Fan Stop Central

Oh, my gosh! You have got to take some time today and visit this site for a HUGE laugh!
May I Take Your Order?

Just imagine the translator sitting down at a table trying to figure out how to traslate these menu items into english, and then the comments in between are just hillarious!

Enjoy!
May I Take Your Order?

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until next year!

Missouri State gave Lousiville a run for their money, but couldn’t squelch a 22-4 run to end the first half. The Bears only shot 25% in the first half … but, most of the misses came from our big guys (doing it all year) having their back to the basket, jumping, turning and throwing the ball in the vicinity of the goal, just hoping that it will go in — poor shot selection!

Anyway, that was the moral of the game … don’t shoot the ball unless you’re already facing the basket! Or, at least work the ball around to get good shots.

Game over … no continues, this isn’t Nintendo.

Now, it’s on to the St. Louis Cardinals watch and Major League Baseball … waiting for the NFL to get going, too … oh, and NASCAR is getting into full swing so we’ll talk about that, too.

Stay tuned.

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Let’s start with Missouri State (first of the last four left out) (MVC):
NIT –
beat Stanford (Pac-10)
beat Houston (ConfUSA)
play Louisville on Wednesday (Big East)

Wichita State (MVC):
NCAA –
beat Seton Hall (Big East)
beat Tennessee (SEC)
on to the Sweet 16 vs. George Mason

Bradley (MVC):
NCAA –
beat Kansas (Big 12)
beat Pittsburgh (Big East)
on to the Sweet 16 vs. Memphis

Northern Iowa (MVC):
NCAA –
lost to Georgetown (Big East)

Southern Illinois (MVC):
NCAA –
lost to West Virginia (Big East)

Arkansas (SEC):
NCAA –
lost to Bucknell (the Patriot League)

Jim Nance has done a little bit of backpedling from his original statements about the Valley not being worthy of four (or more) bids to the tournament. Billy “Fudge” Packer has not backed off his derogatory comments about the Valley even though Valley teams have sent teams from the Big East, Pac-10, Big 12 and SEC conferences home from post season play.

The national commentators’ biggest excuse for thier comments have been “put these Valley schools in these other conferences (or vice-versa) and see how they handle an entire season.”

Well, if all things stayed unchanged, some of these Valley schools would finish very well in some of these other conferences … and as Mark Turgeon said about Seton Hall, some of the “power” teams would not finish very well in the Valley regular season.

But, we all know that things wouldn’t remain the same. Just by moving to a “power” conference, these Valley schools would draw higher quality talent to the school just b/c they are in that “power” conference. Could they hang with Duke and North Carolina night in and night out? I don’t know, but guess what … Duke, Carolina, Maryland, Kentucky, Michigan State, and on and on won’t schedule these Valley teams on a regular basis … and the commentators know that, so they hide behind that excuse as if no one else knows that.

I have had a solution for all this maddness and conference bashing, but the NCAA has not ever responded:
take the top 6 RPI conferences at the end of a season. The following season each conference would be matched up 1 v 6, 2 v 5, 3 v 4. Then within each conference matchup the top four or six teams from those conferences would matchup with each other on a single weekend showdown of sorts.

So, for example, let’s say that the ACC was the #1 conference and Duke was #1 in the ACC, and let’s say that the Big 12 was the #6 conference and Kansas was #1 in the Big 12. Those two would play each other, and so on and so on throughout each conference matchup.

That would be an interesting guage from year to year, and conference to conference.

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Craig Littlepage has made it known that the Missouri Valley was not worthy of more tournament bids than they received, and that the Big East was worth its weight in gold.

Well, for any and all doubters … here’s the first final of the Tournament:

Wichita State – 86
Seton Hall – 66

Oh yeah, Missouri State just happened to get seeded in the same side of the NIT bracket with two other Big East schools (Louisville and Cincinatti). So, for MSU to show well in the tournament, they have to go through two Big East schools. Coincidence? More like conspiracy.

Let’s all just sit back and watch the Missouri Valley drill the rest of the league … since the Valley’s not that good.

Oh, and the second score of the day, Milwaukee-Wisconsin sends Oklahoma home early. By the way, Missouri State wiped the floor with UW-M on UW-M’s home floor.

Missouri State doesn’t belong … please, let’s see how Air Force and Utah State finish.

OK, enough of my complaining and stat pointing. It’s now time to focus on the NIT championship.

GO BEARS!

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Well, well, well – those silver-tongued devils are at it again. The brood of vipers that is the NCAA Selection Commitee.

In the morning light, we can sift through the rubble caused by the wreck of the NCAA Selection Committee (not the tornados and hail) and draw some general conclusions Of course the problem is that the precedent set by this year’s Selection Committee is that the only rule to be followed is that the Committee will act arbitrarily and capriciously in arriving at its conclusion. Nonetheless, here goes:

1. The RPI isn’t worth much as a predictor. The Selection Committee will use it to rationalize its decisions or ignore it entirely when it is useful under the circumstances. The problem, however, is that the NCAA has strongly urged schools to put together a strong enough schedule to get their RPI and SOS up. Now, after teams like Missouri State have heeded their advice and earned an RPI of 19, they disregard it altogether
2. Conferernces do get bids and the Selection Committee is keeping track. The single biggest factor in MSU being left out appears to be that the Committee had them 5th in a 4-bid conference. At the end of the process, the Committee was not going to give the MVC a 5th bid at the expense of a 2nd bid for either the WAC, Mountain West or Conference USA, etc. Similarly, the Committee was unwilling to give the MVC more bids than the ACC, Big 12 or PAC 10.
3. Total out of conference strength of scheudule isn’t as important as playing several high profile games and winning at least one. Example: Air Force’s out of conference schedule was dreadful, but they played and beat Miami (who didn’t make the tournament).
4. A good win is much more important than a bad loss.
5. Last 10 games are important, but you better not lose in the first round of your conference tournament.

In the end, however, MSU left itself vulnerable to the vagaries of the Selection Committee by failing to perform well against the other top teams in the Valley and losing in the first round of the conference tournament. As the above demonstrates, a “mid-major” team takes a major risk when it leaves its fate in the hands of the Selection Committee.

But, to be a good sport and a greater fan, I have decided to fill out a bracket prediction (simply picking, no betting) and post to my tournament bracket for all to see.

Enjoy, and let me know your picks, or join my group tournament challenge on ESPN.com. The more the merrier!

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