to get a coaching decision wrong, I think we understand that now.

But I get that point for sustained success, but I think it removes the fact that they were competing in a much less competitive conference. Not sure what it says when the 2 previous coaches haven't shown much on a higher stage.

[GGGG]

But the reality is it happened. It made Shaka Smart into a budding star. That's what we need in this league. Young, exciting coaches that can drive their programs to success. And if they leave, we need administrations with a proven track record of making good coaching hires. VCU has both. They have the coach, and if he goes, they have shown the ability to replace him.

Couple points here.  The athletic director that hired both Grant and Smart is gone.  We have no idea if the current guy would be able to continue that trend.

Also, IMO this is exactly the wrong reason to include a school in a conference.  I wouldn't mind VCU in the conference for a number of reasons, most important of which are an institutional commitment to investing into the program and a shared view of where the conference should go.  "Shaka Smart is a good, young coach" should never be a reason.

[dwaderoy2004]

Augh, can you name another school that was not good, decided to invest a lot money into the program and then suddenly got good?  I'd take that argument more seriously if you could produce an example of that happening.  Because most of your arguments for SLU involve new facilities, bigger endowment, etc.  Is there any proof that any of that stuff matters?  Cause historically and recently, SLU is straight up bad at basketball and I find it hard to believe that simply wanting to turn things around can overcome 60 years of mediocrity.

[Aughnanure]

Augh, can you name another school that was not good, decided to invest a lot money into the program and then suddenly got good?  I'd take that argument more seriously if you could produce an example of that happening.  Because most of your arguments for SLU involve new facilities, bigger endowment, etc.  Is there any proof that any of that stuff matters?  Cause historically and recently, SLU is straight up bad at basketball and I find it hard to believe that simply wanting to turn things around can overcome 60 years of mediocrity.

Xavier in the MCC. Really had no success until the 80s. Facilities are kind of a recent arms race (just like how pro teams need new arenas every 15 freakin' yrs now), so hard to compare on that ground alone, but generally making basketball a higher priority has worked.

In this day-and-age money matters more that ever (i.e. coach and asst coach salary, facilities, arena, travelling/recruiting expenses) and can thus close that gap quicker. I mean, look what Majerus did to that program relatively quickly - that counts as investing.

[GGGG]

Augh, can you name another school that was not good, decided to invest a lot money into the program and then suddenly got good?  I'd take that argument more seriously if you could produce an example of that happening.  Because most of your arguments for SLU involve new facilities, bigger endowment, etc.  Is there any proof that any of that stuff matters?  Cause historically and recently, SLU is straight up bad at basketball and I find it hard to believe that simply wanting to turn things around can overcome 60 years of mediocrity.

Gonzaga...Xavier...George Mason...Butler...

There are many examples.

[rocky_warrior]

Round and round the membership threads go, when they'll stop nobody knows.

At least this one has some enumerated lists!

[dwaderoy2004]

So the fact that VCU invests heavily in their coaches and is building a new basketball practice facility bodes well for their continued success, no?

[GGGG]

So the fact that VCU invests heavily in their coaches and is building a new basketball practice facility bodes well for their continued success, no?

Yes it does.  It isn't a guaranty, but it most certainly helps. Which I have never disputed.

[dwaderoy2004]

Wasn't directed at you sultan, more at Augie.

[brewcity77]

Gonzaga...Xavier...George Mason...Butler...

There are many examples.

...VCU...their success largely has all come since they built a new gym and invested in the program in 1999.

But I like the list idea as well...keeps it easy to follow

1. I want schools with upside, and I do feel that recent success is important because this league's strength long-term will largely rely on how strong it is to start. I feel we are better establishing ourselves quickly than waiting for programs to mature.

2. Beaten to death and covered elsewhere, so I'm going to address the geographic outlier argument. You characterize VCU as the "lone southeastern...university". They are 100 miles from DC. They are over 300 miles closer to the C7 on average than SLU is. In addition, in a league with likely two 6-team divisions, VCU would fit in the east much better than Butler.

3. Beaten to death, so how about why do you think SLU can survive a bad hire better than VCU? Soderbergh was poor there. Majerus did okay, but people remember his one NCAA season far more than the 4 fairly mediocre seasons he had before that. Winning there seems to be a very difficult task.

4. How many conferences have been going for 50 years? We need to get this thing off and running before we can think 5 decades down the road. And VCU is much better suited to propel the entire league forward than SLU is. They fit better geographically, they have shown a longer and more consistent dedication to the success of their program, and they are more prepared to compete with the rest of the league from the start. I'm far more concerned with the next 5 seasons than I am seasons 45-50. Success now will help us get to 50 years. Taking bad teams off the start will weaken the league from the start.

5. If it was one year, I'd be advocating just as much for George Mason. I would much rather have VCU.

6. Definitely

[MUMonster03]

2. Beaten to death and covered elsewhere, so I'm going to address the geographic outlier argument. You characterize VCU as the "lone southeastern...university". They are 100 miles from DC. They are over 300 miles closer to the C7 on average than SLU is. In addition, in a league with likely two 6-team divisions, VCU would fit in the east much better than Butler.

I hope we don't have divisions. I lke getting home and homes with the east coast teams so I can make it to more games.

One concern I have with VCU is the market. VA sport coverage, at the college level is dominated by Virginia and Virginia Tech. The new conference may have a hard time gaining any traction down there. Richmond is ACC country.

