Iona (11/23/14)

[meangreenacct]

Common sense says we lose to SFA, Creighton, and Tech...

[UNT90]

Who says we lose to Creighton, SFA, or Tech?

Anyone who understands basketball...

[ChristopherRyanWilkes]

In Andrew's defense, S.F.A. just lost to Northern Iowa at home.. Texas Tech has been inconsistent up to this point and lost to J.J.'s LSU in their only decent competition game so far. I agree you can probably go ahead and mark @ Arkansas, @ OK State, and Vs. Creighton as losses, we could take 1 or 2 upsets in this stretch, my bet being Tech and SFA.

[Andrew]

This team has at least 1 or 2 upsets in them this season. I have high hopes but I like what I have seen. Sure it's not the best competition but the schedule was done perfectly. I was hoping to go 5-0 to start but 4-1 is ok. Right now we need solid point guard play and a shooter. If we had both of those we could be 4-0 right now. This team hustles, the defense is not terrible, and they have rebounded well. They can only get better baring injuries.

[Greendylan]

This team has at least 1 or 2 upsets in them this season. I have high hopes but I like what I have seen. Sure it's not the best competition but the schedule was done perfectly. I was hoping to go 5-0 to start but 4-1 is ok. Right now we need solid point guard play and a shooter. If we had both of those we could be 4-0 right now. This team hustles, the defense is not terrible, and they have rebounded well. They can only get better baring injuries.

If this team only has 1 or 2 upsets in them this season, then we'll probably only win about 12 or 13 games. I hope you were only referring to non-conference games.

[UNTFan23]

This team has at least 1 or 2 upsets in them this season. I have high hopes but I like what I have seen. Sure it's not the best competition but the schedule was done perfectly. I was hoping to go 5-0 to start but 4-1 is ok. Right now we need solid point guard play and a shooter. If we had both of those we could be 4-0 right now. This team hustles, the defense is not terrible, and they have rebounded well. They can only get better baring injuries.

I think our rebounding numbers are skewed by the level of opponent we have faced so far. We barely out rebounded Iona last night 35-32.

[Andrew]

I think our rebounding numbers are skewed by the level of opponent we have faced so far. We barely out rebounded Iona last night 35-32.

Guys like combs and Flannigan are going for every ball. Hustle like that will pay off.

[UNTFan23]

Guys like combs and Flannigan are going for every ball. Hustle like that will pay off.

Turnovers have been a constant problem this season and will only get worse against better opponents -- 69-59 for the season and 16-10 last night. We could win the rebound battle and still lose the war in many cases.

[Andrew]

I am starting to wonder if people ever watched UNT basketball before. Other than a few good years under Johhny we have been pretty terrible in my life time. Why is the expectation so high? Because we had some 20 win seasons? Josh white use to turn the ball over and no one complained. I am not justifying our poor point guard play, but what are people expecting?

Was the expectation for us to win 20 games and make it to the big dance every season? The past couple season have been terrible but it's like people had not watched UNT basketball prior to this other than a few seasons under JJ.

I was expecting us to go 5-0 to start the season but I am happy with 4-1. If we were 2-3 then I would defiantly be waving the red flag.

[ChristopherRyanWilkes]

To win 20, we need 1 or 2 non-conference upsets, and then splitting with the teams we aren't supposed to beat in conference by beating them at home. Other than that, we'll need to be better than everyone who i'm not that impressed with in Conference which is everyone outside of the top 4: LaTech, UTEP, Charlotte, and Old Dominion.

Edited November 24, 2014 by ChristopherRyanWilkes

[Travis]

I am starting to wonder if people ever watched UNT basketball before. Other than a few good years under Johhny we have been pretty terrible in my life time. Why is the expectation so high? Because we had some 20 win seasons? Josh white use to turn the ball over and no one complained. I am not justifying our poor point guard play, but what are people expecting?

Was the expectation for us to win 20 games and make it to the big dance every season? The past couple season have been terrible but it's like people had not watched UNT basketball prior to this other than a few seasons under JJ.

I was expecting us to go 5-0 to start the season but I am happy with 4-1. If we were 2-3 then I would defiantly be waving the red flag.

I feel that after 4 20-win seasons in a row and winning seasons before and after that... it is quite reasonable to at the very smallest tiny least.... to have an over .500 record. But, 20 win seasons are not unreasonable... especially when we have played the cupcakes that JJ and TB schedule.

[ChristopherRyanWilkes]

My only two years watching J.J. we got to 20 wins or around 20 wins by basically beating a couple well-known but not great basketball programs from the Big 12 or SEC, winning our cupcake games, and then being around .500 in conference.

[Andrew]

My only two years watching J.J. we got to 20 wins or around 20 wins by basically beating a couple well-known but not great basketball programs from the Big 12 or SEC, winning our cupcake games, and then being around .500 in conference.

