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Around the A-10: 2024–25 Edition

could be legit. or could be let's call it a mental health reason retroactively. u can call anything mental health & be fine. it's just a little fishy imo when u don't go for the med reshirt qualification immediately. perhaps that is common tho. I do think with the ncaa leniency these days what's to stop any former player who maybe knew it wouldnt get approved 10 years ago but now would.

the tweet says "looking into possibility of another year of eligibility" means to me it's not straightforward. maybe that's related to the time lapsed idk.

fwiw I like Zeb Jackson, he was most likeable guy on that team imo. Remined me of Jesse Pellot Rosa.

lol what did I say. Chris Mack thinking like me.

& why not. just get the state legislature on your side and the ncaa can't stop it.

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Death of the MTE?

Feel like the A10 does this with in conference scheduling already. Yes, we always get VCU as our rival twice a year and then they try to match top teams with each other to play twice. This is why VCU and Dayton play each other twice each year and I bet Fordham, Duquesne, LaSalle are all playing each other twice on the other end of that spectrum.

We are going to get the shaft next year because we finished so low and our roster is really bad, so we are probably going to playing LaSalle or Fordham twice in addition to our geographical rivals of Mason, VCU, and Davidson.
Yah - some years the fixed scheduling works but others like last year it doesn't ; would have been much better us to have played 2 games against Loyola and Dayton in '24 than Gmu and Davidson
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Death of the MTE?

You will get no argument for me if we kicked out Fordham and LaSalle. Neither bring anything to the league and neither make the necessary investments in their programs to at least have a realistic chance of being consistently good, the both play in high school gyms. Duquesne at least has made significant upgrades to their arena, gives us the Pittsburgh market, and seems to be trying hard to be good.

someone with the time and the know-how should run some simulations or projections on how the A10 would look this past season with at least Fordham and LaSalle out of the mix.

Death of the MTE?

They do try but imagine how much better the NET of all other teams would be if LaSalle, Fordham, and Dooq were not littering everyone else's schedule with landmines. Which I get the Dukes have been improved the last couple of years but that doesn't make up for 50 years of helplessness
You will get no argument for me if we kicked out Fordham and LaSalle. Neither bring anything to the league and neither make the necessary investments in their programs to at least have a realistic chance of being consistently good, the both play in high school gyms. Duquesne at least has made significant upgrades to their arena, gives us the Pittsburgh market, and seems to be trying hard to be good.

2025 Portal Tracker

this is speed dating. have to move fast, and it's a numbers game.

there's already 1,300 in the portal and we may hit 2,000. there are certainly way over 100 that would be interesting to us.
my understanding is the process is something like this. every kid that hits the portal gets a look from someone on the staff at stats, team and conference level, high school ranking, any reason we might be a fit, etc. if there's any interest at all, kid gets discussed. if still interested, an assistant makes contact to express interest and gauge reciprocal interest.

many of the kids we'll see lists from only get to this level.

internally we're prioritizing. the head coach soon makes contact with the top guys we really are hoping for. the fall back options are still talking to assistants. HC offers a visit. if a kid if offfered and accepts a visit (like Duggan), he's clearly a priority recruit to us. but we're not just talking to that guy. if we need a PG, we're talking to a bunch of PG's and the head coach is talking to a couple trying to get visits. after a visit, kid is told we want him ... but we have to fill the spot. can't hold it long. another guy is coming on a visit for the same spot soon.

the recruits know what kind of priority they are based on all this too. if the head coach isn't calling, they know they're behind a couple guys. some are fine waiting for their dream spot. others want to go where they're really wanted.
It's really gotten to the point where you don't want the transfer prospect to leave the visit without committing. Once that guy leaves campus without committing any school can swoop in with a high offer. That's not saying that some kids will just love UR but it's a brutally competitive market.
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Death of the MTE?

Feel like the A10 does this with in conference scheduling already. Yes, we always get VCU as our rival twice a year and then they try to match top teams with each other to play twice. This is why VCU and Dayton play each other twice each year and I bet Fordham, Duquesne, LaSalle are all playing each other twice on the other end of that spectrum.

We are going to get the shaft next year because we finished so low and our roster is really bad, so we are probably going to playing LaSalle or Fordham twice in addition to our geographical rivals of Mason, VCU, and Davidson.
They do try but imagine how much better the NET of all other teams would be if LaSalle, Fordham, and Dooq were not littering everyone else's schedule with landmines. Which I get the Dukes have been improved the last couple of years but that doesn't make up for 50 years of helplessness
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NCAA Coaching Carousel

Did anyone read "Thinner" by Stephen King? If so I feel like the guy eating the poison pie at the end, after he wakes up and sees his family already ate it. I am hoping to land some dudes in the portal even though moon will screw things up 4 out 5 years and will he extended no matter what. May as well eat the pie, eff it.
Honestly, perhaps long term best case scenario is that we don't have any more roster defections, Moon misses with his few portal hits, like last year and we finish with another 8-10 win season next year. That may get him the axe.

