Updated 1/6/18: MVC Expansion Poll

[VUGrad1314]

Because they’ve drawn a national champion and national runnerup. Both times, Murray St was their closest game.

This is a very salient point and deserves more attention. Tournament games are all about draws. Murray matched up incredibly well against Marquette and whipped them then they got a terrible draw against Florida State and got whipped. Same deal for Loyola two years ago and Bradley last year. Michigan State was a really tough draw. They would have beaten many other teams in that field in the first round. By contrast, Miami was a favorable draw for the Ramblers and they took advantage.

[mvfcfan]

Murray State is a good program, but they do remind me a lot of Wichita State and Creighton. Like Creighton they've been to the tournament a lot, but they've never even made it past the first weekend. Like Wichita State they blame their conference for "holding them back". Wichita hasn't done anything since they left, and Creighton still hasn't made a Sweet 16. Is there any evidence out there that if the Racers joined the MVC they'd actually make a Sweet 16? I kind of doubt they would honestly. I don't think joining our league would get them better recruits than they're already getting, and even if they got a better seed that a 12 it probably still wouldn't matter. They had a 6 seed one year and still couldn't get out of the first weekend.

I'm not saying that we shouldn't add them (because I think we should), but I think they/we need to look in the mirror too. Not only that, but their football is not anything special. Honestly as of right now, Jacksonville State is overall the best program in the OVC. They just won the OVC in football, finished 1 game back in basketball, and won baseball. JSU almost did a sweep for the major sports.

IMO the MVC would benefit more from adding Murray State, than Murray State would benefit from joining the MVC. Their travel costs would go way up (especially for football) and there are no guarantees that we will ever be a 2 bid league again. Their path would be more difficult to make the NCAA tournament and if they didn't win Arch Madness they probably still wouldn't make the NIT (unless the were the #1 seed and received an auto-bid).

[RacerJoeD]

...and yet the Racers are itching to go...

I wonder why that is?

It must seem confusing to people who don’t play February games in basketball hotbeds of Edwardsville, Il. and Martin, TN, in front whatever fans of yours make the trip and nearly no one else. It must be strange to lose kids you’re recruiting to worse teams in better conferences. It must be weird to know that no matter how you play the whole season, your NCAA hopes ride on one game, even when you’re in the top 25. It is such an easy path, why would anyone give that up?


So let me ask you all a question. If your President today came out and said your school was in talks to join the OVC or Summit or WAC... how would you feel about it? If you first instinct is something akin to “what? Screw that” then you already know why we want out. If your first thought is something like “sweet, now we have an easier trip to the NCAA” please call your school president and urge a trade, Murray State for your school.

[BEARZ77]

I would say it's more a mixed bag than you think. I certainly favor adding Murray State and in many ways it would be a positive for them. But I also would add, history suggests it could cause them problems as well. If you look at the histories of other very successful programs that moved into the MVC like Evansville, Valpo and Missouri State, one could make the argument it hurt them as much as helped. All had histories of success, for MSU and Evansville even dating back to D-2 and/ or NAIA. Then similar success at low major D-1 . When MSU entered the Valley they were riding 4 straight NCAA D-1 Tourney appearances out of the Mid Continent Conference. They made a NIT in their 1st year in the Valley and a NCAA their second. But they, as Evansville has, and Valpo is now experiencing struggled to maintain that. They've made quite a few NIT appearances , but only one NCAA since. If you think just moving up in conference helps, consider MSU has 2 RPI's in the 20's a 1 in the low 30's, and a league championship that didn't get a bid since joining the MVC.

While a lot goes into their lack of success , one of the major factors is that as you struggle to get a bid that you routinely got before, it effects all aspects of your program. Prestige, attendance, funding, support, national perception all take a hit which then makes it harder to do the things necessary to get back to where you once were, that being regularly in the NCAA tourney. While you can't assume the same would be true for Murray, there's plenty examples of other programs in other conferences that experienced similar. Tulsa, Arkansas , Davidson are just a few names that come to mind.

