Pool C

[Ralph Turner]

If the argument is "performance in the Final Four is indicative of the strength of the regional," New England Final Four performances over the past 15 years demonstrate conclusively that New England teams that reached the Final Four in the aggregate undoubtedly belonged there.

2013: Amherst wins the national title  Yeah, they beat a team from ... Texas.         OVERRATED!     LOL!

Nuff said!   

(Boy, was the field ever so weak that year!   It must have been the drawn out playoff schedule that moved the Finals to the Final Four.)

[Gregory Sager]

If the argument is "performance in the Final Four is indicative of the strength of the regional,"

That's not the argument, though. It hasn't been the argument for a long, long time now where the two purple-clad western Mass teams are concerned.

The strength of Amherst and Williams has been a given over the past decade. Prior to the Williams title in '03, the argument was put forth that the NESCAC was left unprepared for Salem by the weak competition it faced prior to getting there, as all five NESCAC Final Four teams had lost by double digits in the semifinals. Then the Ephs team with Crotty and Coffin changed all that by beating two really good midwestern teams, Wooster and Gustavus Adolphus, in the Final Four in '03 to win the first title ever claimed by a team based in New England.

Since then, NESCAC teams have always gotten the benefit of the doubt in terms of pre-FF strength assessment. That's been reinforced further with the spread of webcasting that has allowed fans to check out teams from other parts of the country during the regular season. But it doesn't change the fact that the NESCAC teams have still had comparatively easier roads to Salem than have WIAC, CCIW, MIAC, etc., teams.

New England Final Four performances over the past 15 years demonstrate conclusively that New England teams that reached the Final Four in the aggregate undoubtedly belonged there.

2003: Williams wins national title
2004: Amherst loses tight game to Williams, Williams loses in title game on last-second shot (Amherst lost in consolation game but they were totally demoralized from losing to their rival at Salem)
2006: Amherst loses by total of 7 points in two games at Salem
2007: Amherst wins national title
2008: Amherst dominates semifinal, gets dominated in title game
2010: Williams wins semifinal, loses tightly-contested title game
2011: Williams and Midd both lose in games that went down to the final possession (and Williams' best player was playing with a broken hand)
2012: MIT loses in semifinal
2013: Amherst wins the national title
2014: Williams dominates Amherst and then loses on last-second shot in title game.
2015: Babson loses badly in semifinal
2016: Amherst loses in semifinal that went down to the last possession

Look at that list again. It's all Williams, Amherst, Williams, Amherst, Williams, Amherst -- in others, just more iterations of the two programs that have been excepted since '03. Middlebury, MIT, and Babson pop in there once apiece, and none of them got past the semi. The Panthers, as you noted, went down to the wire with the Tommies in '11 (the Middlebury program enjoys a healthy amount of national respect, too), but UWW ran away down the stretch from MIT and beat the Engineers by 15 in '12, and the Beavers had the same thing happen to them two years ago when Augie beat them by 20.

If New England teams were only getting to Salem, as you claim, because they were emerging through weak regionals,

... except that I never claimed such a thing with respect to Amherst and Williams, whom I've been maintaining since '03 have merited their Salem hotel reservations.

you would expect that they would be consistently losing, and losing badly, in semifinal games.  Instead, they generally perform to roughly the statistical average, and when they DO lose, it's generally in a title game or in an extremely close semifinal game.

Again, we're just covering the same ground here ... Amherst and Williams, Williams and Amherst, the two programs that nobody thinks have been competitively hampered by the weak path to Salem ever since '03. Fewer chances to be upset along the way? Yes. Unworthy of Salem, though? Certainly not.

My point is that I think the strength of other New England teams is generally underrated by many of the posters here who are unfamiliar with them.  In particular THIS YEAR.  The reason no one ever sees them in Salem is that they have the difficult task of beating NESCAC teams to get there -- just like lots of midwest teams have the misfortunate of going through WIAC teams.  But there HAVE in my view been a good number of New England teams that could have performed well in Salem had they not been blocked by Williams/Amherst juggernauts. 

