2015 Arch Madness seeding probabilities

[rlh04d]

It's not a coincidence that UNI is having a great year now that 4 years of the dead McDermott scholarship are over.

Year 1- Too late in the spring, went unused.
Year 2- Olivier Redshirt Year
Year 3- Olivier quits in December
Year 4- Jesperson transfer year

It literally took a scholarship for 4 years and put us in a situation where Rank and Singleton couldn't use the redshirt years they both needed.

If Jacobson couldn't overcome a single recruit bailing on his scholarship, he's not as good of a coach as I think he is.

Marshall wouldn't have been impacted in the slightest by it. And I know that because it's happened several times to him and it hasn't impacted his team's performance.

It's funny how several UNI fans are making such a big deal about this, yet the lack of senior balance year-to-year and the complete lack of a 2012 recruiting class are apparently non-issues.

[rlh04d]

Depth at the post position is really a problem for just about every Valley team isn't it? There just aren't enough quality 4/5 players to go around even for a team like WSU. As good as WSU has been this year they have a definite gap at the post in between Carter and their young guys. Is that a deficiency on the part of Marshall and staff? I don't think so. I'm sure they took the best players available to them.

Next year it appears we (the Valley) will really have a dearth of quality post players. If Mock doesn't come back who does that leave? Lynch for sure but who else. You could argue that Tyler McCullough even though he's been really inconsistent could be one of the top 3 or 4 fives in the league. Kind of by default.

I actually don't think there's that much of a gap between Carter and Shaq right now -- particularly considering the experience gap of senior to freshman. Carter's the better offensive player and Shaq's the better defensive player. Regardless, Shaq will be a strong five long-term as long as his motivation level stays high. That guy is one of the few people I see with a Valley future that realistically ranges from Player of the Year to transferring to a lower conference by his junior year.

For WSU, Nurger could potentially be a player if he gets a lot of weight room help ... but considering his age I think it's more likely he ends up as a bust. Kelly has a good future in front of him at 6'7". McDuffie's going to be one of the best big men in the league at 6'8", but he's not a post guy from what I've seen of him.

I think Envold at Drake could be really strong the next two years as well. Especially with a solid PG in Timmer getting the ball to him consistently.

Lynch seems to have a very high ceiling. Mock obviously has the potential to be a monster. Koch will likely end up being good considering the family's/Jacobson's track record.

But yeah, big man issues are always going to be a Valley thing.

[PantherSigEp]

Did we just ask or imply if UNI fans prefer 2 years of Jesperson to 4 yrs of McDermott? Uh...that one should be obvious. Plus Jesperson still wants to leave UVA regardless of Doug. They would've figured out the scholarship last year and the situation is still the same this year. Olivier was the "replacement" and never felt like working hard. We had to give Rank 15 mins of game time as a 4/5. Singleton never redshirts. Plus UNI brings in a number of talented recruits and players despite being "down". Let's not kid ourselves, UNI isn't national champion with Doug but Creighton would be even worse and we wouldn't be talking about UNI's tourney drought. It made a difference. Especially when we had all those middle-of-the-pack ties in the standings. You can't tell me Doug doesn't help the Panthers win about 2-3 more games each year (minimum). Even if he isn't the same high-volume scorer. Jake's system limits stats, but obviously it doesn't limit talent

I wouldn't argue any of this. I argued that not getting McDermott didn't lead to a failure to get a big man in year 2-4.

It was clearly pointed out that Olivier was year 2, leaves during 3 and we had to rely Rank+Singleton+Friedman (with Koch and Carlson red shirting) in year 4. I guess I'm confused. Are you asking why we didn't get another big man of Doug's talent? We got a big man who by all accounts was talented, motivated and ready to make an impact at the D-1 level in Chris Olivier. It became apparent to Jake within a year that the talent was there but the motivation was not and he was sent packing. He is currently averaging 12.5 pts and 5.7 rebs at Eastern Illinois as junior because they are willing to deal with his immaturity. I don't fault Jake and the staff at all for not compromising on that. His size (6'8, 250) would have been a nice contribution last year and this year but this is a case where I'm much happier to have Paul Jesperson. Fits the system, strong shooter, unselfish, decent length and plays lock-down D.

Given how late it was to replace the scholarships for Doug and Olivier they essentially rolled over into the next year which is why we have now recruited 5 players 6'7 or bigger in the last 2 years (with Jesperson at 6'6). This has been debated to death on here and Panthernation (and I'm sure we're all thrilled when it is brought up) and perhaps my other big sticking point is: Who should we have picked up? Who is the big man that could replace Doug McDermott and was all for accepting a scholarship to UNI. Matt Tiby is the only one I've ever heard of that would make sense and as far as we know, there may have been some interest but that's all speculation and coming out of high school he was NOT an MVC-level player. He's been a complete surprise for UW-Milwaukee as a poor man's Tuttle. I should also mention that one of those influx years included Nate Buss fracturing his forearm and missing just about the entire season.

