Big Time Kudos to the Staff on Scheduling

[hoyaboya]

Now that the regular season is officially over, we can see that the Hoyas' strength of schedule finished at #4 in the country. By beating Florida in the first round of the Bahamas tournament, the Hoyas were able to generate 2 extra RPI top 25 games (Wisconsin, #5 in the RPI and Butler, #25 in the RPI). Kansas ended up #2 in the RPI, so great job by the staff in getting that one scheduled. A key to the scheduling success was the relatively few number of games played against very low ranking RPI teams.

I know for me, one of the big worries with the new Big East was playing a weaker schedule. By doing a tremendous job of scheduling pre-conference games and by the Big East overall performing very well (lock 6 out of 10 teams making the NCAA tournament), at least for this year, that worry was nullified.

[Big Dog]

One of these days/years, I will get around to writing a long post about the most frustrating Georgetown team in program history--the 2002 Hoyas. That team, ranked #16 in the preseason polls, finished 314th in "luck" thanks to a series of just excruciatingly close losses, including the 5 OT game with ND and the unforgettable game against UConn when Esherick declined to foul UConn down 1 with 38 seconds left.

I bring this up because notwithstanding all of that nonsense, if you go and look at KenPom.com for that season, it seems pretty clear that the Hoyas should have been selected for the NCAA tournament. And yet as Selection Sunday approached, there was absolutely no consideration whatsoever by objective or fan observers that we had a chance at a bid. The reason for this was Georgetown's abysmal #55 RPI ranking. And the reason for that ranking--it seems obvious now but was less so then before these things were evaluated in more advanced fashion--is because Esh scheduled 6 home games against sub-250 opposition, and another game against Howard. He scheduled us right out of the tournament.

Thank god JTIII knows better.

[FLHoya]

Mar 9, 2015 15:09:45 GMT -5 Big Dog said:

One of these days/years, I will get around to writing a long post about the most frustrating Georgetown team in program history--the 2002 Hoyas. That team, ranked #16 in the preseason polls, finished 314th in "luck" thanks to a series of just excruciatingly close losses, including the 5 OT game with ND and the unforgettable game against UConn when Esherick declined to foul UConn down 1 with 38 seconds left.

I bring this up because notwithstanding all of that nonsense, if you go and look at KenPom.com for that season, it seems pretty clear that the Hoyas should have been selected for the NCAA tournament. And yet as Selection Sunday approached, there was absolutely no consideration whatsoever by objective or fan observers that we had a chance at a bid. The reason for this was Georgetown's abysmal #55 RPI ranking. And the reason for that ranking--it seems obvious now but was less so then before these things were evaluated in more advanced fashion--is because Esh scheduled 6 home games against sub-250 opposition, and another game against Howard. He scheduled us right out of the tournament.

Thank god JTIII knows better.

Shoot, even the time Esh did make the tournament this same thing happened. We turned a 23-7 (10-6 BE) record after the regular season (and we were ranked in both polls!) into a 10-seed in the Tournament, when the last two in that year were 11-seeds. And it should be noted for hilarity's sake that in the year Esh got canned we started 10-0.

[guru]

Mar 9, 2015 15:40:02 GMT -5 FLHoya said:

Mar 9, 2015 15:09:45 GMT -5 Big Dog said:

One of these days/years, I will get around to writing a long post about the most frustrating Georgetown team in program history--the 2002 Hoyas. That team, ranked #16 in the preseason polls, finished 314th in "luck" thanks to a series of just excruciatingly close losses, including the 5 OT game with ND and the unforgettable game against UConn when Esherick declined to foul UConn down 1 with 38 seconds left.

I bring this up because notwithstanding all of that nonsense, if you go and look at KenPom.com for that season, it seems pretty clear that the Hoyas should have been selected for the NCAA tournament. And yet as Selection Sunday approached, there was absolutely no consideration whatsoever by objective or fan observers that we had a chance at a bid. The reason for this was Georgetown's abysmal #55 RPI ranking. And the reason for that ranking--it seems obvious now but was less so then before these things were evaluated in more advanced fashion--is because Esh scheduled 6 home games against sub-250 opposition, and another game against Howard. He scheduled us right out of the tournament.

Thank god JTIII knows better.

Shoot, even the time Esh did make the tournament this same thing happened. We turned a 23-7 (10-6 BE) record after the regular season (and we were ranked in both polls!) into a 10-seed in the Tournament, when the last two in that year were 11-seeds. And it should be noted for hilarity's sake that in the year Esh got canned we started 10-0.

That's actually hilarious. A ranked team as a 10 seed!

