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Post by HLFanaticus on Jul 11, 2020 3:27:45 GMT -6
The Horizon League appears to be in a period of adjustment...hopefully for the good. This season, two new teams, Purdue Fort Wayne, Robert Morris} have been added with two good coaches (Jon Coffman, Andy Toole). Cleveland State's Dennis Gates was co-coach of the year with Wright State's Scott Nagy. Green Bay and UIC have hired new coaches who, on paper, appear to be good choices. It even seems that the student-athlete talent has gotten better. There is 3-star talent throughout the league this season with at least 2, 4-star talents on board. With these happenings the question now becomes will the Horizon League begin a trajectory to regain its status as a top 12-15 conference?
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Post by Deleted on Jul 11, 2020 12:26:24 GMT -6
As the registered Horizon League eternal optimist, you already know my answer. This League can make a resurgence. I've always believed that if you have above average coaching and good recruits, you can win...at any level. Sometimes, that's in spite of an administration hamstringing the program funding-wise. When the MCC/Horizon was in its heyday, they had really good coaches and good recruits. Coaches didn't leave right away and players stayed longer than 1or 2 years. They also didn't have the juggernaut budgets that P5's had. I do know that things have changed in that regard (except for the budgets), but I still believe this conference can come back. The HL has a number of good coaches right now: Scott Nagy, Dennis Gates, Andy Toole, Jon Coffman, Jarrod Calhoun, Darin Horn, Will Ryan (on paper), Luke Yaklich (on paper) and I think Greg Kampe still has some juice left. That's nine of the 12 teams or 75% with good coaches. Right now, with the pandemic, it appears that more mid-majors are getting some players who would normally venture a little farther from home. They're staying closer and not having much opportunity to visit P5 schools or talk directly to those head coaches. The uncertainty of being offered or not is causing some to commit early or to a program they might not have considered before. The mid-major coaches are making headway and are personally zooming with recruits. It's probably me, but once again I think the HL will rise again. Give it 3-5 years.
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Post by vugrad1314 on Jul 13, 2020 14:35:48 GMT -6
It'll be a tall order and will require a lot of programs getting much better in a short period. BUT if CSU and Milwaukee can recover and play to the potential they have shown in the past, GB, Oakland, Wright State, and NKU can remain solid, RMU is as good an addition as advertised, and the league has no boat anchors (UIC YSU and UDM continue moving upward\getting up off the mat IUPUI shows at least a pulse as a program and PFW improves thanks to the reduction in travel costs) I could definitely see the league improving to at least the low end of the 12-15 range. It will take time and a pretty strong year from the conference overall but I do think it can happen. The addition of RMU has me optimistic about the league's future because it adds another top level program to the league. If there's one thing this league needs it's depth. Is it likely to happen in the short or even the mid-term? Maybe not but mid-long term it's certainly possible.
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Post by gbphoenix1 on Jul 14, 2020 8:29:58 GMT -6
If there is a non conference season the short answer is no the HL will not likely be a top 20 conference.
Too many of the league members play stupid schedules. If you can't play games you can win your metrics are going to suck. If some of the games you can win are against non D1 games that don't help your metrics at all then your metrics are going to suck.
I heard Coffman and Toole say the league coaches have a call each week and scheduling is a topic of conversation on that call. I hear HL people talking about becoming a two bid league again which I appreciate. It is not realistic until they figure out the scheduling issue. On one hand I hear them say they want to play 60% of the Non Con at home which is a good thing. The problem is many league members are choosing to make the other 40% beat downs for money. That totally negates the winning at home games that count.
Last year WSU had a very good team. In the metrics they looked way better than most of the league. They played games they could win and for the most part won those games. Now they didn't beat anyone great so the schedule was soft overall and had them poised to be a 14 or 15 seed had they danced. I know they want to make it tougher but they were closer to having the right idea than the wrong one.
If league members want to schedule like MEAC, SWAC, OVC and other low major conferences than the HL will continue to look like a low major conference. GB is a huge offender of this. Their schedule has been stupid in the past several years. This year they at least will play all D1 games which helps IMO but 5 games for money is dumb. The league has to get smarter before it can get better. Scheduling is the #1 issue as most of the members have facilities and coaches on par or better than our peers.
If there is no non conference I am not sure what that does to the metrics. In theory that could help everyone else close the gap. Your metrics would be based on your peers and how you play against them withouth them having tons of bad losses piled up. The 10th place big ten team wouldn't have a bunch of home wins against low majors making them look super efficient.
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Post by freewind on Jul 14, 2020 11:39:47 GMT -6
Well there's 11 conference i don't think we'll ever compete with:
Big East
Big 12
Pac 12
SEC
Big 10
ACC
AAC
A10
West Coast
Mountain West
Missouri Valley
Outside of those, i think the Horizon should be able to compete with...but right now, they are no where close.
The MAC finished 12th in conference RPI, and though they had an exceptional year, you can usually depend on couple conferences making good run. The average MAC team RPI last year was 155. The average Horizon League team (Including PFW & Robert Morris) was 234. So each team in the Horizon has to make up 79 spots from last year to be a 12th place conference. GOOD LUCK. I think only Cleveland State might improve their RPI anywhere close to what every team needs to do.
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Post by ougrizz05 on Jul 18, 2020 13:20:06 GMT -6
Green Bay at 55? Detroit at 79? In Mens basketball, am I reading that correctly?
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Post by bballraider on Jul 18, 2020 22:44:53 GMT -6
From their manual, not real basketball, you may want to remove all of these posts, so people don’t think they are real NCAA ratings.
Introduction
Heat Check CBB Simulation is a text-based simulation college basketball game. Users will control a college basketball program by managing rosters, setting budgets, recruiting high-school players and transfers, and plenty more. Though the simulation has plenty of info and details, it will require little time to manage a team. The simulation features multi-tournament events, draft declarations, accolades, top-25 rankings, March Madness and more.
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Post by ougrizz05 on Jul 19, 2020 12:41:57 GMT -6
From their manual, not real basketball, you may want to remove all of these posts, so people don’t think they are real NCAA ratings. Introduction Heat Check CBB Simulation is a text-based simulation college basketball game. Users will control a college basketball program by managing rosters, setting budgets, recruiting high-school players and transfers, and plenty more. Though the simulation has plenty of info and details, it will require little time to manage a team. The simulation features multi-tournament events, draft declarations, accolades, top-25 rankings, March Madness and more. Thx for the info. I had no idea. |
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Post by vugrad1314 on Jul 20, 2020 0:13:25 GMT -6
Here's everything you need to know about this simulation... It's wildly inaccurate. It doesn't even have the right teams in the right conferences. It has Robert Morris in the NEC right now and we all know that's no longer accurate...
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