[Wufan]

BCSpanther fan stated that UNI had four years of dead scholarship due to Doug going to CU. Yes, UNI was at a disadvantatage in Doug's freshman year. Yes, UNI was not as good in the following years due to his absense. All I'm saying is that losing Douggie McBuckets did NOT contribute to the Panthers missing on big men in 2011, 2012, and 2013. There is correlation, not causation.

[PantherSigEp]

BCSpanther fan stated that UNI had four years of dead scholarship due to Doug going to CU. Yes, UNI was at a disadvantatage in Doug's freshman year. Yes, UNI was not as good in the following years due to his absense. All I'm saying is that losing Douggie McBuckets did NOT contribute to the Panthers missing on big men in 2011, 2012, and 2013. There is correlation, not causation.

And my rebuttal is that we it is causation because Doug's replacement screwed us (partially our fault for taking a risk on a talented Chicago kid) because his "replacement" was not willing to work. That's one scholarship that was wiped out twice and gave us 0 time to recruit an adequate big man option. I'm not saying all the blame is on Doug and none of it comes back on us...but his decision absolutely contributed to us trotting out undersized 4's and 5's for the better part of the past 3-4 years. No chance Marvin Singleton doesn't red shirt as freshman and no chance Chip Rank or Ted Friedman eat up meaningful minutes last year if Doug wears purple and gold.

[Wufan]

BCSpanther fan stated that UNI had four years of dead scholarship due to Doug going to CU. Yes, UNI was at a disadvantatage in Doug's freshman year. Yes, UNI was not as good in the following years due to his absense. All I'm saying is that losing Douggie McBuckets did NOT contribute to the Panthers missing on big men in 2011, 2012, and 2013. There is correlation, not causation.

And my rebuttal is that we it is causation because Doug's replacement screwed us (partially our fault for taking a risk on a talented Chicago kid) because his "replacement" was not willing to work. That's one scholarship that was wiped out twice and gave us 0 time to recruit an adequate big man option. I'm not saying all the blame is on Doug and none of it comes back on us...but his decision absolutely contributed to us trotting out undersized 4's and 5's for the better part of the past 3-4 years. No chance Marvin Singleton doesn't red shirt as freshman and no chance Chip Rank or Ted Friedman eat up meaningful minutes last year if Doug wears purple and gold.

So Doug partially caused Olivier to fail and Jespersen to take the mandatory redshirt transfer year. Got it.

[PantherSigEp]

BCSpanther fan stated that UNI had four years of dead scholarship due to Doug going to CU. Yes, UNI was at a disadvantatage in Doug's freshman year. Yes, UNI was not as good in the following years due to his absense. All I'm saying is that losing Douggie McBuckets did NOT contribute to the Panthers missing on big men in 2011, 2012, and 2013. There is correlation, not causation.

And my rebuttal is that we it is causation because Doug's replacement screwed us (partially our fault for taking a risk on a talented Chicago kid) because his "replacement" was not willing to work. That's one scholarship that was wiped out twice and gave us 0 time to recruit an adequate big man option. I'm not saying all the blame is on Doug and none of it comes back on us...but his decision absolutely contributed to us trotting out undersized 4's and 5's for the better part of the past 3-4 years. No chance Marvin Singleton doesn't red shirt as freshman and no chance Chip Rank or Ted Friedman eat up meaningful minutes last year if Doug wears purple and gold.

So Doug partially caused Olivier to fail. Got it.

Where the heck did I say that. If Doug comes to UNI then no Chris Olivier. Pretty simple concept. That's the causation. You weren't questioning a causation of performance, you questioned a causation of how removing X lead to the introducation of Y. The failure of CO at UNI can be blamed on his work ethic and our inability to properly read his character.

[Wufan]

So Doug partially caused Olivier to fail. Got it.

Where the heck did I say that. If Doug comes to UNI then no Chris Olivier. Pretty simple concept. That's the causation. You weren't questioning a causation of performance, you questioned a causation of how removing X lead to the introducation of Y. The failure of CO at UNI can be blamed on his work ethic and our inability to properly read his character.

If Doug would have come to UNI then it would have caused Olivier to not come to UNI. The reverse is not true, and since the reverse is not true, there is no causation. Once Doug was out of the picture he no longer factors into any decisions made. Ben had an open a scholly and HE chose Olivier. Maybe there were no better options, but Doug didn't cause there to be no better options either. Doug did not cause UNI to miss. UNI lost McDermott and then missed on Olivier. Two bad breaks that happened sequentially (correlation) for the Panther post.

[MVCfans]

Just updated - thanks again to Hacksaw for his continued assistance.

What we know:
1) The winner of the WSU-UNI game will be the #1 seed regardless of what happens Wednesday;
2) The winner of the Loyola-Drake game will avoid Thursday and be the #6 seed

See the entire breakdown here: 2015 Arch Madness seeding probabilities – February 22

[MVCfans]

Not as much drama to the final Saturday as far as Arch Madness seeds go - the game at Koch notwithstanding.


Final game by game breakdown: 2015 Arch Madness seeding probabilities – February 26