As with our results last year, you literally couldn't do worse than OOC schedule we played last year either. We played 1 team with a Top 125 NET last year. 1. Yes, This schedule is marginally better than last year. Yay.
2025-2026 Non Conference Schedule
- Thread starter Section9.RowD
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I get that you want to play all top 100 teams but that isn't reality.
we're going to play some weaker teams like every team does. I'd rather play an improving local rival than some random crappy team like Marist or Maine.
Since the University rightly declared Men’s Basketball a flagship athletic program with the accompanying direct payments to players, there could/should be higher expectations for the program.
I have no idea whether there are, or not, and we’ll never hear anything about expectations from the AD.
But with the higher flagship profile and $ investment the whole University, alumni, media and fan base will be watching. Should another disaster like last season occur, I’d expect serious concerns to arise.
Go Spiders!
point is u can have zero 300 games & your schedule still stinks.
the problem when u schedule weak is it usually bleeds into the next seasons which we r seeing. we need to establish a culture a precedent of scheduling tough with national games. every year. doesn't matter if good or bad. got to have it in the good years but in pay to play transfer era that can be any year. 3 straight years w no real chance at NCAA, and now go into a 4th with a coach going into his 21st straight year at UR....wtf r we doing let's aspire to be something better and schedule like it.
the only way for this staff to do it imo, is to play the road buy games because they don't have ability to get into enough of the right H&Hs or MTEs. i wish our admin and AD had it in them to force a new culture.
thanks. I forgot we started the WM series at WM. we r in year 4 of 4. But with Moon being so close to Brian Earl at WM it will be no surprise if we renew this. Esp with our scheduling strategy as it stands now.
But...since technically it might be over after next season, it might mean ECU is a home game to start. Q4. idk we'll see.
I thought it might start away too, but with WM technically over (unless we renew) and us not being at WM in 2026 then it could easily be at home. idk we'll see. If at home u r at 4 Q4 games. and more if factor Charlotte which I don't know why u shouldn't. There is a 33% chance we play them game 1. Then a 50% chance game 2. Does that equal 83% total odds of playing?? idk mush grad that paid little attention in business stats. maybe easier to say we have a 2/3 chance of playing them in a 4 team pod.
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well we have 8 games counting VMI, which I think fair to count. so r u saying out of those 5 left we'll get at least 2 majors and 3 other games better than all the games on our schedule? let's see Moon go 5 for 5. all 8 games so far are bad to ok yet the last 5 will be the best ones. hmm.
exactly. it's better partly because we don't have embarassing d2's. But who is excited about being better than last year's garbage. I agree fairly marginal. I think decent chance we get 1 D2 anyway. Let's not toss out that possibility yet. They certainly won't announce it early.
maybe it falls closer to 22-23' and 23'24'. But is that good...nope. Some like to act like our schedukes r so solid but the numbers r the numbers. And while there r good years there are plenty of others like these too under Moon. i'd like to see us have goal of a top 100 ooc schedule every year.
Net ooc sos last 3 years
277 - 24-25'
179 - 23-24' (rpi and kenpom had it 325 and 272 respectively)
218 - 22-23'
ho hum.
That’s enough to get some to find positives even if it’s marginal at best. Seems those who give CM benefit of doubt will always do this on every aspect of the program, and the latest is in scheduling OOC.
I give Mooney the benefit of the doubt more than most, but last year's schedule was incredibly disappointing and really bothered me, and, unless we add at least 3 games better than what we have now (with at least 2 of them majors), I will be be disappointed and bothered again.
I think the issue is the staff have just traded out a spot where you could get a decent Q2 or god forbid Q1 game, for ECU. For 2 years.
not sure a lot of those are available. look at the UVA schedule. high majors and low major buy games. doesn't seem many high majors are offering a lot of buy games at the A10 level. teams like Dayton and VCU who had some high major games last year got most of them in their MTEs ... which is where we need to do a lot better.
? A couple days ago u said teams at our level haven’t traditionally gone for them. That they held out for h&h. I agree. I’m saying change tactics. I don’t believe it’s about offering from the p5. But us not attempting. How many have we played in 20 years under Moon…3? Bama Florida Auburn. I think that’s a choice to limit. Goo moos played at Duke. Akron at Purdue this year. So other recent examples. Yes Dayton and VCU have less pressure bc they get in good MTEs consistently and also can still pull a good H&H. Unfortunately our staff cannot. Also we could undercut the guarantee that low majors get. Because they need for financial reasons. I’m not saying play it for peanuts but u could undercut a bit. I don’t know what the profit margin is on a road buy game vs. a home buy game that we pay a large guarantee on to sell cheap tix but we could potentially use that $ to pay more rev share. But #1 is to just get national games with upside any route possible imo.
a couple days ago I said teams at our level used to hold out for h&h's but that they've pretty much given up on that. very few can get a h&h. we hoped HMs needed good games with good mid major teams. they don't. they used to play very few HM games in the OOC. now they schedule some high major's and fill in lower major buy games.
undercutting lower majors for buy games might help in the short term but eventually all you do is drop the buy game guarantee for everybody. lower majors still need the revenue so they cut as well. then we're all begging for buy games at $40k instead of $90k.
best way to play HMs is to get in better MTEs. then fill in schedule with better mid majors and fewer awful teams. that improves your SOS. then win games.
undercutting lower majors for buy games might help in the short term but eventually all you do is drop the buy game guarantee for everybody. lower majors still need the revenue so they cut as well. then we're all begging for buy games at $40k instead of $90k.
best way to play HMs is to get in better MTEs. then fill in schedule with better mid majors and fewer awful teams. that improves your SOS. then win games.