That's a counterfactual, and thus impervious to proof one way or the other. All we can go by are d3hoops.com Top 25 rankings from those years, and they do not tend to favor your argument.

And more generally, you are extremely frustrating to argue you with because you ignore the ENTIRE CONTEXT of this argument, which started with my rebuttal to the following pointed "observation" by AO:

"They can't prove they would be in by any other set of criteria by beating the relatively weak Eastern teams in the tournament."

That's because his argument is not my argument. I, for one, thought that Amherst belonged in this year's tournament.

That is what started this whole discussion.  That has NOTHING TO DO WITH what titles CCIW teams may have won in 1982.  I myself said that this year was an atypically strong year for New England as a region, and I stand by that.  So by definition, my very point is that this year is an outlier in terms of New England's exception strength.  As such, what may have happened decades ago is entirely irrelevant to this discussion.  I took umbrage to AO's initial comment, and you seem to, again, be ignoring the entire context of the argument.

Again, I'm ignoring it because it's not my argument. It's AO's argument. He thinks that the ex-Jeffs didn't belong in the field because their region is weak. I thought that the ex-Jeffs belonged in the field, in large part because: a) the NESCAC was unusually strong this season; and b) they beat Babson, a team that I've seen in person and mightily impressed me.

Then you exacerbated things by claiming with no basis (because it's an impossible claim to test) that NESCAC THIS YEAR would have performed worse in the midwest regional, or at least, without any doubt would not have performed better.  Come on, dude, that is a silly statement dripping with disrespect.

Actually, it's a pushback to a mirror assertion that you had made:

I don't think it's fair to assume that NESCAC would have done any worse if placed in a Midwest-heavy bracket.  It is equally likely that this year in paticular, they would have fared better.  As an Eph fan, Midd and Tufts at full strength are the two most talented teams I've seen this season.

Dripping is as dripping does.

Your biases are so ingrained that you can't even recognize it, I guess, and suddenly started bringing in decades of irrelevant data in.

My biases? Pot, meet kettle.

The "irrelevant" data establishes background. And, contrary to your assertion about NPU teams of the mid-80's, I put the accent on recent performance -- the same time period, in fact, that you used in your chart up at the top of this post. In fact, the two years that I've mentioned the most are the last two: 2015 (Augie beats Babson in one semi, UWSP beats Virginia Wesleyan in the other) and 2016 (Benedictine beats Amherst in one semi, St. Thomas beats Christopher Newport in the other).

  Sorry but the North Park teams from the 1980s have exactly zero to do with the strength of midwest and northeastern teams in 2017.  Zero. 

As for the CCIW, no national title in TWO DECADES.  By your own logic, that means the CCIW teams who make it to Salem are likely just skating into final fours

That's not my own logic at all.

and when they get there, can't get the job done, right?

True. The CCIW has inarguably fallen short of the mark the last seven times it's been to the Final Four.

Last thing I'll say: when I bring up historical complaints / disrespect, it's because it seems like we ONLY have these conversations, over and over again, about New England and NESCAC.  No one else is generally denigrating the caliber of play in an entire region (as happened on this thread) or gone on ad infinitum about double-round robins or purported schedule manipulation or the unfairness of so many New England teams at Salem.  It's always New England, and in particular NESCAC, that is the target of perpetual whining and complaints.

Well, come on. Look at the facts. How many leagues in D3 play a single round-robin? One. Which region in D3 has the densest population of both leagues and schools? The region that contains the only league that has the single round-robin. We can all go round and round (and we do!) on how much these two facts color the winning % and SOS of the NESCAC schools -- and this is a discussion that has been bandied about on Hoopsville, too -- but nobody's arguing it in order to reinforce your or anybody else's persecution complex. The argument gets raised because it's a genuinely legitimate topic of discussion in D3 men's basketball.