[Big Dog]

Mar 9, 2015 15:40:02 GMT -5 FLHoya said:

Mar 9, 2015 15:09:45 GMT -5 Big Dog said:

One of these days/years, I will get around to writing a long post about the most frustrating Georgetown team in program history--the 2002 Hoyas. That team, ranked #16 in the preseason polls, finished 314th in "luck" thanks to a series of just excruciatingly close losses, including the 5 OT game with ND and the unforgettable game against UConn when Esherick declined to foul UConn down 1 with 38 seconds left.

I bring this up because notwithstanding all of that nonsense, if you go and look at KenPom.com for that season, it seems pretty clear that the Hoyas should have been selected for the NCAA tournament. And yet as Selection Sunday approached, there was absolutely no consideration whatsoever by objective or fan observers that we had a chance at a bid. The reason for this was Georgetown's abysmal #55 RPI ranking. And the reason for that ranking--it seems obvious now but was less so then before these things were evaluated in more advanced fashion--is because Esh scheduled 6 home games against sub-250 opposition, and another game against Howard. He scheduled us right out of the tournament.

Thank god JTIII knows better.

Shoot, even the time Esh did make the tournament this same thing happened. We turned a 23-7 (10-6 BE) record after the regular season (and we were ranked in both polls!) into a 10-seed in the Tournament, when the last two in that year were 11-seeds. And it should be noted for hilarity's sake that in the year Esh got canned we started 10-0.

I just noticed for the first time that Pomeroy had us ranked at #31 in 2003, which is the year we went 6-10 in the BE. That's NCAA tournament worthy as well (although I can't tell if that ranking includes the games from our NIT run), but again the non-conference schedule was abysmal.

I think what we're actually saying is that Esherick scheduled himself right out of a job. There is no way he gets fired if he gets the team in the tournament in back-to-back years early in the decade.

[FLHoya]

Mar 9, 2015 15:46:22 GMT -5 guru said:

Mar 9, 2015 15:40:02 GMT -5 FLHoya said:

Shoot, even the time Esh did make the tournament this same thing happened. We turned a 23-7 (10-6 BE) record after the regular season (and we were ranked in both polls!) into a 10-seed in the Tournament, when the last two in that year were 11-seeds. And it should be noted for hilarity's sake that in the year Esh got canned we started 10-0.

That's actually hilarious. A ranked team as a 10 seed!

I confess, it was funnier in 2006 when WG went from #7 in the country to an 8-seed playing a NC team in Greensboro for the right to play Duke in the span of 1 game.

[SFHoya99]

It wasn't just scheduling. It was end of game coaching.

[prhoya]

Esh learned to schedule like that from Pops. But, he didn't learn the coaching part, so he couldn't get away with it vs BE teams.

[Big Dog]

Mar 9, 2015 15:52:17 GMT -5 SFHoya99 said:

It wasn't just scheduling. It was end of game coaching.

Yes, but this Board has already spent 10 million words on the latter of these two things.

[calhoya]

Glad someone started this thread. JT III is subjected to alot of second-guessing. I am just as guilty as others in this regard. However, in addition to bringing the right personality and values to the program, he has also brought a very needed upgrade in scheduling. He exceeds his father as well as Esherick.

Having meaningful home games is still needed for the preconference season, but as the quality of the Big East improves this will become less important than having quality games on days and times which are conducive to a bigger crowd. That is beyond JT III's control.

[Big Dog]

When you look around division 1 basketball and think about the moral compromises that people like John Calipari, Coach K (re: Sulaimon), Boeheim, and Buzz Williams and then you look at JTIII and think about Tyler Adams and how insane would be the notion that the University would ever condone an atmosphere like that described in the Boeheim report--I don't know how you aren't grateful today that JTIII is our coach.

[professorhoya]

Mar 9, 2015 14:26:21 GMT -5 hoyaboya said:

Now that the regular season is officially over, we can see that the Hoyas' strength of schedule finished at #4 in the country. By beating Florida in the first round of the Bahamas tournament, the Hoyas were able to generate 2 extra RPI top 25 games (Wisconsin, #5 in the RPI and Butler, #25 in the RPI). Kansas ended up #2 in the RPI, so great job by the staff in getting that one scheduled. A key to the scheduling success was the relatively few number of games played against very low ranking RPI teams.

I know for me, one of the big worries with the new Big East was playing a weaker schedule. By doing a tremendous job of scheduling pre-conference games and by the Big East overall performing very well (lock 6 out of 10 teams making the NCAA tournament), at least for this year, that worry was nullified.

I was a little worried about the scheduling going into the Big East season because we scheduled so few games (29 games, Most of our conference rivals have 31 total games this year) this year for some reason. Going into the first Villanova game we basically had to split with Nova and go 7-4 in the remaining games to get to 20 wins.

