^I like your idea, though I'd say win one of UNC/FSU/Lou and one of Cuse/VT for a 6-3 record (11-7 overall). 11-7 would likely put State in without having to do extra work in the ACC tourney. I think if State goes 5-4 rest of the way and loses the 1st game of the ACC tourney we might be in trouble.

1/31/2018 9:21:18 AM

Quote :

"My main point was pretty clear: why do you think 19 wins (and 10 acc) with a loss to say, top 100 Georgetown, is measurably worse than 20 wins replacing that loss with a win over #330 Bryant or something?"

But we're not just replacing a win with a random unranked team. We're replacing them with beating #2 Arizona. We have 2 wins better than Cuse had that entire season and 1 less bad loss. I picked 3 years because I believe the year before that was when Maryland was still in the ACC and the whole conference kinda got shook up around that time to be a stronger basketball conference.

I missed the VT post, but you're right, in the last 3 years only 1 ACC team has had 20+ wins and .500 or better in conference and missed the tournament.

Our RPI right now is 60th. That's not awful. If we win 5 of our last 9 games, it's not going to drop(unless we lose @Wake and/or BC). We're on the bubble with a bunch of feathers in our cap with those signature wins. Still think 20 wins will be enough to get the job done, barring us losing to Pitt in our first game in the ACCT. Our SOS right now is #65, per CBS Sports, not sure why that would be bad enough to keep us out of the tournament.

1/31/2018 9:28:30 AM

That VT team had 2 top 10 wins, one loss outside top 100, but played 6 teams outside top 300

They also won 7 of last 9 (including tourney) so they were even "hot"

1/31/2018 12:59:34 PM

^They were also 2-8 against ranked teams on the season that year. We're 4-1 so far.

Quote :

"They also won 7 of last 9 (including tourney) so they were even "hot""

That's cherry-picked and not even accurate. They won 7 of their last 10(including tourney), all 3 losses were against ranked teams, only 1 win was against a ranked team in that stretch. But then if you slide back right before that 7-3 run they made, they went 0-5(2 ranked losses).

They were firmly on the bubble, but honestly had nothing to really push them over to the positive side of the bubble.

Here is the difference in our 2 resumes:
Record: 20-15(10-8)
Good wins: 2. #4 UVA(H), #7 Miami(H)
Bad losses: 1. Alabama State(H)

Record: 15-7(5-4)
Good wins: 4. #2 Arizona(N), #2 Duke(H), #10 UNC(A), #19 Clemson(H)
Bad Losses: UNI(N), UNCG(H) - Note, if UNCG indeed makes the tourney this isn't a bad loss

So barring any further bad losses(BC or Wake), we'll end with twice as many good wins as VT and potentially the same number of bad losses with an equivalent record.

I just don't see how we end up at 20 wins with a RPI > 50 and our SOS should be somewhere in the 50-60 region. Don't see us getting left out.

1/31/2018 2:27:13 PM

^No chance we get left out agreed.

There is a human factor here too. I don't care how good they were or rank, wins over Arizona and Duke look better than UVA and Miami.

20 wins with the strength of this year's ACC and who we've beat and we will be in. We'll get an early season pass some because of a new coach.

100% if we get to 20 wins we'll be in. Anything below that I'd say our chances start to drop by 30-35% if at 19 wins, 18, etc.

RPI is also stupid. Should never be used to judge anything.

[Edited on January 31, 2018 at 2:35 PM. Reason : .]

1/31/2018 2:34:39 PM

AP/coaches poll rankings are fairly irrelevant when looking at tourney resume

Rpi might be stupid but it the committee uses it. Gott snuck us in gaming rpi

[Edited on January 31, 2018 at 4:50 PM. Reason : E]

1/31/2018 4:49:38 PM

SMU got left out in 2014 when they were in the top 25.

1/31/2018 7:17:39 PM

^ do tell...

1/31/2018 8:18:10 PM

Looks like they were 25th and were 23-9 heading into the tournament. We beat them out for one of the last spots and its probably because of Gottfried's ability to schedule.

1/31/2018 10:08:43 PM

I think it was actually because we had a guy named Staats Battle on our team

1/31/2018 10:15:07 PM

I think it's actually because they had a garbage schedule and lost 3 in a row to end the season, had some pretty bad losses (USF and Rutgers) and did nothing really away from home.