So yeah, I do think folks respect the strength of NESCAC generally, but you can't seriously deny that by an overwhelming margin complaints at these boards are focused on a particular region, and a particular league within that region.  I'm not making this up out of thin air or something!

Oh, on this we most certainly agree. Where we obviously disagree is on the legitimacy of those complaints.

[Gregory Sager]

Just remember since you parsed my post..you conveniently left out the part of it was Middlebury's Game 1 without their second leading scorer who transferred a day later.

I left it out because it was irrelevant. He wasn't on the team.

Therefore your outshot point is moot based on new Middlebury offense installed after tournament, oh yeah that finished 7th in nation averaging 90 points a game against 31st SoS.... that is current team.

Again, irrelevant. What Middlebury's been running since Baines decamped to sunnier climes -- and how well or how poorly they've been running it -- has nothing to do with the game played on December 29 on Staten Island.

You caught Middlebury at their weakest both in terms of strategy, game play (first after break), and mental preparation as no one knew the final situation of their teammate Zach Baines, just that he was not there, zero communication

First things first. See that logo in the icon box under my name? That's the North Park athletics logo. Was North Park the team that Middlebury played on December 29? No, it was Illinois Wesleyan. Not. My. Team. It will never, ever, ever be my team.



Second, if you want to start playing the excuses game, I can call in the Titans guys, and I'm sure that they can match you excuse for excuse. F'rinstance, Brady Rose, IWU's leading scorer this season (and an All-CCIW first-teamer), had the flu. In fact, he sat out the game against Bridgewater the next day. Any more excuses will have to be contributed by the Titans guys, because I feel a bit soiled doing their dirty work for them.

And yes Jack Daly patiently backed your defender

Please see the above. Not. My. Team.

down and faked two jab steps and on third jab step got seperation and drained a 10 footer which proved the difference.

Yes, he most certainly did (except it was deeper than a ten-footer), and I duly praised Daly after the game. I like his moxie. But that one shot, somehow, you've managed to extrapolate into some gigantic theory of how the entire midwestern cadre of D3 men's basketball is inferior in terms of coaching, physicality, toughness, etc., which puts us right back to where we started with me calling your post one of the silliest that I've read this season.

[Mr. Ypsi]

BigMike33, from the moment you made your post I knew you would come to regret implying that IWU was Gregory's team!

I AM a Titan guy - we don't make excuses.  (Though it IS true that our leading scorer missed the next game entirely, and was almost certainly way less than 100% against Midd.)

[4samuy]

WOW.  That stream of posts was not only thoughtful, but entertaining.  Thanks for all involved! As it relates to THIS YEAR, I've been a critic as to the legitimacy of Amherst as a tournament team based on their non conference schedule and riding on the shoulders of an OT win at home vs Babson and quite frankly their previous reputation.  I've seen Amherst play a number of times this year and nothing against the NESCAC, but Amherst, IMHO didn't earn their way into the tournament and it played out that way.

[Smitty Oom]

WOW.  That stream of posts was not only thoughtful, but entertaining.  Thanks for all involved! As it relates to THIS YEAR, I've been a critic as to the legitimacy of Amherst as a tournament team based on their non conference schedule and riding on the shoulders of an OT win at home vs Babson and quite frankly their previous reputation.  Nothing against the NESCAC, but Amherst, IMHO didn't earn their way into the tournament and it played out that way.

I watched the end of that Babson vs. Amherst game and that was probably the best game of the regular season/year. With that being said they were definitely backing into the tourney and not playing their best ball in Feb/March. I know it has never been part of the criteria but I wonder how much subconscious plays into the committees mind when picking Pool C teams, like this year it seemed that last of the Pool C teams were from the power conferences (St. Thomas MIAC, Auggie CCIW, Amherst NESCAC, Oshkosh WIAC). I know some of those teams were sitting pretty good selection Monday, but these teams were all still sweating out a bid.

As it refers to THIS YEAR, the Northeast has to have 2 of the 3 teams with the best chance to win it all in Babson and Middlebury (Whitman would be my third). Midwest seemed to be down in general this year with no top tier elite teams and numerous good teams that never separated themselves, with maybe the exception of River Falls.