But for most part we aren’t doing any of that. Our MTEs stink, the mid major ones r average at best not the better ones, and we still have awful teams, tho possibly less. Our SOS is not strong enough too often. The response is win more which will be said with no irony. Schedule doesn’t work without some real scalps. No scalps without those games. I’ve said b4 but that’s only way we’ve ever gotten into the mix. And we’ll probably get at least 1 chance it won’t be enough.
And winning games…we have 20 year history of 55%. but that’s really another subject.
I think we just disagree on availability of p5 road buy games. There is some evidence. There’s not a lot but why would there be when u agree our level didn’t go after them. If u go after then there will be more evidence imo.
I don’t want to resign myself to these mid & below schedules. Let’s aspire to a lot more.
With the move increasingly to 4-team fields, you're only gonna get two good games even if you can get into a great MTE.
And honestly, if the MTE bonus of extra games goes away after this season, it really lessens the draw of them. So aside from a few marquee ones that may remain out of tradition, the big guys will just stay home and rake in revenue or set up more big-time matchups at neutral sites in major cities.
And honestly, if the MTE bonus of extra games goes away after this season, it really lessens the draw of them. So aside from a few marquee ones that may remain out of tradition, the big guys will just stay home and rake in revenue or set up more big-time matchups at neutral sites in major cities.
if we go after them, what evidence would there be? Mooney telling us we went after them and didn't get them?
no idea how often we go after them. seems we go get one every year lately like Auburn last year, Florida the year before, Clemson the year before that, NC State ...
last year's schedule sucked but it was clearly appropriate because WE SUCKED!
we went 3-9 against that weak schedule. sure I want a better schedule but scheduling better wasn't going to help that team. there's no scheduling trick. you have to be good.
Yep. Just 2 seasons ago, we played @BC, @ Wichita, @ No Iowa, Colorado neutral and Florida neutral. Nothing crazy. 3 games against majors and only 1 true road game. But, we lost them all. Win just 2 of them, and we likely get a lot more committee love and are at least on the bubble, if not in, at 25-6 after the regular season.
In 2020, we played 5 majors, but only 1 was a true road game. We had a good MTE with Wisconsin and Auburn and got a win there, and beat Vandy and BC at home. Again, nothing crazy with the schedule. But, we won enough and were in great shape for a bid post regular season at 24-7. So, all we really need is schedules close to what we have done before last year......majors might not play us at our place anymore, but a good MTE and just 1 or 2 other games with majors combined with some good mid major games is enough if we win enough.
the evidence would be we would have more of the games imo. But yeah I'd like to hear Mooney say u just can't get these buy games. I've heard him speak on difficulty of H&H. But he has also always said our focus is H&H and neutral (MTEs or single games) & admitting they don't go after the pure road buy games frequently.
also u might be misunderstanding what a road buy game is...3 of those 4 u list were not road buy games. They were neutral site games (Clemson, Florida, NC State). Now we played them in their "territory" so to speak but they r neutral. Only Auburn was AT Auburn. I've been referring to going after the pure road buy games which is a less standard to secure than neutrals.
No u have to be good and & have the schedule. Very good mid majors get denied at large bids because of schedules. & I don't want last year's schedule ever, regardless of how bad we sucked.
I assumed we got paid to show up for travel, food and accomodations, while Clemson, Florida and NC State got shares of the gate and possibly concessions. that would be a buy game.
if those schools got the same treatment as us, then that's different ... but still the kind of game we want.
Not what I said, but a good quality schedule would have 3-4 Top 100 match-ups. Ours has zero in it.
and I agree. but even with some top 100 match-ups, you'll have 10+ non-top 100 matchups.
all I'm saying is that in those lesser games, the ECU's and even the W&M's now aren't the problem. sign them. no problem. but get a couple top 100's and minimize the 300 types that nobody wants to see anyway.
Of course we want them. But no they aren't buy games. They are set up by third parties. Nobody calls a neutral game a buy game, and that's why they r listed as neutral in the Quads too.
All those games were doubleheaders at minimum too. We were 1 of at least 4 teams playing those days. The one in Greenville with Clemson possibly more. So there's a lot more splitting going on. I'm not going to pretend to know the breakdown of the financials, but it's a ton less than the P5 gets at their home arena. Honestly I never would have guessed that u considered these to be road buy games at P5s. I'm hoping we have at least 1 of those single neutral games too.
Weren't we the headliner in the Anacostia/DC games? I was there. I'd love to see our cut of the concessions and gate. Would cover two happy meals. Actually we would have been buying lol.
I suspect the MTE will be decent. It's at Disney, they're not going to invite Frostburg State and SW Illinois Tech.
any understanding why Clemson and others would want to play in one of these single gaeme events instead of just playing us at their home where they get their fans, their ticket sales, their concessions, etc? think it's just to get the neutral game NET bump?
Somebody's been mostly offline for the past week!
It's Charlotte, Furman, and Illinois State.
Yeah NET bump main deal as i understand it. It's a fair question. There may be other reasons but I don't know them.
Many of these ooc games r played when students on break so they would not have the same student atmosphere at home venue (btw just another reason why I'm for UR taking the true road buy games). And since many are "semi-home" games anyway with little travel and cost, esp in the case of our games vs clemson/nc state/florida, it's worth the NET bump. For the big boy single neutral games where they play each other I think that's more of a true compromise plus they r getting TV considerations I'm sure.
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