1/31/2018 10:42:14 PM

I think I still don't buy his narrative

2/1/2018 12:55:10 AM

Don't forget that the UNCG loss was our first game without markell. Especially with as well as hes playing. They'll prolly be a tournament team anyways, so it won't be a bad loss...but the fact that we were without our starting PG for the first game will definitely be a factor considered by the committee. So northern iowa, the day after beating #2 Arizona will be our lone bad loss unless we lose to BC, georgia tech or wake...which we shouldn't but could definitely happen especially as 2 of those 3 are on the road

2/1/2018 2:00:36 AM

There aren't criteria cutoff or requirements. Sure, its effective to look at what has happened before as a way of predicting what will happen in the future but there are always outliers that the bracketology people yell about after the brackets are released.

We aren't being compared to previous years teams and there are too many variables. A lot of it depends on how many bids are stolen but you also have the eye test and the effect all of our big wins will have on the committee. The teams we are compared against will have better RPI numbers but their records won't be THAT much better and their wins will pale in comparison.

2/1/2018 2:50:53 AM

ND - W
@VT - L
UNC - W
@Cuse - W
@WF - L
BC - W
FSU - W
@GT - L
Louisville - W

11-7 in the ACC means we at least have the first day of the tourney off, it's tough to say but we might pull out some tough road wins to get the double bye (only the top 4 teams right?)

I really don't have any doubts about making it off the bubble and easily getting a 10 seed in the big dance.

2/1/2018 9:41:58 PM

Can we get a friggin game thread for the love of K?

2/1/2018 11:01:04 PM

^^if we finished top 4 in the ACC, we'd be much better than a 10 seed in the ACC tournament.

2/1/2018 11:12:24 PM

No longer a game behind schedule to make the NCAAT imo. This was not one I expected to win.

Doesn't get any easier though. Going to have to steal one on the road or sweep UNC to stay on track

2/3/2018 3:19:41 PM

Quote :

"Doesn't get any easier though"

There are no givens. But I’d argue this back half of the schedule actually is easier than the front half. But I get what you mean.

2/3/2018 3:28:01 PM

This is geniuenly exciting to watch. Had no expectations and the most satisfying change has been our attitude and mentality, especially in responding to tough situations. It shows good quality coaching IMO and I love the potential of this team. It's been extremely fun to watch us as well regardless of the result.

2/3/2018 8:42:44 PM

Quote :

"ND - W @VT - L UNC - W @Cuse - W @WF - L BC - W FSU - W @GT - L Louisville - W"

Quote :

"Going to have to steal one on the road or sweep UNC to stay on track"

I think we win at Wake and we have a good shot @GT. But I also think we could fall to FSU.

2/3/2018 11:26:15 PM

I have Wake etched as a loss in my mind but Keatts has been doing very anti-NC State things this year so maybe we do actually win that one.

Losing @ GT isnt really just an NC State thing though, that's a thing any mediocre team will do, so I really don't see us winning both of those. How that usually happens is it comes when you're feeling yourself, so it happening after possibly taking all 3 of Wake/BC/FSU means it wouldn't be the end of the world.

2/4/2018 1:28:06 AM

AstralEngine where's that VT game thread?

2/5/2018 11:43:15 AM

I just noticed we received 5 votes in last Monday's (1/29) AP poll. We were "37th" in their top-25. Wonder what we'll look like when today's polls come out?

2/5/2018 11:53:02 AM

^^ it's not <24 hours before tip yet

2/5/2018 12:02:13 PM

tough 3 game stretch coming up (4 if you're wanting to include @WF)

2/5/2018 12:11:54 PM

Up to 12 votes this week, but still not ranked.

2/5/2018 1:17:20 PM

Quote :

"12. NC State (16): Yes, I’m this high on the Wolfpack. And why not? NC State has some of the best wins in the ACC outside of Virginia. The Wolfpack continue to get great shelf life out of the neutral-court win over Arizona. The 18-point win over Notre Dame is the type of game the Wolfpack wouldn’t have won in the past few seasons. They were coming off the high of the road win at UNC. But they didn’t fall flat. Well, this week will be another test with a road game at Virginia Tech before hosting UNC in going for the season sweep. (Katz)"

https://packinsider.com/2018/02/05/nc-state-12th-andy-katzs-power-36/

2/5/2018 1:44:17 PM

We all know how this goes.

2/5/2018 2:25:45 PM

Power Rankings are all about momentum and recency bias.

Out of our 3-game winning streak, only 1 of the wins is impressive(@UNC), the other 2 aren't really going to change voters minds.

Win @VT and finish the season sweep of UNC this week, then perhaps you'll start seeing more love for our team. It's weird that I think we have a better shot at beating UNC at home than we do beating VT on the road.

