Originally Posted by Anonymous
There have been a couple of interesting and eye opening posts regarding Virginia and Notre Dame and their chances of being .500. As we all know, a team must be at least .500 in order to be eligible for the NCAA Tournament. Many on here applaud programs/coaches that challenge their teams it is not difficult to see why the coaches at Duke may have changed their Tack. Every coach wants to make the NCAA Tournament but their are a limited number of at large bids to be had and the selection process does not always make sense or reward teams for playing a tough schedule. I watched Notre Dame play Northwestern and Virginia play Boston College to think that either UVA or ND might not get an at large bid is a little crazy, both are very good teams.

The 2019 season illustrates how playing challenging schedule can hurt a teams chances of an at large bid as well as negatively impact perception of the team as well as hurt the team in the polls.

I cringe as I write this but here we go, the can of worms is open again.... Take a look at the tale of two teams from 2019. Duke and you guessed it Stony Brook :-)

Stony Brook was ranked # 5 in preseason, Duke was a preseason # 24.

Stony Brook played 0 regular season games vs Top 5 opponents, Duke competed against 5 Top 5 opponents during the regular season (duke went 0-5).
Stony Brook played 2 regular season games vs Top 10 opponents (0-2), Duke played 8 Top 10 teams (1-7) with a win over #9.
Stony Brook played 5 regular season games vs Top 20 teams (2-3) wins over #17 & #19. Duke played 9 Top 20 opponents during the regular season (1 - 8) lone win #9.

Duke had no losses to teams outside the Top 20, Stony Brook had 1 loss to a team not ranked in the Top 20.

Stony Brook finished the regular season ranked 15th.
Duke finished the regular season ranked 16th.

Stony Brook won the AE and was awarded the AQ to the NCAA Tournament.
Duke did not win the ACC and Duke did not receive an At Large Bid to the Tournament.

Stony Brook won 1 Tournament game.

Stony Brook moved up and finished #12 in the Final poll.
Duke did not play a tournament game and dropped in the Final Poll from # 16 to # 21 (out of the Top 20).

Dukes regular season schedule was significantly more difficult and obviously it hurt the Blue Devils.

Playing a less competitive schedule and racking up wins while players pad stats does appear to help the coach, the program and the players in terms of recognition, ranking, tournament etc...

The following year, 2020...

Stony Brook had a preseason ranking of # 5.
Duke was ranked preseason at # 18.

Draw your own conclusions as to why Duke and possibly other programs that compete in very competitive conferences may look to ease up on their non conference games.


The one unknown for 2019, would Stony Brook have received an at-large bid if they were not an AQ? As for the rest of it, I am a fan of Duke's opponent every game for this season. They will get enough wins to meet the 500 record requirement, but that does not guarantee them an at large bid. If would be justice from my perspective if they do not register a top 20 win. It is possible they loss to BC, UNC, Syracuse, Penn and Virginia. Appears Virginia Tech and ND both might slip out of the top 20. ND still has a chance to beat them as well. If those scenarios happen, the selection committee should leave Duke out based on their schedule and not having any top 20 wins. Does Duke finally get back to the form they showed in 2015 and beat several top 10 teams in the same season, time will tell.