You're either with us, or you don't watch hoops and you're against us
Editor's note: This post was thought out and mostly written prior to the ghastly first half that we are seeing on tv right now
So we've got a situation here. After Sparty's big win on Saturday night I got ridiculed by a couple of people for congratulating the Big 10 in what they considered a "down" season. Since I have watched a gazillion hours of hoops since around Election Day and since I actually follow the game while others are busy focusing on dopey politicians or their radio show, I actually understand that the Big 10 had a pretty good year. But before I get started at proving myself correct, let's review the following Facebook exchange:
TR is tired of people who don't follow hoops telling him that the BT is having a down year- go Sparty, Go Lions, Go Badgers!
RS: I will be the first to admit that, living in KC, I am better prepared to discuss the Big 12 than the Big 10. However, numbers still don't lie. Two teams in the top 25. Illinois loses to WKU, OSU loses to Siena, and the one good team in the conference gets to the finals.
By that logic, you're going to tell me that the Pac 10 is a great football conference even though USC is the only solid team they've fielded in five years...
JJH: I am sick of people who live and die by the numbers. Watch some fucking games! (JJH later admitted he was drunk and has no idea what point he was trying to prove)
RS: I suppose this would be the wrong time to mention that the Big 10 has never won the Big 10/ACC Challenge? That they're a big fat 0-10?
In the last ten years, the Big 10 has had one national champion and averages just under one team in the Final Four per year. If we look at the last five years, that's zero champions and four teams in the Final ... (and two of those were back in 2005). In three of the last six years, the Big 10 has not been represented at all.
Unless this is third grade and everyone gets a medal, winning and losing is all that matters. Is there something intrinsic about the Big 10 (other than regional bias) that I'm missing here? Or is the "uniqueness" of the Big 10 really just another word for mediocrity?
Ok, all caught up?
Since the Supervisor brought up the last 10 years- even though my point was this season (nothing like ignoring a comment to enhance your side) lets go with the Final Four fields between 2000 and 2009. I've decided to break them down in appearances, schools who made the final 4, championship losses, and championships. Lets look at how we did:
SEC: 4 appearances, 2 schools, 1 loss, 2 titles
PAC Ten: 4/2/2/0
Big Twelve: 6 appearances, 4 schools, 1 loss, 1 title
ACC: 9 appearances, 4 teams, 1 or 2 losses, 3 or 4 titles
BIG Ten: 8 appearances, 5 schools, 2/3 losses, 1/2 wins
CUSA: 3 appearances (MU and Lville were in CUSA for their Final 4 births) 3 schools, 1 loss, no titles
Big East: 5 appearances, 4 schools, no losses, 2 titles.
Yes, once again the RS wanted to use the last 10 years of data to prove a point about the Big 10- that point must be that the Big 10 is on par with every top conference in America. Even if we give the Lville and Marq appearances to the Big East the conference would still trail in appearances and title game losses and have a whopping one more title than the Big 10. To be honest, looking at their numbers, especially with 16 teams, the Big East is the conference that has certainly been overrated over the past decade.
Also, look at the number of schools that have made it. Out of the 11 members of the Big 10, 5 have gone to the Final 4 in the past decade. Only the Big East, with their 16 teams can beat that number. In addition, should we take this data back another 10 years we would be able to add 2 more schools who made it to the final weekend. My argument in favor of the Big 10 this season is that the conference is as deep as any in the country- the fact that almost half their members have made it to the Final 4 in the last decade shows that the top to bottom quality of this conference can not be matched.
Again, the original argument before the RS decided to turn his guns on himself was this season. So lets look at this season.
First off, the Big 10 was ranked either 2nd or 3rd in the RPI all season. The NCAA basketball committee also chose to put 7 teams in the tournament- the same number of teams as the ACC and Big East (the other two conferences ranked in the top 3 of the RPI all season). Those 7 spots were well-deserved. Lets look at the season, what two things do the following teams all have in common?
Butler
Florida State (2)
Texas
UCLA
Duke
Boston College
Washington
Kansas (2)
Louisville (2)
UConn
Mizzou
Each of those teams wore white on the first day of the NCAA tournament and each were defeated by a Big 10 program sometime this year. That is a pretty good list of scalps and would have looked even better had Notre Dame and Davidson not completely wet the bed all season.