People should have watched the Trilli or Newman days. Then Benford might look like coach K haha

[ChristopherRyanWilkes]

I don't think anyone will argue that the Conference USA, even in it's current state, is not a stronger conference than the Sun Belt that we were in. Charlotte, Old Dominion, UTEP, and WKU are all historically strong basketball programs that have made pretty good runs in the Tourney in the past.

Edited November 24, 2014 by ChristopherRyanWilkes

[ChristopherRyanWilkes]

Not to mention Rice and LaTech who have both been pretty good programs at one point as well.

[Andrew]

Not to mention Rice and LaTech who have both been pretty good programs at one point as well.

USM has been good as well.

[TheTastyGreek]

I don't think anyone will argue that the Conference USA, even in it's current state, is not a stronger conference than the Sun Belt that we were in. Charlotte, Old Dominion, UTEP, and WKU are all historically strong basketball programs that have made pretty good runs in the Tourney in the past.

Tangent, using your mention of conference strength as a jumping off point...

Last year, objectively (in terms of conference RPI), was the absolute worst year in the entire history of Conference USA basketball. As I recall, it wasn't even close to the 2nd worst year.

And, we also enjoyed an absurdly fortunate run of good health all season long. The only guys who missed or DNP'd more than 2 games were Anefiok (3 games) and Kelvin Gaines, by far the least utilized guy on the roster anyway.

The awesome thing about every school you mentioned (and you could have included UAB in there, too) that actually is a serious basketball program... They've all been in the same situation we're in with Benford within the past 6-8 years or less, and EVERY SINGLE ONE canned a guy with as many or more years and/or money remaining as we had on Benford after last season. When they had a guy who wasn't going to make them successful, even if the coach had a track record of previous success or a history of NCAA appearances (often at their school, and Benford has neither)... They cut ties and moved on. I got through writeups and posts about half of the stories before giving up hope during the start of the offseason.

The exception is UTEP, because they haven't botched a hire as badly or seen an incumbent collapse the same way we and those other schools have in that timeframe.

Anyway, the point is... Last year was the worst CUSA has ever been, the luckiest we've ever been in terms of health and continuity in-season, and we still saw what we saw. And the programs you're rightfully pointing to as powerful and serious about the sport in our league (diminished as the conference may be compared to it's glory days in bball)... They all handled their business the same way when in our situation. We did not.

[Travis]

People should have watched the Trilli or Newman days. Then Benford might look like coach K haha

I remember the Trilli days. That was awful.

But, being better than Trilli isn't our standard. In fact, our standard should be to match or exceed what we did the previous five years. And TB has simply not come close to JJ's last 5 and that is a problem. Even more so when you see who we couldn't beat. A lot of bad/beatables that really show where we are. If that wasn't enough, it is amazingly evident that RV and TB have lost all interest from the fans as it is a ghost town on game days. Clearly, this isn't the right direction.

[Andrew]

I remember the Trilli days. That was awful.

But, being better than Trilli isn't our standard. In fact, our standard should be to match or exceed what we did the previous five years. And TB has simply not come close to JJ's last 5 and that is a problem. Even more so when you see who we couldn't beat. A lot of bad/beatables that really show where we are. If that wasn't enough, it is amazingly evident that RV and TB have lost all interest from the fans as it is a ghost town on game days. Clearly, this isn't the right direction.

This s the season to decide if it's the right direction. The season has just begun. If combs and Pittman can develop they will be solid Players in the future. Wesley's future seems up in the air and it's scary he may not be back after sitting out a year last season. We seem to be able to bring in some good young players who like Benford. I wonder if combs, Pittman, and the 7ft kid would stay of we let Benford go. My guess is if he goes they go and so does the future of UNT basketball for 3 to 4 years.

[GoMeanGreen1999]

so far, we've done exactly what I thought we would do--beat three nobodies at home, lose to the one decent team we have played. With this 3-1 start we should end up at 6-2 after we finish off our home OOC (loss to Creighton),plus 4 losses on the road against Arkansas, Oklahoma State, SFA, and Texas Tech, which will get us at 6-6 before CUSA play. The 6 wins would be at home against Arkansas-Monticello, Nicholls State, Delaware State, Mississippi Valley State, Langston, and Prairie View A&M.

If we can find 9 wins in CUSA play and one in the CUSA tournament, that gets us a 15-15 record, which would be .500 and match last season's .500 record. That should be enough for the monied alums on this board and around the university to give RV the OK to extend him out a few years. Just watch...RV is gonna take care of his hire, here. I have no doubt about this at all.

Agree 100%. No doubt in my mind these weak lower division schools are on the schedule to pad his record for RV to look better.