[real chili 83]

Personal opinion, I think St. Louis fits fine, but if it were me, I'd be deciding between them and Dayton, not them and VCU. And when I look at the profiles of Dayton and St. Louis, it's really not that close. I have a lot more faith in Dayton's ability to sustain a moderately high-level program and to hire good coaches

This.

Dayton is a long time foe.  Not for you youngsters. We add Dayton, watch out.  The trolls at x.com know it.  They fear playing UD every year.

SLU honors Hank, and our Jesuit tradition.

Make it so.

[Aughnanure]

...VCU...their success largely has all come since they built a new gym and invested in the program in 1999.

But I like the list idea as well...keeps it easy to follow

1. I want schools with upside, and I do feel that recent success is important because this league's strength long-term will largely rely on how strong it is to start. I feel we are better establishing ourselves quickly than waiting for programs to mature.

2. Beaten to death and covered elsewhere, so I'm going to address the geographic outlier argument. You characterize VCU as the "lone southeastern...university". They are 100 miles from DC. They are over 300 miles closer to the C7 on average than SLU is. In addition, in a league with likely two 6-team divisions, VCU would fit in the east much better than Butler.

3. Beaten to death, so how about why do you think SLU can survive a bad hire better than VCU? Soderbergh was poor there. Majerus did okay, but people remember his one NCAA season far more than the 4 fairly mediocre seasons he had before that. Winning there seems to be a very difficult task.

4. How many conferences have been going for 50 years? We need to get this thing off and running before we can think 5 decades down the road. And VCU is much better suited to propel the entire league forward than SLU is. They fit better geographically, they have shown a longer and more consistent dedication to the success of their program, and they are more prepared to compete with the rest of the league from the start. I'm far more concerned with the next 5 seasons than I am seasons 45-50. Success now will help us get to 50 years. Taking bad teams off the start will weaken the league from the start.

5. If it was one year, I'd be advocating just as much for George Mason. I would much rather have VCU.

6. Definitely

I get it. I simply value St. Louis' upside and having one of the larger and best known Catholic universities in the country. With Xavier, Creighton, and Butler we can afford a long-term investment. I do believe the conference is about more than just basketball. Is basketball the driving factor? Sure. But academics and being the right group of universities matters - I think the B1G and  Pac-12 understand that dynamic.

I don't the idea of leaving out a SLU in favor of a large state public university. Look, have they not had a lot of success? Sure, but they are not Duquesne, Drake or Detroit either. Didn't take too long for Majerus to get that thing up and going after they began caring. They have a big-time arena, have invested in their facilities and serve as a better geographic and rival fit for my favorite team,  Marquette - so there is a little bit of bias.

VCU in a 16 team league, I'd be fine. There I said it. But I still prefer SLU, Dayton, and probably even Richmond over them

Anyways, a couple of notes:

#1 I like St. Louis' upside more and don't see this inevitable rise of VCU and Shaka.

#2 was more about this fit, than the "southeastern" geographic designation. Was trying to point out it's distinctiveness.

#3 They can't. But they can support and help the program in many more ways (private jet recruiting trips, new facilities to sell recruits on, marketing, asst coach salary).

#4  I think you're asking a lot of coach to change a program around in only a few years. If it's so hard to win, then you have to give his efforts time to mature. Isn't that why we have the 5 year rule? And he was on his way to passing with flying colors.

#5 I guess I just don't value the "appearances" metric as much in lesser conferences.

[Aughnanure]

By the way, is this the closest poll in Scoop history?

94 to 91...wow

[Avenue Commons]

This.

Dayton is a long time foe.  Not for you youngsters. We add Dayton, watch out.  The trolls at x.com know it.  They fear playing UD every year.

SLU honors Hank, and our Jesuit tradition.

Make it so.

Majerus was just SLU's coach.

Agree on Dayton. Youngsters don't remember the independent days when MU, ND, DePaul, Dayton would go at it like it was a cross town parish battle. It was great. Familiarity breeds contempt.

[dwaderoy2004]

I don't the idea of leaving out a SLU in favor of a large state public university.

Serious Question:  Are you against keeping UConn and Cincy?  I'm on the fence personally, but I see little downside if this scenario plays out, as rumored (although also supposedly squashed by UConn's AD).  But there is certainly something to be said for taking a clean break and removing yourself completely from any future defections.

[brewcity77]

Serious Question:  Are you against keeping UConn and Cincy?  I'm on the fence personally, but I see little downside if this scenario plays out, as rumored (although also supposedly squashed by UConn's AD).  But there is certainly something to be said for taking a clean break and removing yourself completely from any future defections.

Honestly, I would sooner take Memphis or Temple over UConn and Cincy. And I don't want any of the four, but I just feel UConn and Cincy are going to eventually beg their way into the ACC or Big 12, while Memphis and Temple reaching the old Big East is their ceiling.

[Aughnanure]

Serious Question:  Are you against keeping UConn and Cincy?  I'm on the fence personally, but I see little downside if this scenario plays out, as rumored (although also supposedly squashed by UConn's AD).  But there is certainly something to be said for taking a clean break and removing yourself completely from any future defections.

Yes. Seeing them eventually leave will only reinforce to the public the league's inferiority...especially if they are winning the league.

[dwaderoy2004]

But you don't see the addition of SLU as reinforcing to the public the league's inferiority?  Couldn't resist...

That's a good point on them winning the league.  I do think both those teams would jump on the first chance to head to a football conference, and it would suck to potentially have their names in the record books.