Valley non-conference SoS

[BEELINE]

Out of fairness you do have to realize the #1 bump to WSU's noncon SOS was not a game they scheduled or earned in tourney play, but the game assigned them by the league at SDSU. Sometimes luck just goes your way. Getting assigned a game a year in advance against a team that then goes on to have the best year in their history is not any more good scheduling than it would be bad scheduling if UNLV tanks next year with Kruger gone. Both were assigned games. Some things just happen independent of your own efforts.

[WSUbballer]

And that same process is applied to scheduled games as well. That's how it goes. But you are given credit or lack thereof for what is on your schedule and how it plays out. That's how it goes.

WSU wasn't lucky to play at San Diego State last year. They earned it as being a favorite. Same with SDSU. Lucky would have been Illinois State going to play at San Diego State last year.

[Jamar Howard 4 Pres]

Wichita State could have replaced the San Diego State game with Arkansas Little Rock and would have still had a better non-conf SOS than 1/2 the Valley. The descepancy between WSU and teams like Illinois State was not simply due to 1 or 2 games.

[DoubleJayAlum]

How is it that San Diego St gets back to back home games in the challenge? WSU had to go out there this year and CU has to go there next year... Is the MVC getting screwed in this deal?

[wildjays]

Doublejay, I wondered the same thing. What I found out is that the MVC/MWC challenge is a four year series, but split into 2 and 2 where in those series of 2, a team does not get back to back home games. For these first two years, there wasn't a team that had two home games or two road games.

But since we are heading into year three, it doesn't say they can't have back to back home games between the series of two. So San Diego State gets to start off at home for this series at home, but will be on the road next year. So it may look like teams are having back-to-back home games or road games, but that is because we are on the 2nd series of 2 games where everything starts over.

[havoc]

1) Wichita State-59
2) Indiana State 138
3) Evansville 158
4) Northern Iowa 170
5) Missouri State 199
6) Creighton 219
7) Southern Illinois 233
8) Bradley 279
9) Drake 281
10) Illinois State 332

This list was posted on this board, sourced to ESPN.com, by hacksaw on February 21. There were 2 Valley games left.

Anyone able to explain the discrepancies if the post-season is not included?

Well, part of the answer is in your post; there were 2 Valley games left. Also, the numbers I posted do include the conference tournaments.

[Red]

10) Illinois State 332

I don't think we can contribute anything worse than we did this year, so we've got that going for us. You're welcome MVC!