Quick update while I frantically search all over Middlesex County for a piece of Louisville Cardinals apparel to wear for tomorrow's game against the hated Stanford CardinaL - use a fucking "s" you idiots - hoping not to jinx them so badly that they lose by 20. Anyway, I am now driving a silver Hyundai Sonata, which drives surprisingly well - until of course you realize you're driving a Hyundai and the blank stares from passersby are not looks of encouragement. I really love that we're having our first spring-like days of the year and I'm driving around with the windows down in something I wouldn't let my mother drive. God, I miss my car. The worst part by far, though, is how spoiled my car has made me with respect to listening to music. There's no Sirius in the Hyundai AND no way to hook up my iPod. The two minute drive between the rental company and my house while I was forced to listen to what passes for FM radio these days was easily the most painful two minutes in my life. How can you listen to that? Seriously, how does everyone not have satellite?
Anyway, the car does come equipped with a single CD player, so I grabbed a few recent purchases and listened on a 120-mile round trip excursion to Burlington, Gloucester, and Deptford, for work, the dentist, and a family dinner. On the bright side, I listened to Neon Bible at least five times through and I didn't have a cavity for the first time in about sixteen years. On the downside, wow - listening to the same songs over and over again really gets old fast. Has the iPod killed my appreciation for the album as art form? Clearly. I couldn't even make it through the entire You, You're a History in Rust without nearly nodding off. Of course, that could have had something to do with staying up until 1 am the past two nights to bitch on the Syracuse message boards. And it didn't help that my cell phone died in the warehouse in Burlington and the charger was still with my G35 and despite both having Verizon Motorola phones like me, neither of my parents had a charger that fit my cell. How is that possible? Seriously, how hard is it for fucking Motorola to make a charger that works all of its phones? They were exactly the same size! Those cheap motherfuckers. So I couldn't even talk on the phone during my drive home. Fuckers. And yes, in case you haven't noticed, I'm still pissed off about Syracuse.
That's all for today. Maybe a normal post tomorrow (South Park?), and then my March Madness running diary should be up this weekend. Go Louisville.
One final comment and then I promise I'll give it a rest...
Former Big East member Boston College (by the way, don't you love how BC and Va Tech are doing so much better in the ACC standings than they ever did - or rarely did in the case of BC - in the Big East? Va Tech was a laughingstock. Now they finish in the top 5 of the ACC every year; oh, by the way, the Big East top 10 teams went 9-4 vs. the ACC this season.)
Boston College
NCAA Seed: 7
Record: 20-11, 10-6 conference, 5-5 last ten, lost to UNC in semifinals
Out of Conference WINS: New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Michigan State, UMass, Fairfield, Sacred Heart, Northeastern, Yale, Hartford.
Out of Conference LOSSES: at Providence, vs. Vermont, at Kansas, vs. Duquesne
Syracuse: Not in tournament
Record: 22-10, 10-6 conference, 7-3 last ten, lost to Notre Dame in quarterfinals
Out of conference wins: St. Francis (PA), Penn (tourney team), UTEP, Northeastern (BC played them), UNC Charlotte, at Canisius, Holy Cross (tourney team), Colgate, Baylor, Hofstra (tourney team last year), St. Bonaventure
Out of conference losses: Drexel, Wichita, Oklahoma State
Syracuse doesn't have any impressive OOC wins, but did beat 2 tourney teams, BC only the one (1-9 on the road this season, Michigan State (only winning at Penn State and yet also making the tourney, as a 9 seed)). Syracuse's losses are certainly no worse than BC's, except that BC did play Kansas (and lost by 18). That helps them in the RPI - but in reality, is a blow out loss that shows nothing about the quality of the team (except that they're a lot worse than Kansas).
Summary: Syracuse and BC both did little out of conference, and you couldn't separate the two if you tried. So let's look at in-conference.
Boston College:
Wins: Maryland (tourney team), at NC State, at Wake Forest, Virginia (tourney), Miami, Florida St, Va Tech (tourney), at Miami, at Florida St, Clemson, Miami
Losses: Anybody good (UNC twice, Duke twice, at Va Tech), plus at Georgia Tech and home vs. Clemson.
The only good wins in there are Maryland, Virginia and at NC State. They beat Miami 3 times! Miami went 4-12 in the ACC (12-20 overall). Seriously.
Syracuse:
Wins: at Marquette (tourney team, 20th in nation), at Rutgers, Villanova (tourney), Cincy, DePaul, St. John's, at S. Florida, UConn twice, at Providence (who beat BC), Georgetown (tourney, #6 in nation)
Losses: Pitt, at St. John's, at Louisville, Notre Dame twice, at Villanova, at UConn
We only lost to two non-tourney teams (UConn and St.John's) and beat Georgetown, Villanova, and Marquette - easily better than BC's Maryland, Virginia, NC State troika (plus we won at Providence, which beat BC).
Now, in BC's defense, we did get to beat up on St.John's, Rutgers, USF, and Cincy, while they only played Miami 3 times, so maybe you can bring them back up to even in strength of wins. I think Syracuse is at worst even in strength of losses.
Again, there is no discernible difference between these two teams. The schedules were almost frighteningly similar, except that BC played top 10 schools three times (UNC twice & Kansas, and lost all three), while we only played them twice (Pitt and G'Town) and split the two games. Against top 20 teams, we were 2-4. BC was (still) 0-3. Maryland and Virginia are not in the top 20. Marquette and Notre Dame and Louisville are.
Finally, BC is a #7 seed in the tournament.
Syracuse was excluded from competing.
If BC were in the Big East this year, (a) would they have been 10-6? (b) If they were, would they be in the tournament with the same out of conference schedule?
What a complete disgrace. BC deserves to be in the tournament (maybe not as a 7 seed, but they deserve to be in). How can anyone anywhere claim that Syracuse does not??
Oh that's right, Boston College's RPI was 32, while Syracuse was 50. So is it possible, or is it quite likely, that the RPI is a huge flawed failure that unfairly hurt the Big East this year? Um, yes. And is it possible that the idiots doing the selection this year didn't notice this and weigh the merits of each team properly as a result? Um, maybe. Did the fact that no Big East representative was sitting in the room during this conversation cause this? Um, yes. So maybe it's not a conspiracy. Maybe no one really had a personal grudge against Boeheim. Maybe they just used bad data to make a monumentally bad decision. I guess we'll just have to move on now. There's nothing else to do.
Posted by: Bill | March 14, 2007 at 02:41 PM
Syracuse is horrible. Just accept it and move on with your life.
Posted by: No Orange | March 14, 2007 at 08:59 PM
"It's the perfect opportunity to do a lot of betting in a short amount of time," said Bill Elenbark, 35, of South Brunswick, who was sitting next to Young with eight or nine brackets of his own.
Phenomenal.
Posted by: Home News Tribune | March 16, 2007 at 10:02 AM