I enjoy banter and all, but it is better when we are talking results of games, this weekend can't come soon enough!

[Mr. Ypsi]

If the argument is "performance in the Final Four is indicative of the strength of the regional," New England Final Four performances over the past 15 years demonstrate conclusively that New England teams that reached the Final Four in the aggregate undoubtedly belonged there.

2003: Williams wins national title
2004: Amherst loses tight game to Williams, Williams loses in title game on last-second shot (Amherst lost in consolation game but they were totally demoralized from losing to their rival at Salem)
2006: Amherst loses by total of 7 points in two games at Salem
2007: Amherst wins national title
2008: Amherst dominates semifinal, gets dominated in title game
2010: Williams wins semifinal, loses tightly-contested title game
2011: Williams and Midd both lose in games that went down to the final possession (and Williams' best player was playing with a broken hand)
2012: MIT loses in semifinal
2013: Amherst wins the national title
2014: Williams dominates Amherst and then loses on last-second shot in title game.
2015: Babson loses badly in semifinal
2016: Amherst loses in semifinal that went down to the last possession

If New England teams were only getting to Salem, as you claim, because they were emerging through weak regionals, you would expect that they would be consistently losing, and losing badly, in semifinal games.  Instead, they generally perform to roughly the statistical average, and when they DO lose, it's generally in a title game or in an extremely close semifinal game.  My point is that I think the strength of other New England teams is generally underrated by many of the posters here who are unfamiliar with them.  In particular THIS YEAR.  The reason no one ever sees them in Salem is that they have the difficult task of beating NESCAC teams to get there -- just like lots of midwest teams have the misfortunate of going through WIAC teams.  But there HAVE in my view been a good number of New England teams that could have performed well in Salem had they not been blocked by Williams/Amherst juggernauts. 

And more generally, you are extremely frustrating to argue you with because you ignore the ENTIRE CONTEXT of this argument, which started with my rebuttal to the following pointed "observation" by AO:

"They can't prove they would be in by any other set of criteria by beating the relatively weak Eastern teams in the tournament."

That is claim entirely specific to THIS YEAR and is what started this whole discussion.  That has NOTHING TO DO WITH what titles CCIW teams may have won in 1982.  I myself said that this year was an atypically strong year for New England as a region, and I stand by that.  So by definition, my very point is that this year is an outlier in terms of New England's exceptional, unusual strength, thanks to a spectacular group of seniors in the reason.  As such, what may have happened decades ago is entirely irrelevant to this discussion.  I took umbrage to AO's initial comment, and you seem to, again, be ignoring the entire context of the argument.  Then you exacerbated things by claiming with no basis (because it's an impossible claim to test) that NESCAC THIS YEAR would have performed worse in the midwest regional, or at least, without any doubt would not have performed better.  Come on, dude, that is a silly statement dripping with disrespect.  Your biases are so ingrained that you can't even recognize it, I guess, and suddenly started bringing in decades of irrelevant data in.  Sorry but the North Park teams from the 1980s have exactly zero to do with the strength of midwest and northeastern teams in 2017.  Zero.  And this year, New England teams beat the two Midwest teams now hosting regionals, which is a pretty good data point. 

As for the CCIW, no national title in TWO DECADES.  By your own logic, that means the CCIW teams who make it to Salem are likely just skating into final fours and when they get there, can't get the job done, right?  Again, I don't think that is remotely the case.  Results in any one game are of course a bit arbitrary and more CCIW teams could easily have won titles, just as three Williams teams were in coin-toss title games, only one of which went our way.  CCIW deserves respect for the final fours and title games it has made over the past few decades, just as NESCAC does, even when those teams don't win.

IWU's coach (Dennie Bridges, now the AD) hated the third place game (A Dunk Only Counts Two Points) since it was such a let-down from the REAL goal.  But I took great pride that IWU NEVER lost a third place game.  Suck it up and play for pride!

