Mid-Continent Now Summit League
We here at StubHub like to keep you abreast of all the little details about the college hoops world, including nuances like the change in name of Centenary’s athletic conference. In case you were wondering, using the term Mid-Continent Conference is now very much out.
In is the new Summit League. Though they may be mid-majors, they will not be Mid-Continents, effective officially on June 1. The name change happened because nobody uses the word continent anymore and because summit is a much cooler and easier flowing name. Said the new Summit League commissioner Tom Douple, “The Summit League provides a mental image to reach the top, both academically and athletically.”
All of the teams in the conference will remain the same, and Oral Roberts has not given any indication that they are considering a name change at this time. NCAA Basketball tickets for all conferences are available at StubHub.com.
Post-Deadline Top 25 in NCAA Hoops
ESPN.com released it’s latest version of the top 25 poll for NCAA basketball. There wasn’t too much that you wouldn’t have expected. One thing I noticed was that the Pac 10 had a lot of teams in the mix. UCLA lost Aaron Afflalo, but nobody seemed to think that would degrade the Bruins much at all. UCLA was right behind fellow Pac 10er Washington State at number 6 overall.
Slightly further down the list a few more teams out west showed up. USC and Arizona were No. 12 and 13 respectively and Oregon was nipping at Stanford’s heels just a few spots later. The Ducks were ranked 16th and the Cardinal 15th. Last year’s NCAA Basketball Tournament was fairly kind to the Pac 10 and unlike a lot of the other conferences, they weren’t decimated by the recent NBA draft declaration deadline.
If you’d like to catch some of the good hoops out on the left coast, you can always get awesome Pac 10 basketball tickets at StubHub.com.
NCAA Basketball Coach: Best Job Ever!
A recent article by Andy Katz of ESPN sought to describe the situation that many schools face when they are forced to give coaches large multiple-year contracts. If the school’s athletic director wants to get rid of a coach, he is forced to pay not only his salary, but the extras as well- the vacation time, the bonuses, etc.
In one instance Katz describes, the former New Mexico coach, Ricky McKray, was forced out of his coaching job with the Lobos three years early. He then got a job with Liberty and due to a contractual agreement he will be earning two six figure salaries for the next three years. That’s gangster.
So my question is this: why fire a coach before his contract is up? Basically UNM is paying over half a million dollars for McKray to coach for a competitor. Now I’m no idiot major, but…. Was he really that bad, and will his being fired really help the program that much? I doubt that we’ll be suddenly going to StubHub.com to buy New Mexico Lobos tickets for a Final Four game next year. Who was the new coach they hired anyways, John Wooden? These are universities, not cost-plus Haliburton contracts.
NCAA Hoops Teams with Bright Furures
Lately ESPN.com has been ranking the “Top Ten of the last Ten” years in college basketball in every category from best overall program to most underachieving team. Today the topic is the teams with the brightest futures. You probably could have guessed the teams that made the top of the list, North Carolina, Florida, UCLA, Ohio State… gosh, what a coincidence that these teams were the Final Four this year!
An explanation of their reasoning is this: “Everything matters — history, tradition, facilities, administrative support, recruiting reach, conference, TV Q-rating, coaching and fans. The more of those a team has in place — and the more it looks like they will be in place for the long term — the better positioned a program is.”
Still, I don’t foresee Florida or Ohio State doing much next year, considering the NBA draft will likely gut their programs of the key players who won all their games. If you want to see if ESPN is right, you can always get NCAA basketball tickets at StubHub.com to watch the next ten years unfold before your eyes.
Who’s the Most Underachieving in NCAA Hoops?
ESPN just released a list of the most underachieving NCAA basketball teams of the past ten years. The top of the list wasn’t surprising: Michigan, Florida State, St. John’s, etc. In order to be “underachieving” you first need a reasonable expectation for success, and that is fairly subjective. Next, you need to do poorly, consistently for the past ten years. Excuses for the teams abound. One thing that schools like Michigan suffer from is NCAA punishments. Then again, schools get punished for reasons, and under performance because of punishments could just be grouped in with under performance in the rule abiding column.
Like with the overachievers yesterday, I put a lot of weight into how much money a school devotes to athletics and their academic standards. For a big, rich school such as Florida State or Michigan to not be able to put together a single good year, that’s unacceptable. ESPN admits that most of the schools on the list have been making efforts to right the ship. There is reason to believe that StubHub.com will be selling Michigan Wolverines basketball tickets like hot cakes again, though right now they don’t deserve to be.
