Bobby Knight is not a mid-major fan

ESPN's newest basketball analyst, Bobby Knight, made his SportsCenter debut tonight. His analysis of the Villanova-Syracuse game was underwhelming -- his expert opinion was that the momentum 'Nova built by finishing the first half on an 8-0 run was, er, important -- but he'll probably get better at saying slightly more insightful things as he gets more used to his new role. What was more concerning was his answer when asked his opinion about the respective at-large merits of Villanova and South Alabama, and, more generally, how he feels about the always-vexing question of comparing major-conference teams from the middle ranks of the standings with top-tier teams from mid- and low-major conferences.

Knight's answer was -- and this isn't an exact quote, but it's a close paraphrase -- that he pretty much always favors major-conference teams, whenever they're anywhere near the bubble, because they play tougher schedules.

Needless to say, he didn't address the fact that those tougher schedules are already taken into account by the fact that we're comparing mid-major teams with records like 26-6 to major-conference teams with records like 20-11. As far as Knight is concerned, schedule strength is apparently pretty much the only thing that should matter. The fact that the non-major teams under consideration at least partially made up for their weaker schedules by winning more games apparently doesn't even figure into the equation.

So basically, if it were up to Bobby Knight, teams like St. Mary's, Illinois State, VCU, South Alabama, and (if they lose the MAC tourney) Kent State would all be out, replaced by mediocre BCS-conference squads like Syracuse, Maryland, Virginia Tech, Florida and Ole Miss. Oh, that'd be thrilling. An NCAA Tournament utterly devoid of potential Cinderellas. Awesome.

Luckily, Bobby Knight isn't on the selection committee. But on top of the possible Great Billy Packer Eruption of 2008 over on CBS, I guess we can look forward to Knight's grumpy commentary on ESPN, wondering how a team like St. Mary's could possibly get in over a team like Ohio State. I hope ESPN lets Knight and Dick Vitale appear on-air together at some point during the post-selection show. It would be fun, in the seemingly inevitable event of a major-vs.-mid-major selection controversy, to watch the always-energetic champion of the little guy go toe-to-toe with the chair-throwing defender of the BCS conferences.

Comments

[Andrew]

What do you expect? Knight's been the coach of a middle-of-the-pack team from a major conference for the past twenty-five years, so of course he's going to back those types of teams over the mid-majors.

[Jason]

More like 20 years, Andrew. IU did win both their conference and the NCAA title in '87 (though as an LSU guy, I'm still a bit upset over that '87 regional final. How in the hell do you not give Knight a techincal when he pounds that telephone on the scorer's table?).

[Andrew H]

Not sure if Dick is exactly the 'champion of the little guy'. He speaks up for them on occasion, but let's be real....Dick loves everyone....especially North Carolina, Duke, Kentucky and worst of all....Kansas. He finds a way to mention those 4 teams in every broadcast he's ever done.

In a similar vein, I liked how he said (at a K-State/KU game) that Hansbrough should be player of the year BEFORE he had even watched Beasley play. Couldn't he wait and watch the game before declaring his choice? His choice is okay but at least see how the games goes before making statements like that.

[Brendan Loy]

Fair point, Andrew, but on Selection Sunday at least, Vitale is a pretty reliable advocate for deserving mid-majors vs. middle-of-the-pack BCS teams. He always talks about his days at Detroit taught him you should "give the little guy a chance."

Did USC sellout the Galen Center this year at all?

[Scientizzle]

Did an anonymous commenter just attempt a lame hater threadjack?

[Andrew]

Anonymous, it depends on if you want to count hundreds of empty seats bought up by Stubhub.

Thanks for the honest answer Andrew. I was really curious with the arrival of Mayo and too lazy to Google.

[yea]

i personally found syracuse's national championship run and west virginia's and st. josephs run to the elite 8 pretty exciting.

[Brendan Loy]

Of course they were exciting, but those weren't middle-of-the-pack major-conference bubble teams, so they aren't relevant to the issue at hand.

(WVU was a bubble team at one point in '05, but they clearly earned they way in by reaching the Big East title game, and consequently got a #7 seed. They're by no means the equivalent of Villanova or Syracuse or Ohio State this year. And St. Joe's was a #1 seed, and Syracuse was, if I recall correctly, a #3. Not even close to the bubble.)