BTW, you may or may not be right about TWO DECADES - IWU won in 1997, but I've not yet found whether it was 20 years or just shy of that ago.

[Gregory Sager]

BigMike33, from the moment you made your post I knew you would come to regret implying that IWU was Gregory's team!

I knew you'd enjoy that post, Chuck.

WOW.  That stream of posts was not only thoughtful, but entertaining.  Thanks for all involved!

To be honest, it seems to me that nescac1 and I do this every spring. It's turned into something of an annual ritual. We could probably just cut and paste last year's argument every year, but I have a sneaking suspicion that he enjoys arguing as much as I do.

As it relates to THIS YEAR, I've been a critic as to the legitimacy of Amherst as a tournament team based on their non conference schedule and riding on the shoulders of an OT win at home vs Babson and quite frankly their previous reputation.  I've seen Amherst play a number of times this year and nothing against the NESCAC, but Amherst, IMHO didn't earn their way into the tournament and it played out that way.

The ex-Jeffs lost by three to a Keene State team that, while I haven't seen it, everybody else seems really excited about. So we'll see.

[Bucket]

Just remember since you parsed my post..you conveniently left out the part of it was Middlebury's Game 1 without their second leading scorer who transferred a day later.

Therefore your outshot point is moot based on new Middlebury offense installed after tournament, oh yeah that finished 7th in nation averaging 90 points a game against 31st SoS.... that is current team.

You caught Middlebury at their weakest both in terms of strategy, game play (first after break), and mental preparation as no one knew the final situation of their teammate Zach Baines, just that he was not there, zero communication

And yes Jack Daly patiently backed your defender down and faked two jab steps and on third jab step got seperation and drained a 10 footer which proved the difference. St. Amour decoy.  See my point of primary and secondary stars to get a hoop in clutch, Middlebury has 3, including Jake Brown

Mike, please give it a rest. Let's just enjoy this run without pointlessly poking sticks in people's eyes. Thx.

[BigMike33]

Everyone wants to argue past years tournament performance as a future predictor..every team, game and season is different.

So I argued facts from this year...Middlebury beat Illinois Wesleyan at their lowest moment of season. They would DESTROY IW today. Their offensive efficiency and passing is special since the offensive change to a high/low post 4 big rotation offense. Sorry you can't wrap your head around that one

Since you are arguing for the Midwest as an aggregate,,,guess what, IW defacto became your team...your argument, your line of reasoning, your inclusion of IW.   

I saw IW so rather than reading the box score and regurgitating stats like you......1.3 seconds..you can read Play by Play...nice...
I know Daly had the ball with 10 secs left, how many jab steps Daly took and exactly where he was......Jack Daly was two steps inside foul line..that is a 10 footer and when I congratulated him Saturday night after the Middlebury Regional win...we laughed about the big goon Seibert from IW and how according to his coach to the press....he would never say anything to get a technical... yet Daly baited him then said bye bye as the technical was his fifth personal foul with a few minutes to go in game.

IW still at the table...wah wah wah....  Middlebury practicing hard and game planning for 2 revenge games. Endicott will be in for a surprise as they faced the December version of Middlebury.

and since you seem to miss this as well..Teams improve as season goes on..the better teams get better.  Ask any Williams fan on January 20th after Hamilton game if they would play for NESCAC title or make Sweet 16...not likely..then it clicked

Amherst was a shaky selection...They called for 5 cabs after every Amherst game...not a team that played together

[BigMike33]

Bucket..do your thing..I'll do mine

I am enjoying the run and the witty banter about the relative merits of Regions which is a farce.  Teams, match-ups, coaches, injuries are determinants.

[FanOfNescac]

Everyone wants to argue past years tournament performance as a future predictor..every team, game and season is different.