Most Underrated Hoops Program?
ESPN has released a list of the top ten most underrated NCAA basketball programs of the past ten years. Topping the list is the Wisconsin Badgers. Though the Badgers play in a major conference and have one of the biggest athletic budgets of any of the teams on the list, they consistently seem to be “under appreciated.”
In order to determine the strength of a team in the “underrated” column, you have to gauge a team’s general perception. That’s not so easy to do. For example, I come from Northern California and I like Pac Ten schools, so Stanford is big where I’m from and I’m never surprised when they do well. Yet they made No. 4 on the list. There is no objective stat on how much a team is followed by the mainstream media, just a… feeling. For example, you could never find Duke on this list, because even if they won ten NCAA Tournaments in a row in the past ten years, they still wouldn’t have earned the hype they always get.
But if you want NCAA basketball tickets to a good underdog, underrated team, I like getting ones with smaller school enrollments and meager budgets. StubHub.com has plenty of tickets for those Xaviers, Southern Illinoises and Butlerses that we all root for when they face the big boys in the tourney.
Florida Best Team of Last 10 Years?
A recent ESPN poll of experts picked the 2007 Florida Gators as the best college hoops team of the past 10 years. The poll, which admits its bias towards recent teams and teams that won the NCAA championship picked the 2005 UNC Tar Heels as the No. 2 team, and the 1999 UConn Huskies as the No. 3.
It was hard for the people of ESPN to combat the “recency effect.” It’s funny how a 10-year poll happens to fall on a year that ends in the number 7. Could you create a poll with any more of a desired effect? I found that there was also a poll for the top 50 boxers of all time somewhere on the main page. Mayweather actually came in at about 45 or so, so the people of ESPN probably made the list prior to his weekend defeat of De La Hoya. Otherwise it would have been “Goodbye Joe Louis, hello Pretty Boy.”
But I suppose such a poll is used primarily to promote debate. So in that case, I guess it worked. Too bad you can’t get a poll to tell which is the most annoying team, otherwise it’d show that the Gators are true back-to-backers. Thank heavens you can’t get anymore NCAA basketball tickets at StubHub.com to witness the obnoxious and victorious 2007 Gators.
Who Will Win Mock Draft?
Most people have their theories about who will win the NBA Draft. Some say there is an easily detectable conspiracy which allows the best players to get to the teams with the biggest markets. Some are helpless romantics who think it’s all luck of the draw and the NBA would put millions of dollars of revenue on the line just for the integrity of the game.
But thanks to ESPN you can simulate your own draft and have your lottery team end up with their logo next to a picture of Greg Oden. Check out the Mock Draft by Chad Ford. If you press the reset button enough, you can end up with the Bulls getting Oden as the first pick. That would be a nice inside presence: Ben Wallace and Greg Oden. Oddly enough, the Celtics always end up No. 2 with Kevin Durant. Fishy…
Don’t get too caught up with this fantasy, though. Some of these guys might go back to another year of school. There are still a few weeks for players to pull out of this draft. You know that if a top 15 pick like Thaddeus Young of Georgia Tech decides to get some more schooling, you can see him play by getting over to StubHub.com for some NCAA basketball tickets for games next season.
New NCAA 3-Point Line
The NCAA men’s basketball rules committee approved legislation that would, if adopted by the Playing Rules Oversight Committee, increase the distance of the threee-point line a full foot farther from the basket. May 25th will likely see the approval of this measure.
Most of the players and coaches are in favor of the new line. Players say that it will help them adjust to professional basketball, which uses a farther out line. Caoches like it becasuse it could potentially open up the floor for more jump shots, and might lead to an increase in the size of the lane. Many also think that it will lead to more teams using zone and variations on zone defense.
The only real problem this new line will make is for school janitors, who must paint a new line, and for the sake of simplicity. In arenas where pro, college and high school games are played, there must now be three different 3-point lines. Women’s college basketball will continue to use to old line, so college gyms must have at least two lines. There is no indication that the lane will be windened, though that seems like the next logical step for the NCAA.
Check out StubHub.com for some NCAA basketball tickets if you like lines… or seeing some adjustments in three-point percentage.
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