Some early resume comparison:

[MKE_GoldenEagleFan]

I was talking with a friend today about Marquette’s tournament chances, I haven’t been shy in saying that I don’t think Marquette will make the tournament this year after our rough non conference slate, however for fun I decided to compare Marquette’s current resume against Joe Lunardi’s Last Four In just to see how far off we are as a friend of mine argued that he doesn’t believe we are as far off as I think we are:



Last Four In:



Stanford:

RPI: 54

SOS: 39

Vs. RPI Top 50: 2-5

Vs. RPI Top 100: 3-5

Best Win: Oregon (RPI 36) and UCONN (RPI 36)

Bad Losses: None

Home Record: 8-2

Road Record: 3-2

Neutral Site: 1-2





SMU:

RPI: 43

SOS: 109

Vs. RPI Top 50: 1-3

Vs. RPI Top 100: 2-4

Best Win: UCONN (RPI 36)

Bad Losses: None

Home Record: 10-0

Road Record: 3-3

Neutral Site: 2-1





Providence:

RPI: 48

SOS: 63

Vs. RPI Top 50: 1-3

Vs. RPI Top 100: 5-4

Best Win: Creighton (RPI 10)

Bad Losses: None

Home Record: 10-1

Road Record: 2-2

Neutral Site: 2-2





Southern Miss:

RPI: 33

SOS: 125

Vs. RPI Top 50: 1-1

Vs. RPI Top 100: 4-1

Best Win: North Dakota St. (RPI 45)

Bad Losses: None

Home Record: 6-0

Road Record: 6-3

Neutral Site: 3-0





Marquette:

RPI: 85

SOS: 88

Vs. RPI Top 50: 1-6

Vs. RPI Top 100: 3-8

Best Win: George Washington (RPI 27)

Bad Losses: None

Home Record: 8-1

Road Record: 2-5

Neutral Site: 1-2

[warriorfan4life]

We are probably 9-12 teams out as of today, on the fringe of serious discussion (heated discussion is around last 4-6 teams in and the 6-8 teams right outside of the field). I think that 12-6 will definitely be good enough, as again there looks to be about 35 surefire tournament teams and then filling out the field with significantly flawed teams.

[WindyCityGoldenEagle]

our strength of schedule is only 88? That surprises me.

[Markedman]

The way I look at it is if we win tomorrow we can at least start paying attention to the bubble again….if we lose then back to the reality…..of being 11-9…..

[MKE_GoldenEagleFan]

Also here is the remaining schedule with RPI numbers, looks like we have 6 top 50 games left, and then 5 additional top 100 games remaining and then whatever we draw in the Big East Tournament.



Vs. Nova (RPI #5)

Vs. Providence (RPI #48)

@ St. John’s (RPI #84)

Vs. Butler (RPI #89)

@ Seton Hall (RPI #120)

Vs. Xavier (RPI #30)

Vs. Creighton (RPI #10)

@ Depaul (RPI #90)

Vs. Georgetown (RPI #74)

@ Villanova (RPI #5)

@ Providence (RPI #48)

Vs. St. John’s (RPI #84)

[kneelb4zerg]

our strength of schedule is only 88? That surprises me.

Yet we have 11 top 100 games, 7 top 50. Too may 250-300+ RPI teams unfortunately.

[Markedman]

Buy games killed us…….. although we rank higher then that by other metrics…..Sagarin for example has our SOS at 21…

I just looked…we played 6 games against teams with RPI’s of 299 or worse this year…….6!


our strength of schedule is only 88? That surprises me.

[MKE_GoldenEagleFan]

To be in the discussion I think we must win the Seton Hall, and Depaul road games (totally doable), then I think we have to go 1-2 in the three remaining games against Nova and Creighton. If we truly want to be taken seriously the remaining games against Butler, St. John’s x2, and Georgetown are must wins. Then I think we have to go 2-1 in the three games against Providence, and Xavier. That would leave us at a conference record of 12-6 with a record of 4-9 against the top 50, and 11-11 against the top 100 with no bad losses. Add to that two wins in the Big East tournament and we are in… I am just not confident we can do that, that means we’d need to finish 11-4 (with a 2-1 BE Tournament record) to make the tournament… that’s a tough hill to climb.

[kneelb4zerg]

To be in the discussion I think we must win the Seton Hall, and Depaul road games (totally doable), then I think we have to go 1-2 in the three remaining games against Nova and Creighton. If we truly want to be taken seriously the remaining games against Butler, St. John’s x2, and Georgetown are must wins. Then I think we have to go 2-1 in the three games against Providence, and Xavier. That would leave us at a conference record of 12-6 with a record of 4-9 against the top 50, and 11-11 against the top 100 with no bad losses. Add to that two wins in the Big East tournament and we are in… I am just not confident we can do that, that means we’d need to finish 11-4 (with a 2-1 BE Tournament record) to make the tournament… that’s a tough hill to climb.

Why wouldn't 12-6 do it? (or, 11-7 with 1 in the BET). Three more losses (plus another in the BET), take your pick; It's not like we are at risk for a slew of bad losses coming up. If we do that, there should be enough quality wins to get in.

[Alan Bykowski, "brewcity77"]

Buy games killed us…….. although we rank higher then that by other metrics…..Sagarin for example has our SOS at 21…

I just looked…we played 6 games against teams with RPI’s of 299 or worse this year…….6!

This is why I was complaining about our schedule preseason and why UW's schedule is so good. The key to a good schedule is minimizing your RPI drains. We didn't do that this year, though likely because of the fear the meat grinder of tough games could be a train wreck, like it was. If we stack this schedule with teams in the 150-250 range instead of sub-299, maybe we have 1-2 more losses.

[warriorfan4life]

This is why I was complaining about our schedule preseason and why UW's schedule is so good. The key to a good schedule is minimizing your RPI drains. We didn't do that this year, though likely because of the fear the meat grinder of tough games could be a train wreck, like it was. If we stack this schedule with teams in the 150-250 range instead of sub-299, maybe we have 1-2 more losses.

We lose to any team with a pulse the way we played in the New Hampshire game, but probably would have beaten an IPFW or Oral Roberts when we had the IUPUI/Ball State homestand. Next year we may need the cupcakes with extra frosting early, but two years from now I want us to play a daunting non-conference slate with tough as possible buy games.