Worst case for me is that we get a couple decent players in the portal and Moon pulls off some .500 esque season and then he and his enablers can say look at the upward progress.

Death of the MTE?

And A10 as other people have said needs to do some form of dynamic scheduling - maybe games against each of the 13 other teams; 2nd game against each teams deemed main rival (VCU for us) and then final 4 games dynamic to provide more Q1/Q2 opps for top teams.
Feel like the A10 does this with in conference scheduling already. Yes, we always get VCU as our rival twice a year and then they try to match top teams with each other to play twice. This is why VCU and Dayton play each other twice each year and I bet Fordham, Duquesne, LaSalle are all playing each other twice on the other end of that spectrum.

We are going to get the shaft next year because we finished so low and our roster is really bad, so we are probably going to playing LaSalle or Fordham twice in addition to our geographical rivals of Mason, VCU, and Davidson.

Death of the MTE?

If we kicked Fordham and Duquesne out of the league, how would Mooney maintain his 55% winning percentage? He has a losing record in his A10 career if you take those games out.

If we did somehow get them removed from the league Moonie would take up four of our non-conference games scheduling an in-season home and home series with both teams 😜

Death of the MTE?

Yes, it is much harder for programs like us to schedule these days, that is a fact. But teams like Dayton and VCU, who are in the same league of us still create demanding schedules, so the fact that we don't is a black mark on us. Secondly, full agreement the league needs to be proactive with scheduling conference match-up with the Pac 10, AAC, MW type leagues and the A-10. That would help all league members with the OOC scheduling. That needs to happen this year, we can not afford another year of sitting on our hands doing nothing.
And A10 as other people have said needs to do some form of dynamic scheduling - maybe games against each of the 13 other teams; 2nd game against each teams deemed main rival (VCU for us) and then final 4 games dynamic to provide more Q1/Q2 opps for top teams.

Death of the MTE?

Another layer in this is, is it’s getting a lot harder to schedule top teams anymore. We used to have home and homes with Wake Forest. Will that ever happen with P5s and 90% of mid majors again? I respect that you, GK, 23, and others all want to schedule as tough as possible, but you make it seem like the reason we aren’t getting those games is because UR or other A10 teams choose to not want to have those games. Unfortunately, it’s much harder to schedule very tough for all of A10 now than it was over a decade ago for a variety of reasons. So for UR, there is a lot of strategy and considerations in regard to scheduling so that’s why I advocate going for an appropriate and realistically as tough schedule as possible.
Yes, it is much harder for programs like us to schedule these days, that is a fact. But teams like Dayton and VCU, who are in the same league of us still create demanding schedules, so the fact that we don't is a black mark on us. Secondly, full agreement the league needs to be proactive with scheduling conference match-up with the Pac 10, AAC, MW type leagues and the A-10. That would help all league members with the OOC scheduling. That needs to happen this year, we can not afford another year of sitting on our hands doing nothing.

Death of the MTE?

Exactly. Back when the A-10 was getting 3,4,5 bids, we had a OOC scheduling requirement for all teams. Now, A10 leadership is just like UR's leadership, there are no standards it's just "try to compete the best you can" mentality.
Another layer in this is, is it’s getting a lot harder to schedule top teams anymore. We used to have home and homes with Wake Forest. Will that ever happen with P5s and 90% of mid majors again? I respect that you, GK, 23, and others all want to schedule as tough as possible, but you make it seem like the reason we aren’t getting those games is because UR or other A10 teams choose to not want to have those games. Unfortunately, it’s much harder to schedule very tough for all of A10 now than it was over a decade ago for a variety of reasons. So for UR, there is a lot of strategy and considerations in regard to scheduling so that’s why I advocate going for an appropriate and realistically as tough schedule as possible.

2025 Portal Tracker

That's a tough read. Do they know (or care?) how many non-P5 fans are on the verge of just checking out
It is really tough to see college basketball be monetized in the way it has. It is just one big money grab for everyone in involved, with no rules or regulations. Transfer as much as you want, go to 4 different schools in 4 years, no one cares about the sport or frankly the players playing it.

It is a completely unlevel playing field at this point, your team changes nearly completely almost every year, and the portal has created this "me first and me only" mentality which is the anti-thesis of a team sport like basketball. I hate everything about it.

Death of the MTE?

We were a Q4 team this past season, but not the season before. We’re historically not an anchor team for this conference. I wouldn’t be opposed to a SOS requirement but tiered to each program. So Fordham, La Salle would have a different requirement than us and Davidson or even VCU, Dayton. A major help to this conference in getting an at-large is two-fold come conference play. 1) have as many Q1,Q2 conference games as possible 2) have as little Q4 conference games as possible.

I do not have expectation of a Fordham or La Salle ever being a Q1/2 game but it would be nice for them to not be a Q4. Same goes with us, Rhode Island, Davidson, GW where we could be a Q4 games some seasons and even Q1 games some seasons, but mostly fall in Q2, Q3 range.

and when the crap teams continue to be crap what are the consequences?
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