The RS also brings up the Big 10-ACC challenge. So let's look at that event this season: The ACC demolished the Big 10 6-5 in the challenge. But those were not the only 11 games between the two conferences this year (there is one tonight, I hear). Maryland also beat MSU, Duke and Michigan split two games, Purdue beat BC. With all of that the breakdown would end up at 8-7 to the ACC, ah but the Big 10 are 2-0 in the tournament giving the midwesterners are 9 to 8 lead going into tonight.
Speaking of the tournament, lets use another control to compare the three conferences that got 7 teams in. Lets see how the schools did compared to their seeds. Did teams underachieve, overachieve, or just achieve what they were slated to do based on their seed. Ths should be fun (parenthesis will mean by how many rounds).
Big East:
Lville: Under
Pitt: Under
Villanova: Over (2)
W Virginia: Under
UConn: Achieved
Syracuse: Achieved
Marquette: Achieved
ACC:
Duke: Under
UNC: Over (1-2)
Wake: Under (2)
BC: Under
FSU: Under*
Clemson: Under*
Maryland: Over
*To a Big 10 team
BIG 10:
MSU: over (2)
Purdue: Over
Illinois: Under
OSU: Under
MIchigan: Over
Wisconsin: Over
Minn: Achieved
The Big 10 schools had a pretty good tournament here. These results show that the conference is not top-heavy, instead it is a deep conference. While you can scoff all you want, lets also keep in mind that both Penn State and Northwestern- two of the non-tourney teams won at Michigan State this year. Penn State also won the NIT in a field that included Kentucky, Creighton, Notre Dame, and ESPN's own St. Mary's.
Sure I could go on- I could bring up academic standards, the problems with recruiting warm weather kids to the upper midwest, and I could even add 5 teams to the conference in order to equal the monstrosity that is the Big East. But my point is more than made. The Big 10 in 2008-2009 is a deep conference, one that has good teams and great teams. A conference with some incredible scalps this season and one that has had a good last few weeks in this tournament.
With so many good players returning, the best is yet to come for the Big 10.
posted by TR @ 8:36 PM
6 comments
6 Comments:
First, thanks for noting up front that tonight's result is unlikely to help your argument.
Your next to last paragraph is the classic stuff of apologists. "Even though we're mediocre, you have to remember A, B, and C."
If you want to hang your case in part on Penn State winning a tournament for losers that nobody cares about, I will not stop you from doing so. Is the NIT even televised anymore? In fact, I would concede that the bottom half of the Big 10 is probably one of the best bottom halves of any conference out there. But nobody cares about how good your worst teams are.
Also, your own argument about tournament results severely undercuts your earlier argument that we should discount the Big 10's 0-fer record in the ACC/Big 10 Challenge because some of those years it's been close. You want margin to be relevant when it helps *your* argument, but when it doesn't help your case (like the Badgers squeaking by FSU in overtime), you prefer a simpler measurement like win/loss that helps your case. Now, all of a sudden, a win is a win whether it's by 1 or 50.
Finally, assuming tonight's result holds, here are your NCAA champions by conference over the last 20 years:
ACC - 7 titles
SEC - 5
Big East - 3
Pac-10 - 2
Big 12 - 1
Big 10 - 1
Big West - 1
So the Big 10 collectively has as many titles as UNLV. Lovely. But now I suppose you'll get worked up because I'm disqualifying the fact that the Big 10 won four titles from 1979-1989. That's fine, you can have Keith Smart and Rumeal Robinson.
The bottom half of the Big 10 rocks. It's the top half that makes the conference yesterday's news. And for the record, I turned off the game halfway through the first half. I can follow on ESPN Gamecast just fine. I eagerly await hearing Big 10 apologists tell me how the game was "closer than it looks on paper."
Man, you bounce around faster than John Calipari (Oh yeah, you probably have not heard that he is now the head coach at Kentucky...for basketball...mens)
Are we talking this year or the last 20 years now? As you pointed out we could keep adding 10 years on until the scales tipped in each of our favors, but I recall the discussion this being about this season.
So lets recap THIS season:
National Runner up
7 teams in the tournament
4 teams over-achieving their seed
2 wins over Lville, 2 wins over FSU, 2 wins over Kansas, win over Duke, win over UCLA
9-9 record against the ACC
Conference that goes 9 deep
NIT Champion in Penn State
Top 3 in the RPI all season
In any other conference that would be considered a good to great season. Unfortunately, the Big 10 is deemed "down" every season by people who wake up, realize its March and fill out their brackets.