So I argued facts from this year...Middlebury beat Illinois Wesleyan at their lowest moment of season. They would DESTROY IW today. Their offensive efficiency and passing is special since the offensive change to a high/low post 4 big rotation offense. Sorry you can't wrap your head around that one

Since you are arguing for the Midwest as an aggregate,,,guess what, IW defacto became your team...your argument, your line of reasoning, your inclusion of IW.   

I saw IW so rather than reading the box score and regurgitating stats like you......1.3 seconds..you can read Play by Play...nice...
I know Daly had the ball with 10 secs left, how many jab steps Daly took and exactly where he was......Jack Daly was two steps inside foul line..that is a 10 footer and when I congratulated him Saturday night after the Middlebury Regional win...we laughed about the big goon Seibert from IW and how according to his coach to the press....he would never say anything to get a technical... yet Daly baited him then said bye bye as the technical was his fifth personal foul with a few minutes to go in game.

IW still at the table...wah wah wah....  Middlebury practicing hard and game planning for 2 revenge games. Endicott will be in for a surprise as they faced the December version of Middlebury.

and since you seem to miss this as well..Teams improve as season goes on..the better teams get better.  Ask any Williams fan on January 20th after Hamilton game if they would play for NESCAC title or make Sweet 16...not likely..then it clicked

Amherst was a shaky selection...They called for 5 cabs after every Amherst game...not a team that played together

Only three years to go

[kiko]

Since you are arguing for the Midwest as an aggregate,,,guess what, IW defacto became your team...your argument, your line of reasoning, your inclusion of IW.   

If you're gonna argue this angle, can we please make Wheaton his team? 

[Gregory Sager]

IWU's coach (Dennie Bridges, now the AD)

Bridges retired two years ago, Chuck. Mike Wagner took over as IWU's athletic director on August 1, 2015. Oh, and Bridges had been the AD since '81, when Jack Horenberger retired. First, you're unaware of the fact that IWU dropped its graduate programs many years ago, now this. Does your wife intercept the IWU alumni magazine and throw it in the trash before you ever see it? It's a little embarrassing that I don't much care for your alma mater and you're devoted to it, and yet I know all of this basic stuff about it and you don't.

Everyone wants to argue past years tournament performance as a future predictor..every team, game and season is different.

So I argued facts from this year...Middlebury beat Illinois Wesleyan at their lowest moment of season. They would DESTROY IW today. Their offensive efficiency and passing is special since the offensive change to a high/low post 4 big rotation offense. Sorry you can't wrap your head around that one

Since you are arguing for the Midwest as an aggregate,,,guess what, IW defacto became your team...your argument, your line of reasoning, your inclusion of IW.   

I saw IW so rather than reading the box score and regurgitating stats like you......1.3 seconds..you can read Play by Play...nice...
I know Daly had the ball with 10 secs left, how many jab steps Daly took and exactly where he was......Jack Daly was two steps inside foul line..that is a 10 footer and when I congratulated him Saturday night after the Middlebury Regional win...we laughed about the big goon Seibert from IW and how according to his coach to the press....he would never say anything to get a technical... yet Daly baited him then said bye bye as the technical was his fifth personal foul with a few minutes to go in game.

IW still at the table...wah wah wah....  Middlebury practicing hard and game planning for 2 revenge games. Endicott will be in for a surprise as they faced the December version of Middlebury.

and since you seem to miss this as well..Teams improve as season goes on..the better teams get better.  Ask any Williams fan on January 20th after Hamilton game if they would play for NESCAC title or make Sweet 16...not likely..then it clicked

Amherst was a shaky selection...They called for 5 cabs after every Amherst game...not a team that played together

Only three years to go

LOL!

Since you are arguing for the Midwest as an aggregate,,,guess what, IW defacto became your team...your argument, your line of reasoning, your inclusion of IW.   

If you're gonna argue this angle, can we please make Wheaton his team? 

Another LOL!

(I'll spare the NESCAC folks the agony of having me prolong this farce. Be warned, though, that it may lead to his migrating back to the NESCAC room. )

[Pat Coleman]

Dang, and you made an IWU alumni magazine reference before I could!