2/5/2018 2:28:48 PM

We are in a great position. We could easily have two losses this week though and the past week wouldn't look as impressive. I wouldn't fault the team if we go to VT and lose a close one but we should be taking care of business at home and while UNC is hard we have another opportunity for a good win.

Lets see what happens. I am happy with what we have done this year so far and Keatts IMO has already changed the mentality and attitude of this program in a very short time. Lets continue playing good basketball and the wins will come.

2/5/2018 4:22:34 PM

I love how we are playing and the team is getting better and better but to put us at 12 right now Katz must be smoking crack.

2/5/2018 10:29:17 PM

^Its not a Top 25 ranking. It’s 12/36 at large bids for the tourney. So, 12th best team not to get an automatic bid.

2/5/2018 10:58:33 PM

Y'all bitch at me for not making game threads, then you don't comment in them until the game starts

2/6/2018 7:54:20 AM

I just made one in Premium Palace Testing Thread but something is fucked up and now I can't edit my post to copy and paste the finished code here.

2/6/2018 9:30:37 AM

There, you animals.

2/6/2018 9:34:24 AM

Since we were arguing about wins needed to make tourney, found this interesting

Odds To Make NCAA Tournament By Win Total
Total Wins	NCAA Bid%
26	100.0%
25	100.0%
24	99.8%
23	97.6%
22	85.9%
21	49.9%
20	8.9%
19	0.4%
18	0.0%
OVERALL	27.6%

2/6/2018 6:23:49 PM

I hope Keatts puts this little nugget up in the locker room after the V.A. Tech game
Joel Berry at unc’s media day regarding NCSU not being a rival
"I don't necessarily treat that as a rivalry, whenever you talk about a rivalry, you always talk about Duke-North Carolina," Berry said. "That's the biggest one. I love being a part of the Duke-Carolina rivalry but NC State, I just don't consider that being a rivalry. We just don't like them, but it's not a rivalry."

2/6/2018 8:22:20 PM

Ah yes. The ol “not our rival” barb. if it were so obvious that it wasn’t a rivalry they wouldn’t have to scream it for the top of their lungs. They say it to get under our skin. And it works.

[Edited on February 6, 2018 at 8:55 PM. Reason : A]

2/6/2018 8:53:35 PM

Its true though.Its a rivalry game but they are our arch rivals while we aren't their arch rivals. Their rivalry with us pales in comparison to their rivalry with duke so its essentially not much of a rivalry to them. Its awkward.

Its not necessarily just meant to shit on us but the relative importance just isn't there for them. Clemson is a rival of ours but we don't really think about it that way (i don't think clemson does either) but thats more how the UNC rivalry is to their basketball program.

2/6/2018 9:16:55 PM

people's views on UNC NCSU being or not being a rivalry is usually a good indicator of their age

[Edited on February 6, 2018 at 9:39 PM. Reason : and/or their pretentiousness]

2/6/2018 9:31:56 PM

If you ran a poll "Who is UNC's archrival?" all over the world, the answer for every age group of every region except (old state fans) would be duke. It would be 99.99% Duke and .01% NCSU. That much is obvious to anyone who has talked sports outside of the State.

Its part of why I'm here. Most people don't know who we are and they definitely don't follow us.

[Edited on February 6, 2018 at 9:42 PM. Reason : People aren't trying to shit on us so don't be offended. They just don't notice or think about us.]

2/6/2018 9:41:19 PM

you are literally the only one limiting the topic of "rivals" to "predominant arch rival in basketball"

2/6/2018 9:45:58 PM

me and Joel Berry

2/6/2018 9:53:31 PM

Quote :

"Their rivalry with us pales in comparison to their rivalry with duke"

even you agree that a team can have more than one rival

2/6/2018 9:56:52 PM

because its the truth but if you have your boo and some hoe you see on the side you aren't going to walk around saying you have two girlfriends

2/6/2018 10:12:17 PM

Does ECU consider any school more of a football rival than us?

[Edited on February 6, 2018 at 10:25 PM. Reason : But sure there can be multiple. We just can't get trolled about being second place in BB]

2/6/2018 10:24:09 PM

Earl'd

2/6/2018 10:27:33 PM

Except I was replying to you.

[Edited on February 6, 2018 at 10:29 PM. Reason : While you're *actually* getting Earl'd]

2/6/2018 10:28:08 PM

No one is rivals with ECU.

2/6/2018 10:29:55 PM