[Andrew]

Agree 100%. No doubt in my mind these weak lower division schools are on the schedule to pad his record for RV to look better.

Yea we scheduled 2 to 3 top 25 teams to pad the schedule....

I forgot how JJ always scheduled Duke, UT, Florida, and North Carolina all the time. Or was it jackson state, Grambling, Sam Houston state, and Cameron university who we' played every year....

Benfords first and third seasons schedules are solid and at least equal to if not better than any schedule we saw under JJ.

Last years schedule was pitiful and to go .500 was very poor and made it even worse.

Edited November 25, 2014 by Andrew

[ChristopherRyanWilkes]

Tangent, using your mention of conference strength as a jumping off point...

Last year, objectively (in terms of conference RPI), was the absolute worst year in the entire history of Conference USA basketball. As I recall, it wasn't even close to the 2nd worst year.

And, we also enjoyed an absurdly fortunate run of good health all season long. The only guys who missed or DNP'd more than 2 games were Anefiok (3 games) and Kelvin Gaines, by far the least utilized guy on the roster anyway.

The awesome thing about every school you mentioned (and you could have included UAB in there, too) that actually is a serious basketball program... They've all been in the same situation we're in with Benford within the past 6-8 years or less, and EVERY SINGLE ONE canned a guy with as many or more years and/or money remaining as we had on Benford after last season. When they had a guy who wasn't going to make them successful, even if the coach had a track record of previous success or a history of NCAA appearances (often at their school, and Benford has neither)... They cut ties and moved on. I got through writeups and posts about half of the stories before giving up hope during the start of the offseason.

The exception is UTEP, because they haven't botched a hire as badly or seen an incumbent collapse the same way we and those other schools have in that timeframe.

Anyway, the point is... Last year was the worst CUSA has ever been, the luckiest we've ever been in terms of health and continuity in-season, and we still saw what we saw. And the programs you're rightfully pointing to as powerful and serious about the sport in our league (diminished as the conference may be compared to it's glory days in bball)... They all handled their business the same way when in our situation. We did not.

Just to go back to my original statement, CUSA was #13 in RPI, and the Sun Belt was #19. Conference USA is usually around #10 or so and was #13 just a few years ago as well. When we were in the Sun Belt it has hovered around 19 to as low as the mid 20s in RPI. Sun Belt is still objectively an inferior conference to the conference we are currently in for basketball. http://www.cbssports.com/collegebasketball/bracketology/conference/rpi/2013-14

[ChristopherRyanWilkes]

Also it appears in 05-06, Conference USA was #15 in RPI, but that's just from skimming through a few years.

Edited November 25, 2014 by ChristopherRyanWilkes

[TheTastyGreek]

Also it appears in 05-06, Conference USA was #15 in RPI, but that's just from skimming through a few years.

Not sure where you're seeing that... Also, to be clear, I'm not basing that off ordinal rankings of conferences. I'm going off of average RPI against D1 opponents, using the RealtimeRPI.com calculations from each year in place of actually gathering and calculating it myself. Because they stop calculating at the end of conference tournaments, so that NCAA/NIT results (and the selection restrictions that influence games there) aren't biasing or inflating the stronger seasons.

Last year was the only time that CUSA has dipped below .5 (.498). Even in 05-06, it was at .5021.

In D1 opponent RPI terms, the 2013-14 CUSA was almost as much worse than 2012-13 as last year's Sun Belt (which was terrible) compared to last year's CUSA.

The phrasing on all that is a bit tortured... If any of it didn't make sense or could be rephrased to read more easily, my apologies.

[ChristopherRyanWilkes]

Not sure where you're seeing that... Also, to be clear, I'm not basing that off ordinal rankings of conferences. I'm going off of average RPI against D1 opponents, using the RealtimeRPI.com calculations from each year in place of actually gathering and calculating it myself. Because they stop calculating at the end of conference tournaments, so that NCAA/NIT results (and the selection restrictions that influence games there) aren't biasing or inflating the stronger seasons.

Last year was the only time that CUSA has dipped below .5 (.498). Even in 05-06, it was at .5021.

In D1 opponent RPI terms, the 2013-14 CUSA was almost as much worse than 2012-13 as last year's Sun Belt (which was terrible) compared to last year's CUSA.

The phrasing on all that is a bit tortured... If any of it didn't make sense or could be rephrased to read more easily, my apologies.

Gotcha. The math and calculations are all fuzzy to me, I just got my information from the CBS RPI rankings that uses who knows what to calculate a ranking at the end of each year. It's also pretty difficult to compare an RPI from one year to the next just because the strength of schedule changes by conference each year, yada yada.. I have very little knowledge on how RPI is calculated, just inferring from what I've read.

Edited November 25, 2014 by ChristopherRyanWilkes