I say let UNI have their moment in the sun. Good for them to get a #10 ranking. The important thing to Cyclone fans should be Conference Titles, and Final Fours. All I care about is what seed ISU will get, and as long as they take care of business the rest of the way, they'll earn their 2-3 seed. I would love to see UNI as the 2nd best team in the state year in and year out.
ISU 12th in new AP
- Thread starter RedlineSi
- Start date
Having 1 top 50 win and a non top 50 loss does not make you deserving of a top 10 in my opinion. Iowa State has beaten 8 top 50 teams and of the teams receiving votes in this very poll we have 7 vs.UNI 1. That says deserving. Being 4-3 on the Road vs. The Top 55 says deserving (compared to 0-1 for UNI). Body of work isn't even comparable. UNI is a great team and maybe even a top 15 team but to say they deserve it and Iowa State there "is a joke" is way over the line.
Witchita State needs to blow out UNI twice (a team that already blew them out) winning their tournament, then advance to the Sweet 16 and play a great game to potentially make the Elite 8 to live up to their hype.
For a team with no quality wins to have that expectation...it's incredibly irrational.
You're right that WSU hasn't even shown why they should be directly next to UNI, let alone the other 50 teams that do have quality wins.
CycloneErik
Well-Known Member
I'm surprised how many ways there are to gauge the strength of the Big 12 by using Texas Tech as the selected piece of evidence.
I'll never defend Tech. They stink, but I don't see where the bottom-feeder dictates conference strength. Most of the time, you look towards the top of the league, and then note how strong the middle is, and then maybe bother with the bottom feeders.
I'll never defend Tech. They stink, but I don't see where the bottom-feeder dictates conference strength. Most of the time, you look towards the top of the league, and then note how strong the middle is, and then maybe bother with the bottom feeders.
Transitive property is key except for VCU and Evanston College.
Seriously, I don't even know where Evansville is and I'm assuming it's named after the town. How does that even happen? It's big enough to have an AMAZING basketball team at a university named after the town but I haven't even heard of it. I lived in Iowa/Neb/Illinois most of my life, how have I never even heard of this basketball mecca that I assume is somewhere in the midwest?
Agreed. I'm happy for UNI and will root for them in the tournament. But we have no idea how good they are because they haven't played anyone. They have no resume to speak of outside of a win against WSU and a loss against VCU.
There is a reason they are #20 in the RPI.
TCU was 14-0 and ranked when they got to play MVC caliber competition. They would probably be top 10 too if they were allowed to keep playing it all season. A quick glance at TCU and you can see they're more athletic and difficult to match up with than MVC teams.
They compare to their conference to Tech because we unfortunately dropped one to tech, and because the other 9 Big 12 teams would all crush teams 3rd-last in their league.
We all respect UNI. I stated earlier I thought Tuttle and Niang do a lot of the same things and given how much ISU fans love Niang that's a huge complement.
What we all laugh at, and are all 100% correct about, is the idiocy of the AP poll moving up UNI and ESPECIALLY WSU every single week for beating nobodies. They should have held at UNI around 15 and WSU around 20 until then next WSU/UNI game at least.
The current trajectory, if the season were long enough, I guarantee the top 3 would be Kentucky, UNI, WSU, possibly with UNI #1 ahead of Kentucky because Kentucky has been challenged much more even in a weak SEC.
H
HGPuck
Guest
All we are really arguing about is where we would rank teams. If we are using entire body of work these would be my ranks of the teams most discussed in the thread.
Gonzaga - 6th (Significantly tougher schedule than UNI/WSU with only loss at AZ)
ISU - 10th (Toughest schedule by far and a significant number of good wins, but two bad losses)
Notre Dame - 12th (4-4 against top 40 teams, but a pretty weak schedule outside of that, no bad losses)
UNI - 15th (1-1 against top 20 teams, one bad loss, 13 of their wins against RPI 200+ teams)
Wichita St. - 25th (slightly tougher schedule than UNI, no good wins, both top 20 games have been on the road)
Gonzaga - 6th (Significantly tougher schedule than UNI/WSU with only loss at AZ)
ISU - 10th (Toughest schedule by far and a significant number of good wins, but two bad losses)
Notre Dame - 12th (4-4 against top 40 teams, but a pretty weak schedule outside of that, no bad losses)
UNI - 15th (1-1 against top 20 teams, one bad loss, 13 of their wins against RPI 200+ teams)
Wichita St. - 25th (slightly tougher schedule than UNI, no good wins, both top 20 games have been on the road)
Best part of ISU being #12 is WSU and UNI are head of ISU - giving the folks here something to complain about after 2 straight ISU road wins and Matt Thomas playing well. 
Yeah, I also heard that Evanston College of Dental Sciences won a hot tub time machine basketball game against the '96 Chicago Bulls last week. It's all settled.
I was just curious if you, personally, believed that if they both won out, that UNI should stay ranked ahead of ISU. Regardless of what KU does, and ISU finishes either 1 or 2 in Big 12 with a 14-4 conference record.
Another great top 20 matchup in Hilton Wednesday night is all any Cyclone fans should really care or be passionate about. Look forward to revenge on Baylor!
H
HGPuck
Guest
TCU and UNI really is an interesting comparison. I tend to think that either team would have a similar record against the opposite schedule, but we will never know.
http://www.cbssports.com/collegebasketball/bracketology/team-comparison/NIOWA/TCU
Edit: More accurately it is very likely TCU would have a similar record against UNI's schedule. How UNI would do against TCU's schedule really is impossible to know and a large reason for the hand wringing in this thread by either side of the argument.
http://www.cbssports.com/collegebasketball/bracketology/team-comparison/NIOWA/TCU
Edit: More accurately it is very likely TCU would have a similar record against UNI's schedule. How UNI would do against TCU's schedule really is impossible to know and a large reason for the hand wringing in this thread by either side of the argument.
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Best part of ISU being #12 is WSU and UNI are head of ISU - giving the folks here something to complain about after 2 straight ISU road wins and Matt Thomas playing well.
BDJ is playing very well in a supporting roll...of all people myself, HFCS, started a well received thread about good Big 12 basketball officiating...if Edozie were to get some playing time there would be nothing left to discuss negatively.
#12 is perfect IMO. UNI can have that #10 ranking. No small feat and good for the entirety of the state. I prefer to keep climbing the ladder steadily. We've got a tough schedule ahead of us still.
As for the conference race, someone other than OU needs to knock off KU. I think KU is going to pull out a win at OU. Need WV or Texas to step up at Allen Fieldhouse.
As for the conference race, someone other than OU needs to knock off KU. I think KU is going to pull out a win at OU. Need WV or Texas to step up at Allen Fieldhouse.