Oh, I just noticed that MSNBC has their really early 2010 rankings out. 2 teams in the top 10, 5 in the top 25. Looks like it will be another "down" season in the BT.
I love preseason rankings. Hasn't the Badger football team been in the Top 10 a couple of times in the last five years? That's worked out well.
We can talk five years, ten years, twenty years, it doesn't matter. You're left to argue that what makes a conference is the middle to bottom of the league, because the Big 10's best are an abject failure time and time again. When it comes to what people care about - what history remembers - you've got nothing to respond with because the simplest facts deny you any viable comeback.
The best you can argue is that Big 10 is very good at *losing* NCAA basketball title games. The Big 10 has done that FOUR times in the last ten years. Congratulations to the Big 10 on being the Andy Roddick of team sports - the guy who can only win when it doesn't matter.
Let's check this again. One basketball championship in the last 20 years. 1 1/2 football championships in the last two generations (yeah, I'll trash Big 10 football while I'm at it too). Feel free to pick any period of time in there to evaluate. My response is the same. No hardware. Your argument, however, will be less constant.
Look, I want the Big 10 to succeed too. I like it when the Badgers win. The difference is, I'm willing to admit when things are bad, and you want to talk about next year's preseason polls. That's fine. I understand not everyone can take off their homer goggles long enough to see what's really there. I deal with this all the time on my own blog - partisan fools who can't see the trees of reality through their own forest of delusion.
Finally, a good sign that you're not winning an argument is when you feel the need to preemptively proclaim yourself the victor. I'm happy to let my arguments stand on their own.
Over the past 10 season the BT has had more final four appearances than any other conference in America save for the ACC, and the ACC has one more appearance.
Definitely not the sign of a bottom-heavy conference.
I believe I already stipulated that I would give the Andy Roddick award to the Big Ten.
What you've said doesn't show depth at all - it shows that every year the Big Ten has one good team. But if merely showing up to the dance is the criteria you want to use, let's work with that. Over the last ten years, here is the number of years each major conference has had a participant in the Final Four and the number of titles each conference has won:
ACC: 7 years (4 titles)
SEC: 3 years (2 titles)
Big East: 4 years (2 titles)
Big 12: 4 years (1 title)
Big 10: 6 years (1 title)
In terms of converting on its opportunities, the Big 10 is dead last. Betting on the Big Ten to make the Final Four and completely fold is statistically the most reliable bet in the pool (followed by a Big 12 team losing, followed by an SEC team winning). Then again, you're a Cubs fan. I can understand why you confuse getting to the big dance with winning the crown. :-)
Let me know when the Big 10 starts winning stuff and I'll gladly eat my crow then. Until then, it is what the scoreboard says it is: a mediocre major conference (basketball and football both) that can't deliver when it counts.
The last word is yours, if you want it.
How did you two get from 'down year for the Big Ten' to 'number of NCAA titles / Final Four appearances'?
If Championships were the only metric, then every conference other than the ACC had a down year.
On the other hand, I can see the point that the width of the top tier in the BT was down from previous years. The Big Ten was essentially Michigan State and a bunch of teams fighting for second place. (Purdue probably belonged on that first tier but for their injuries...yet they still ended 4 games back.)
The reason that I agree with TR's belief that the Big Ten had a pretty good year is that the middle tier of the conference is larger than it has been in a long time. 8 of the 11 teams in the conference finished with 20+ wins.
In non-conference play (since every conference game is a win for one team + a loss for another team, regardless of how good they are), the Big Ten went 119-36 as a conference....including the Tournament. Doing the math, they won 76.77% of the total games played. Only one of the eleven schools had a losing record in non-conference (Indiana....like I needed to say it).
While a critic of this metric may point out that teams could schedule easy...things like the ACC-Big Ten challenge prevent that from happening. You can also look at the Badgers, who had a very strong non-conference schedule (and took their knocks because of it) as an evidentiary counterbalance.
Did the Big Ten win an NCAA title? Obviously, no. Did they have a down year? I just don't see it. It's not parity when you're beating up on the other conferences.
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