Again, I think the move made sense for Missouri State and it makes sense for Murray State and I hope it happens, but it comes with real risks . You could be the same or better on the court than you have been, but with worse results which then slowly eat at the core of what made you good.

[mvfcfan]

I'm an Indiana State fan and I would personally be fine with moving to the OVC (but not any other league). The thing is, between football, basketball, and baseball there are only 3 schools we play in every sport (ILST, MSU, and SIU). Then there schools like Drake and Loyola that we only play in basketball. It's just hard to actually have a true rival in our league when we never play any of the same teams consistently.

I'm pretty sure in the OVC there are only three schools that don't have football, basketball, and baseball. (Belmont and SIUE don't have football; TNST doesn't have baseball). We would also have a natural rival in EIU and our travel would go down, especially for football.

The MVC is kind of a mess and I'm honestly a little surprised that it has stayed as stable as it has. If the Dakota schools ever create Summit League football then I think that might end up being the straw that break the camel's back. The MVFC (Gateway) was in trouble a little bit when WKU left, because it left us with 7 schools, so then we added NDSU and SDSU who had recently moved up to D1. If The Summit League schools left that would leave us with 6 for football, which is enough for an automatic bid, but really puts pressure on everyone for scheduling. This is one of the biggest reasons why I think the MVC really needs to add the XDSU's. It would create a lot of stability for this league. Both have good basketball and both have baseball as well. It also ends any threat of the Summit League having football.

Even though it would add travel for us, if we added the XDSU's I could honestly say that I would no longer be interested in the OVC at all. However they are not in the MVC and I doubt they ever will be. So as of right now I wouldn't be upset at all if we were considering a move to the OVC. I'm not going to say that I prefer the OVC, I just wouldn't be against it.

I will say that if I was in Murray State's shoes I don't think I would want to join the MVC. There would just be too much risk and not enough to gain by joining. If it was the mid 2000's then I'd absolutely want to take a shot at it, but those days are long gone now. Murray State has a lot of fan support because they win. If they played in the MVC they might end up losing fans if the winning didn't continue. Just look at Valpo. They were packing it out in the HL and now their crowds are increasingly getting worse. In our case if we joined the OVC and started winning we might actually gain fans just because we were winning. Our crowds suck right now and we typically don't have much success in basketball, so we really wouldn't have much (if anything) to lose by going to the OVC.

[IllinoisState]

I'm not saying that we shouldn't add them (because I think we should), but I think they/we need to look in the mirror too. Not only that, but their football is not anything special. Honestly as of right now, Jacksonville State is overall the best program in the OVC. They just won the OVC in football, finished 1 game back in basketball, and won baseball. JSU almost did a sweep for the major sports.

Jacksonville State would be the weakest academic school in the MVC by far. They are not a good cultural fit nor are they a good geographic fit. Plus they've only had two good basketball seasons recently.

[Mikovio]

The MVC is a basketball league should absolutely not consider football when making an expansion decision. Midmajors make money on basketball and lose money on football, with NDSU maybe being the only exception.

I could be convinced otherwise if success in FCS football seemed to be correlated with success in basketball, but that sure doesn't seem to be the case. Here's the final FCS top 25 last year:

1 North Dakota State (156) 15-0 3900 1
2 Eastern Washington 12-3 3741 4
3 South Dakota State 10-3 3563 5
4 Maine 10-4 3299 12
5 Kennesaw State 11-2 3224 2
6 Weber State 10-3 3096 3
7 UC Davis 10-3 2939 7
8 Colgate 10-2 2836 9
9 James Madison 9-4 2532 6
10 Jacksonville State 9-4 2360 8
11 Princeton 10-0 2189 10
12 North Carolina A&T 10-2 2136 11
13 Wofford 9-4 2135 13
14 Nicholls 9-4 1951 14
15 Southeast Missouri State 9-4 1587 20
16 Stony Brook 7-5 1163 15
17 Montana State 8-5 1157 23
18 Dartmouth 9-1 981 18
19 Elon 6-5 909 17
20 Towson 7-5 803 16
21 Duquesne 9-4 699 NR
22 ETSU 8-4 686 22
23 UNI 7-6 676 NR
24 Delaware 7-5 670 21
25 San Diego 9-3 635 19

