Am I the only one who hopes they win the whole tournament just so we can say we were tied with the national champions for a half?
March Madness: Spiders v. UCLA
- Thread starter spiderstudent17
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You are not the only one - Go Bruins
I felt okay celebrating the moral victory of playing well against UCLA also...
but believe moral victories like the game against UCLA this year are okay to celebrate since our win over Georgia Tech made program history as our first ever NCAA...
next season if we're able to make it back to the Tournament moral victories shouldn't be okay to celebrate...a third trip in a row proves we've got a program that expects to be there and expects to win regardless of the opponent...looking forward to it.
Go Spiders!
Our dream to have lost to the eventual national champion continues ... Kiki Rice I think is up to 42 straight made FTs in the tourney. LSU did contain Betts somewhat but rest of team stepped up.
Don't forget Texas who would be in the Final Four with a win tomorrow. Of course it was regular season versus tournament, but having two of your seven losses on the year be to Final Four participants would be something of note for Spider WBB.
Watching Auburn/Izzo game now and I guess I should be all in for Auburn as well since I went to that game -- how cool would it be to have lost by just a bit on the men's side as well to a potential mens national champion too.
Watching Texas/TCU - both teams look rough but think we would have beat the Frogs by double digits
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It is astonishing to me just how poorly a bunch of the "elite" teams are at shooting - particularly from three. I didn't look up any stats and am just going by the eye test, but it really makes you appreciate just how well the Spider women can shoot the ball.
The layups in women's hoops will drive you insane. USC women have two bigs that must shoot 33 percent from 5 feet and in.
Honestly, as nice as it was to completely demolish Georgia Tech and win our first NCAA game, the potential of this team was no where near realized.
We got screwed by a match up with the #1 team in the nation on their home court in the 2nd round. It was definitely within reach for us to make the Elite 8 with the right matchups. Final 4 was even possible.
We got screwed by a match up with the #1 team in the nation on their home court in the 2nd round. It was definitely within reach for us to make the Elite 8 with the right matchups. Final 4 was even possible.
I strongly believe the buzzer beater loss to St.Joe in the semis cost us an Elite 8 appearance this year due to seeding and the matchups which would have resulted had we won the A10 tourny.
Mr Spider - I appreciate your fervor but can't really agree. It can be fun to speculate, but... We had a NET of 33, and if that was the only factor we would have been a 9 seed. We could have been in the exact same building wearing red instead of white. We had two quad 4 losses which worked against us. I'm not convinced we would have gotten any better than a seven seed if we had won the A-10 tournament.
Was it the best draw we could have gotten? No, but I don't see any way we were "screwed" by the Committee. We got a higher seed than GT even though their NET was slightly better. In a tournament like this you are going to end up with an unfavorable matchup somewhere along the line. I think we gave UCLA a hell of a fight and am going to focus on what we accomplished this year instead of what might have been.
Was it the best draw we could have gotten? No, but I don't see any way we were "screwed" by the Committee. We got a higher seed than GT even though their NET was slightly better. In a tournament like this you are going to end up with an unfavorable matchup somewhere along the line. I think we gave UCLA a hell of a fight and am going to focus on what we accomplished this year instead of what might have been.
Hey, that NCAA beatdown drove the Georgia Tech coach into retirement. So there's that! 😃
You're right. It's all speculation. That's a big part of sports, though. No guarantees we would have gotten better than a 9 seed or 8 seed with an A10 tourny win. But my gut tells me we would have been a 7 (or maybe even a 6 given we were 2 spots away from a top 25 rank prior to the A10 tourny). All other things the same, I would have definitely taken Michigan State's spot at the 7 seed. Reasonable to think we could have handled Harvard in the 1st round, followed by a much more feasible win over NC State than UCLA in the 2nd round. LSU didn't look unstoppable in the Sweet 16, potentially setting up a UCLA matchup in the Elite 8 on a Neutral court. Different situation, probably the same result, but maybe not. We were right there with UCLA minus a short stretch of 3 pointers by UCLA on their Home court.
This team was special. My point is there was certainly potential to make a deeper run with a better seeding.
Oh, and don't get me started on Quads. Stupidest thing ever, and they're even more ridiculous in women's hoops.
To be fair, we didn't get screwed by the committee, and the team in no way looked at it that way, which is a breath of fresh air. Screwed was the wrong word choice, but I meant we screwed ourselves out of a better chance at a potential deeper run by losing in the A10 tourny and not achieving a better seed as a result. We got the seed we deserved after losing in the A10 tourny.
This was a great season, and I'm not trying to take away from that in any way. I'm simply saying there was potential for more.
True, but this team really had something.
I'll give you an example where the potential was not REALLY there:
The Spider's men team of 2022. They had an exciting finish and the adrenalin was pumping which was awesome. I think, though, most of us would agree that as a 6th seed in the A10 tourny to A10 tournament champions to a 1st round win over a highly thought of Iowa team, the team over-achieved, or at least closely maxed out their potential. Sure, I guess they could have made the Final Four or even won the National Title, but not a very good bet.
I believe the women's team this year was more capable of a deeper run and had a lot more potential to do so than the last men's team to make the NCAA tourny. Just sayin'. Of course anything is possible, but some things are less likely than others.
I get what you mean. With the men’s team in 2022, it’s not to say we weren’t a good team but really that last 2 weeks was the excitement and came as a sort of surprise. We certainly weren’t getting an at large otherwise and for the expectations of that team had a somewhat disappointing regular season.
For our women’s team this year, from the getgo we knew we were good and had a shot at an at-large. Also, if you want to think “best case scenerio” of what could’ve been, we lost on a buzzer beater to Georgetown and St. Joes. We also lost by 2 at Fordham and were leading Alabama with under 4 minutes left. If we won all those games and the A10 tournament we would have had a record of 28-2 that would’ve given us likely a 4-5 seed range. So I agree with Roussell that we haven’t reached our apex yet and I think are apex is quite high.
And we still would have had to play the damn 1 seed in the Sweet 16 round!
So, no chance at an Elite 8 afterall. 😉
