Lunardi - First Four Out

[RI Stang]

For those that have decided to not just give up on the season and start calling our players "cowards", Lunardi just posted an updated bracket and has us in the First Four Out.

http://www.espn.com/mens-college-basket ... acketology

Three AAC teams in with Houston and Boise the last two teams in the field.

Man, how I wish it was only mid-January where we still had some time to get this thing going back in the right direction...

[ponyboy]

This is about right. We are #42 Sagarin today BTW. But not trending upwards for obvious reasons.

I do think you're right: Maybe we shouldn't cancel the rest of the season.

[Prideful Pony]

We definitely still have a shot. Anyone saying we should call it a season already is far off the mark. Anyone calling our players "cowards" should grow up -- garbage talk from a garbage person.

That said, the last couple games have revealed some concerning things. Nothing insurmountable, but we seem to be missing the spirit to fight through them beyond Shake and Jarrey. We definitely miss Semi and Sterling's skills, but at this point I think we're missing their confidence and fight even more.

The worrying thing isn't this slump; it's that we seem to be (mostly) sleepwalking through it. I think we really needed the comeback win against Temple to put the fight back in the team. Hopefully we'll see a response at WSU.

[PonyLawExpress]

Agreed. We have tons of opportunities to get back. My confidence is shook on believing we will, but we can. 13-5 in conference gets us in as a lock and 12-6 (22-9) (with wins over UC and WSU at home) would get more than likely get us in as well. Any worse than that we probably have to win the AAC tourney or at least make the AAC final and hope the field is real soft.

[PonyLaw90]

We're in a tailspin but we can get back on track with a "shocking" win at Wichita State. How nice would that be. I haven't given up on the Big Dance just yet. The price premium for my re-seat however, has begun to trend downward.

[Junior]

We need to run the table after another road loss next Wednesday to have a chance at this point. Including several wins in the conference tournament. We have 4 bad losses already.

[RI Stang]

We need to run the table after another road loss next Wednesday to have a chance at this point. Including several wins in the conference tournament. We have 4 bad losses already.

Come on, if we ran the table post Wichita we would be in with ease and have a pretty nice seed. We have one bad loss (UNI) and maybe two (Tulane) depending on how their season shakes out. There are still plenty of opportunities to right the ship.

Will it happen? I don't know but I think it's just as likely that it will turn back around that it is that it wont. I do know that I wish I could be a fly on the wall at practice this week...

[Pony ^]

2 bid league again

[mustangxc]

In terms of resume there is no reason to panic. In terms of where our team is right now there is definitely reason to panic because if Northern Iowa and Western Kentucky weren't wakeup calls Tulane definitely should have been. As a result I know Temple was absolutely not a wakeup call for them so I at least hope they find a way to right the ship.

[mtrout]

Agreed. We have tons of opportunities to get back. My confidence is shook on believing we will, but we can. 13-5 in conference gets us in as a lock and 12-6 (22-9) (with wins over UC and WSU at home) would get more than likely get us in as well. Any worse than that we probably have to win the AAC tourney or at least make the AAC final and hope the field is real soft.

A lock? Lol that’s a good one.

I guess we shouldn’t worry about our rpi of 89 either.

[SMU_Alum11]

This is about right. We are #42 Sagarin today BTW. But not trending upwards for obvious reasons.

I do think you're right: Maybe we shouldn't cancel the rest of the season.

I think it's worth noting that Sagarin "recent" score has us ranked 134. The way the team has played the last 3 games is definitely more towards this score than 43. Something has to snap for this team and it's certainly not going to happen against WSU (unless a miracle). They really need to use that game to find a groove again. Seriously this team really needs to practice FT for like 4 hours a day. Had we made our shots, the outcome of Wednesday game could have been drastically different. We are only kept in decent rankings thanks to our 2017 mustangs but these 2018 mustangs are lost at the moment.

Who was calling our players cowards? That literally makes no sense. Regressing sure, but it's not that they're fleeing from conflict or anything. They're still running up the court and not letting the other team have free transition buckets or anything.

[RI Stang]

Not sure what you mean by 2017 team? The metrics this year have absolutely nothing to do with last year.

[Junior]

We need to run the table after another road loss next Wednesday to have a chance at this point. Including several wins in the conference tournament. We have 4 bad losses already.

Come on, if we ran the table post Wichita we would be in with ease and have a pretty nice seed. We have one bad loss (UNI) and maybe two (Tulane) depending on how their season shakes out. There are still plenty of opportunities to right the ship.

Will it happen? I don't know but I think it's just as likely that it will turn back around that it is that it wont. I do know that I wish I could be a fly on the wall at practice this week...

Temple will go down as a bad loss by the end of the year. They were 0-4 in conference going into last game. We are not getting into the tourney as a 8 or 9 loss team.

[RI Stang]

Temple is too 100 in every ranking, too 50 in rpi.

Depends who we beat and who we lose to, there is no magic number of wins or losses.

[SMU_Alum11]

Not sure what you mean by 2017 team? The metrics this year have absolutely nothing to do with last year.

Like OOC + UCF + USF game, we looked great (2017)

We've lost all games in 2018.

More of a joke, just don't understand what happen to them. Maybe NY resolution was for us to be more humble and share the AAC.