Those are in general some bad basketball schools. Other historical FCS powers are Youngstown State, Appalachian State, Georgia Southern and Marshall. Bad. Basketball. If you can give a reasonable explanation for why the MVC basketball league should take FCS performance into account when looking at expansion candidates I'd like to hear it, other than helping the MVFC, which, I stress again, is a different entity.

Also, there's an argument to be made for wanting to be a big fish in a small pond vs moving to a bigger pond with more hostile environments and it becoming more difficult to make the NCAA via the conference tournament. As pointed out, E-ville and Valpo have found the transition difficult. Butler OTOH gave up the safety blanket of the Horizon and has risen to the challenge. Hey, Wichita might have won Arch Madness last year if they stayed (Glad they didn't!).

[mvfcfan]

And this is the exact reason why I would not be against my school joining the OVC. We spend 4 million per year on football. Why should we stay in a league where 50% of the schools would vote against our interests in a heartbeat?

[Mikovio]

You spend $4 million on football and can't afford to fire Greg Lansing. What's against your interests again?

[E-Villan]

I would say it's more a mixed bag than you think. I certainly favor adding Murray State and in many ways it would be a positive for them. But I also would add, history suggests it could cause them problems as well. If you look at the histories of other very successful programs that moved into the MVC like Evansville, Valpo and Missouri State, one could make the argument it hurt them as much as helped. All had histories of success, for MSU and Evansville even dating back to D-2 and/ or NAIA. Then similar success at low major D-1 . When MSU entered the Valley they were riding 4 straight NCAA D-1 Tourney appearances out of the Mid Continent Conference. They made a NIT in their 1st year in the Valley and a NCAA their second. But they, as Evansville has, and Valpo is now experiencing struggled to maintain that. They've made quite a few NIT appearances , but only one NCAA since. If you think just moving up in conference helps, consider MSU has 2 RPI's in the 20's a 1 in the low 30's, and a league championship that didn't get a bid since joining the MVC.

While a lot goes into their lack of success , one of the major factors is that as you struggle to get a bid that you routinely got before, it effects all aspects of your program. Prestige, attendance, funding, support, national perception all take a hit which then makes it harder to do the things necessary to get back to where you once were, that being regularly in the NCAA tourney. While you can't assume the same would be true for Murray, there's plenty examples of other programs in other conferences that experienced similar. Tulsa, Arkansas , Davidson are just a few names that come to mind.

Again, I think the move made sense for Missouri State and it makes sense for Murray State and I hope it happens, but it comes with real risks . You could be the same or better on the court than you have been, but with worse results which then slowly eat at the core of what made you good.

I don't think this is entirely accurate for Evansville. Most would agree that the conference championships we were getting in the MCC was against as good, if not better competition than the MVC programs. Remember, both Creighton and Bradley were all set to move to the MCC before Dayton bolted to the Great Midwest. The move from the MCC to the MVC was more of a necessity due to the implosion of the MCC than a quest to get into a better conference. For the first 6-7 years in the MVC, we competed fairly well, mid to top. Our problems since have been more the result of complacent leadership than conference affiliations. Those teams Crews had in the MCC would compete very favorably in the current MVC. I think the same could be said about Valpo, which clearly did move up, but those Drew teams of a few years back would have done well in the MVC. In addition, I think it is fair to say that Loyola has actually improved since joining the MVC.

If a school currently fits the other MVC schools in terms of resources, facilities and support, they should be considered on those merits, and Murray currently checks those boxes.