If we had lost twice to Nova, then we would have had to go 8-3 in the rest of the games to get to 20 wins which would be a tall task. Anything short of that and we end up with 19 or 18 wins or worse going into the BET. And at only 18/19 wins (with no Nova wins) that puts you right on the bubble. Seemed like the margin of error was pretty small with so few games.

[hoyasaxa2003]

Even if we had 18 or 19 wins this team would not be on the bubble. 10-8 in the Big East with our SoS and RPI (even with it being lower with the additional losses) would have been plenty good enough to easily make it.

[professorhoya]

Mar 9, 2015 19:30:53 GMT -5 hoyasaxa2003 said:

Even if we had 18 or 19 wins this team would not be on the bubble. 10-8 in the Big East with our SoS and RPI (even with it being lower with the additional losses) would have been plenty good enough to easily make it.

I dunno. Someone brought it up to me earlier in the seasons because they were worried about the lack of games on the schedule and I looked into it but 18-13 record would probably not get in no matter how high the SOS. 19-12 would put you on the bubble with the majority of the 19 win teams not getting in.

RPI would be significantly lower without the Villanova win plus the additional losses.

Just looking at the win-loss for teams in past tourneys and 18 wins and under teams basically never make it unless they win their conference tournament for the auto bid. 19 wins can make it if RPI and SOS is high but it puts them on the bubble or in the first four. Alot of it depends on the year and the other teams on the bubble but it gets tricky when you have only 19 or 18 wins

You can go here and see the win loss records for every tourney team.
www.allbrackets.com/

[nathanhm]

Why did we have 2 fewer games?

[sleepy]

Mar 9, 2015 19:50:10 GMT -5 professorhoya said:

Mar 9, 2015 19:30:53 GMT -5 hoyasaxa2003 said:

Even if we had 18 or 19 wins this team would not be on the bubble. 10-8 in the Big East with our SoS and RPI (even with it being lower with the additional losses) would have been plenty good enough to easily make it.

I dunno. Someone brought it up to me earlier in the seasons because they were worried about the lack of games on the schedule and I looked into it but 18-13 record would probably not get in no matter how high the SOS. 19-12 would put you on the bubble with the majority of the 19 win teams not getting in.

RPI would be significantly lower without the Villanova win plus the additional losses.

Just looking at the win-loss for teams in past tourneys and 18 wins and under teams basically never make it unless they win their conference tournament for the auto bid. 19 wins can make it if RPI and SOS is high but it puts them on the bubble or in the first four. Alot of it depends on the year and the other teams on the bubble but it gets tricky when you have only 19 or 18 wins

You can go here and see the win loss records for every tourney team.
www.allbrackets.com/

Why are you arbitrarily taking away the Villanaovs win? Yes if you take away all of our best wins our resume so completely different. However if we lost to Seton Hall, also putting us at 19 wins, we are not on the bubble and another additional loss also doesn't put us new the bubble. Heck, give is three more losses but switch our Wisconsin lost and make it a win and we are probably again not on the bubble.

Basically, the amount of games you play never would have mattered as long as we did a good job with it.

[whatmaroon]

Mar 9, 2015 15:49:31 GMT -5 Big Dog said:

I just noticed for the first time that Pomeroy had us ranked at #31 in 2003, which is the year we went 6-10 in the BE. That's NCAA tournament worthy as well (although I can't tell if that ranking includes the games from our NIT run), but again the non-conference schedule was abysmal.

I think what we're actually saying is that Esherick scheduled himself right out of a job. There is no way he gets fired if he gets the team in the tournament in back-to-back years early in the decade.

The 31st final ranking does include the entire NIT run. Ken has the pre-tourney data available as a downloadable CSV on his site. Per that, we were 59th entering postseason play, so the NIT run bumped us up quite a bit.

[MCIGuy]

III's scheduling has been one of the stronger elements of his coaching reign at GTown.

[Cambridge]

Mar 9, 2015 20:56:42 GMT -5 nathanhm said:

Why did we have 2 fewer games?

Does it have anything to do with the fact that we scrimmaged at least one team (UVA) before the season started?

[rockhoya]

Mar 10, 2015 9:12:07 GMT -5 Cambridge said:

Mar 9, 2015 20:56:42 GMT -5 nathanhm said:

Why did we have 2 fewer games?

Does it have anything to do with the fact that we scrimmaged at least one team (UVA) before the season started?

Pretty much every single team in the nation scrimmages, if not multiple times and we have usually scrimmage at least a game, oftentimes two, during the offseason.