Po' Va. Tech

**Slobber Knocker** · March 14th, 2010, 07:01 PM

See ya when football season gets here. Honestly, I could care less but I do think they got hosed!!

**NotSoSilentBob** · March 14th, 2010, 07:06 PM

Hosed? Not really. Their RPI (60) and Strength of Schedule (133) is what kept them out.

**pvfan** · March 14th, 2010, 07:08 PM

I hate VT and they got screwed.

**GC-1** · March 14th, 2010, 07:59 PM

I don't think they got screwed. They played a weak OOC and it bit them. They had a chance and went 2-5 down the stretch (one of the losses was to Duke so they went 2-2 in their final 4) and then acted like they would have rather been somewhere else when they played the Canes in the ACC tourney. When you're on the bubble you can't stick your head so far up your rear it's up to the waist, you gotta play like you want something.

**1inStripes** · March 14th, 2010, 08:31 PM

Originally Posted by GC-1

I don't think they got screwed. They played a weak OOC and it bit them. They had a chance and went 2-5 down the stretch (one of the losses was to Duke so they went 2-2 in their final 4) and then acted like they would have rather been somewhere else when they played the Canes in the ACC tourney. When you're on the bubble you can't stick your head so far up your rear it's up to the waist, you gotta play like you want something.

Agreed. I think the loss to Miami was the nail in the coffin.

**hoard** · March 14th, 2010, 10:27 PM

First off, VTs out of conference schedule sucked and most years you can make the case that's a good enough reason to keep them out...until you consider that California, Utah State and UTEP all got in over Tech. Take a closer look at the RPI and SOS of all three...

Cal was 23-10, is #22 in the RPI and had the 15th-best strength of schedule. Sure, they played Kansas (#1 RPI), Ohio State (21), New Mexico (12) and Syracuse (5).....but didn't beat ANY of them. Their lone Top 50 RPI win was against Washington (#41), which they also lost to twice. Pac 10 got two NCAA tourney teams...Cal and Washington.

So judging by Cal's results, had VT replaced two of their non-conference cupcakes with road LOSSES to any two random Top 25 teams, they probably would have made the tournament.

And tell me how you're #22 in the RPI if your best win is against the #41 team and you have 10 losses? What the hell does strength of schedule matter if you lose to every good team you play?

And Utah State (#31 RPI/100 SOS, one less loss than VT)? They didn't play ONE school from a BCS/Power Six conference. Not one. Every single win they had against an RPI top 100 were against other mid-majors. Most of those were against the WAC, which would have been a one-bid league had it not been for Utah St. losing in the tourney. They played five games vs NCAA tournament teams and three of those were vs New Mexico State. To their credit, they at least beat BYU.

And who did UTEP (#38 RPI/111 SOS, two fewer losses than VT) beat outside of Conference USA (another one-bid league had it not been for a conference tourney upset)? They played five notable non-conference games: BYU (loss), New Mexico St (split 1-1), Texas Tech (lost), Ole Miss (lost).

Just goes to show how deceiving these SOS and RPI numbers are.

**Milk3** · March 15th, 2010, 02:51 AM

They got ripped off. Look at some of the little conference teams. i though they wanted good match-up s in the tourney? VT could but up a better fight than UTEP, Utah St.

**CoeburnCane** · March 15th, 2010, 09:52 AM

1) Schedule better teams.

2) Win 1 or 2 games you shouldn't. (i.e.--don't go 0-4 against the top 2 teams in the ACC)

Someone, anyone saying VT got hosed try to explain to me how scheduling:

Brown
UNC-Greensboro
Campbell
Delaware
VMI
Charleston Southern
UMBC
Longwood

Makes ANY sense if you're trying to beef up your OOC schedule? You know for 100% certain that the committee's going to look at that if it's a close call. How hard would it have been to drop any one of those 8 teams and play Radford, Richmond, William & Mary, VCU, ODU, George Mason...all in-state teams who either made the tourney and/or have better RPI's than the above? The highest rated RPI out of those 8 teams above is Delaware, with 239 out of 347 teams. All the rest are lower than that, with the lowest being UMBC (333).

I'll put it this way--VT could have scheduled:

Radford
Richmond
William & Mary
VCU
ODU
George Mason
ETSU
Appy St.

INSTEAD of those 8 teams above, saved $$$ on travel costs all around, even if it meant agreeing to 1-2 less home games, and had a MUCH better SOS. Whatever money they lost in 1-2 less home games would have been brought back up by those in-state teams travelling to Cassell for their other home games. SOS wouldn't be an issue had they won those games. Even a loss to say Richmond wouldn't have looked bad, and 7-1 or 6-2 against those 8 looks 100x better than 8-0 against the 8 teams they played. The lowest RPI out of those teams is Radford at 168.

Greenberg/VT have no excuses given the above as far as I'm concerned.

**burton2019** · March 15th, 2010, 10:01 AM

The only beef they have is that they beat WF head to head.

**CoeburnCane** · March 15th, 2010, 10:12 AM

Originally Posted by burton2019

The only beef they have is that they beat WF head to head.

But a win vs. Wake in the regular season didn't make/break their tournament resume. Wake played a tougher overall schedule and won 6 games vs. the RPI top 50 when VT only won 3.

Wake's sleepwalking right now after getting drubbed by Miami, but as far as their whole body of work, it's better than VT's when you take into account who each team played.