Will the WAC ever be back? Basketball

[packman]

I was just looking at realtimerpi.com, the WAC is 15th. So far the conference only has one team in the top 100, La Tech at 90. Has the WAC seen it's best days? I for one hope we blow this joint before it's to late.

[PackNation]

Tonight wasn't great.

UNEP beat Alcorn St. 97-72
Utah St. beat Morehead St. 79-72
Boise beat Portland State 69-62

All those were WAC home games

On the road:

Fresno lost to Montana 59-56
San Jose was crushed by N. Colorado 93-69

[packman]

That's what I mean, it seems like the conference has fallen so far so fast. I understand down years, but the stuff I read really sold me on the fact we as a whole would be a lot better this year. Obviously it's been a bitter disappointment.

[student4ever]

No doubt that this has been a very disappointing year for the WAC, but there are two points that should be made to keep things in perspective.

1. THe RPI right now doesn't matter. RPIforecast, which projects the RPI at the end of the year, which is really what matters the most has the WAC expected to finish in 11th. The WAC is also expected to not have a team finish OOC below .500. This will be the first time in a while that has happened, and is the reason that RPI will increase once conference season starts. Unfortunately we aren't enough over .500 to really make a big move.

2. Teams matter, conferences don't. As Kyle Whelliston relayed from his experience in the mock selection committee last year, conference affiliation was never discussed beyond the fact that one of the committee members was in charge of knowing all that they could about that conference. The teams are judged individually, not on the basis of their conference. If the conference has a lot of strong teams, that will show up in the first two things on the team sheets that committee members see; Average RPI Win and Average RPI Loss. Right now, the WAC is projected to have 8 of 9 teams inside the top 200 and Hawaii is expected to be on the border of top 200. That is the strongest from top to bottom the WAC has been in quite a while, and not having an above 250 team to play in conference will help out the average win totals.

Keeping those two points in mind, Nevada and La. Tech aren't out of at-large consideration. For those of you who will respond that I'm crazy and we stand no chance, go back and read those two points again then come back and start here and keep reading. Nevada has no bad losses, but we don't have any good wins either. No WAC team has ever received an at-large bid with more than 4 OOC losses, so if Nevada loses to BYU today, this probably all moot. Today's game is the first game of the NCAA tournament for Nevada. Win and stay alive. Lose and the at-large is essentially gone. The advantage of playing a strong schedule is that you can lose a couple more games than some other teams and still have a shot. La. Tech's SOS is much easier than Nevada's and they are in the same position, in that they have to win out in the OOC. If Nevada and La. Tech can win out OOC (not probable, but still possible), then the WAC could send two if the Pack and the Bulldogs can also finish top 2 and both make the championship game. There's a lot of ifs there, and it could all end this afternoon, but it's still a possibility and the fact that current RPI and conference affiliation don't really matter means that it is too early to declare a multi-bid conference out of the question.

[packman]

No doubt that this has been a very disappointing year for the WAC, but there are two points that should be made to keep things in perspective.

1. THe RPI right now doesn't matter. RPIforecast, which projects the RPI at the end of the year, which is really what matters the most has the WAC expected to finish in 11th. The WAC is also expected to not have a team finish OOC below .500. This will be the first time in a while that has happened, and is the reason that RPI will increase once conference season starts. Unfortunately we aren't enough over .500 to really make a big move.

2. Teams matter, conferences don't. As Kyle Whelliston relayed from his experience in the mock selection committee last year, conference affiliation was never discussed beyond the fact that one of the committee members was in charge of knowing all that they could about that conference. The teams are judged individually, not on the basis of their conference. If the conference has a lot of strong teams, that will show up in the first two things on the team sheets that committee members see; Average RPI Win and Average RPI Loss. Right now, the WAC is projected to have 8 of 9 teams inside the top 200 and Hawaii is expected to be on the border of top 200. That is the strongest from top to bottom the WAC has been in quite a while, and not having an above 250 team to play in conference will help out the average win totals.

Keeping those two points in mind, Nevada and La. Tech aren't out of at-large consideration. For those of you who will respond that I'm crazy and we stand no chance, go back and read those two points again then come back and start here and keep reading. Nevada has no bad losses, but we don't have any good wins either. No WAC team has ever received an at-large bid with more than 4 OOC losses, so if Nevada loses to BYU today, this probably all moot. Today's game is the first game of the NCAA tournament for Nevada. Win and stay alive. Lose and the at-large is essentially gone. The advantage of playing a strong schedule is that you can lose a couple more games than some other teams and still have a shot. La. Tech's SOS is much easier than Nevada's and they are in the same position, in that they have to win out in the OOC. If Nevada and La. Tech can win out OOC (not probable, but still possible), then the WAC could send two if the Pack and the Bulldogs can also finish top 2 and both make the championship game. There's a lot of ifs there, and it could all end this afternoon, but it's still a possibility and the fact that current RPI and conference affiliation don't really matter means that it is too early to declare a multi-bid conference out of the question.

Thanks S4E, that makes a lot of sense I also agree the conference's rpi will rise from here, but that is still just a forecast and obviously there is always a margin of error in those. I guess I was just venting a little frustration over it's performance so far, pack included. Anyways, like you said the best thing the pack can do is handle it's business and what better time to start than today! Go Pack!

[NevadaFan]

And the WAC is back? From what? The WAC was and always has been a two bid league. The major problem I see is that his league needs Nevada or Fresno to carry the torch as programs that can receive at-large bids. If this was the Nevada of three years ago, and the rest of the league was playing as well as it is now, it would be fine. As it is, there is no marquee team, and no marquee wins to get anyone excited about. IMO, the WAC is the fourth best league in the west in this order.

1) WCC
2) PAC 10
3) MWC
4) WAC
5) Big West

That said, I'm not so sure it should be ranked behind the Big West with Pacific and LBSU have success against the WAC.

[Stuck in Seattle]

The real drop off in the WAC was in 07-08 where we fell from being the 9th ranked conference with 5 teams in the top 100 RPI (2 in the top 50) in the previous two years to being the 21st ranked conference. The WAC had only 3 teams in the top 100 RPI that year and none ranked in the top 50. Since then the WAC has moved back up to the 11th ranked conference, but the bottom was terrible for a few years and the top has not been as good.

Nevada's RPI over that period:
17
23
73
83
Forecast for this year: 112

The other top WAC program, USU during the same period:
46
45
75
23
Forecast for this year: 63.5

But the bottom has improved dramatically from the really down year and the middle has regressed slightly.

Anyway, I'm more concerned with Nevada than the WAC. The trend in Ranking matches our trend on defense. Change that and the Pack will be back on top.

[Packmike]

Its so volatile, who ever thought the WCC would improve like it has this season. I think the mid major conferences have up and down years and the WAC will be back to multiple bids soon