Lipstick on a pig

[TAMU, Knower of Ball]

That's exactly what momentum is.  Once something gets moving in one direction, it catches speed quickly.  Of course if a team starts 4-0 that doesn't mean momentum has started and look out, they're not losing all year.

Take UCONN's 2011 last National Title.  17-2 (positive momentum) to start the year.  Run into a tough stretch and lose 7 out of 11 games (negative momentum) to close out the regular season.  Get a nice "fix me" game against DePaul to open the BE Tournament and bam, 11 straight wins to win the BET and National Title.

Take the Bucks.  2-10 since opening the season 20-18.  Sorry, but I don't think the Bucks are giving up 72 points in a half to a bad 76ers team without their 2 best offensive players if they're playing the way they were for the first 30 games of the season.  They have some horrible momentum going right now.

Look at the Packers year.  4-2 to 4-6 to 10-6.

Teams get in funks.  Teams get hot.  One game can shift momentum and take you from a horrible rut to a great run.  Or vice versa.  That's what momentum is, and it happens in sports all the time.

For every example you find there are ten examples where a team had "great momentum" but still played like crap in the next game. Or a team was on a skid but played like worldbeaters in the next one. Really momentum is just a word that people use to try to explain when a team had a string of games near their ceiling or a string of games near their floor.

As you are known to say, the most important game is the next one. And the least important game is any that came before it.

[Golden Avalanche]

For every example you find there are ten examples where a team had "great momentum" but still played like crap in the next game. Or a team was on a skid but played like worldbeaters in the next one. Really momentum is just a word that people use to try to explain when a team had a string of games near their ceiling or a string of games near their floor.

As you are known to say, the most important game is the next one. And the least important game is any that came before it.

This.

The feeling around Scoop recently is people are twisting and turning trying to find ways to explain this Marquette team. It's simple: they're a classic NCAA bubble team who can beat any team in the conference on a good night or lose to any team in the conference on a bad night (excluding DePaul, you know, since the Demons suck).

[Lennys Tap]

Why? The cupcakes are playing other like cupcakes more often than not. If we played UWM's schedule our defensive numbers would skyrocket.

We are the 64th ranked team (defensively) out of 75 power 6 conference teams. Among high D1 teams, we aren't mediocre - we're awful. Skewing the numbers with cupcakes gives a false impression.