You know what else was exciting? George Mason's Final Four run two years ago, and Bradley's and run to the Sweet 16 that same year. Those were bubble teams. (Mason and Bradley were among the teams that Packer objected to in his legendary on-air rant against the mid-majors that year.)

I'm not saying mid-majors are the only thing that's exciting about the tournament, I'm just saying the opening weekend would be a hell of a lot duller if the committee followed Knight's advice and ALWAYS took the Villanovas and Ohio States over the VCUs and South Alabamas.

[Brendan Loy]

P.S.

"by no means the equivalent of Villanova or Syracuse or Ohio State this year" ... unless, of course, Villanova or OSU makes a similar conference-tournament run ... in which case they'll no longer be on the bubble, and nobody, least of all me, will object to their inclusion in the tournament at the expense of a VCU or USA or Illinois State or whomever. If they do that, they'll have earned their way in, and that's fine. But Bobby Knight thinks they should be ahead in the pecking order already, just by virtue of their tougher schedules.

[yea]

i agree that bobby knight's point of view is ridiculous. i thought the general tone of your post was that when big conference teams go on a big unexpected run its not really exciting. hence my wvu and cuse points. st joe's isn't really a mid-major or a big conference team, but was another example of a well known program making a really exciting run regardless of their seed. i thought those 3 teams were just as exciting as george mason.

im not taking anything away from the mason run. george mason vs uconn was one of the 5 best college basketball games ive ever seen, uconn didnt shit the bed that game, mason just took it to them. i just think that there is plenty of potential for exciting if the florida's/syracuse's and marylands of the world make the tournament or if the virginia commonwealths, st. marys and uab's of the world get in. the committee says they just look at the resumes and big the best ones. hopefully they do that only and don't try to stick to some pre-conceived mid-major to power conference ratio.

[yea]

another thing. i don't think its fair to see that villanova (or insert other random team) hasn't earned their way into the tournament if they don't go on a big run. nova played a tough schedule all year and didnt do bad against it. if they get in over illinois state its no injustice. these things are a crapshoot anyway, there is no foolproof system to determine who is the 45th best team in the country and who is the 46th best team.

[yea]

im a horrible writer. i apologize for the 50000000 typos in my posts.

[Brendan Loy]

Okay, fair enough. If that tone you mentioned came across, it was not my intention. Some of the most exciting tournament games ever played have involved powerhouse teams. I mean, Duke-Kentucky '92 is obviously Exhibit A. And just thinking back to that crazy 2005 Elite Eight, with the three overtime games, Illinois' ridiculous comeback against Arizona, etc. ... yeah, there's no question whatsoever that the power teams are a huge part of the excitement, and I'd never deny that. Indeed, they generally own the second and third weekends (but cf. George Mason).

Where I think the mid-major teams really generate most of the excitement is on the FIRST weekend (which, not coincidentally, is my favorite part of the tournament). If you followed the Packer/Knight viewpoint and had a bunch of Villanovas and Ohio States in the 11, 12, and 13 seeds, with the only mid-majors getting at-larges being the Butlers and Drakes and Gonzagas of the world, the opening weekend would be much more boring than it is now.

As for whether it's fair to say that this or that team didn't "earn" it, I take your point, and to a large extent you're right. The differences between these bubble teams are very slim, and they're all flawed in one way or another, otherwise they wouldn't be on the bubble. But I generally take the Andy Glockner view of these things:

Teams like Alabama…or Arkansas or Maryland or Georgia Tech or whatever: I’ve seen enough performances out of you that I know that you can lose games. You’ve proven that you are what you are. I don’t see any particular upside there. Versus a [mid-major] team that I’m not quite sure, because you haven’t seen them get that type of caliber of opportunity on a consistent basis, like an Old Dominion, a team that won at Georgetown earlier this year, or like a Xavier, which is quietly putting together a decent profile in the Atlantic 10. That would be my argument for [giving the benefit of the doubt to the mid-major teams].

I agree with that. I won't express my view in absolute terms, like Knight does with his opposite viewpoint. I'm not saying you should ALWAYS take top-tier teams from mid- and low-major conferences over middle-of-the-pack BCS teams. Obviously not. You should compare profiles and pick the most deserving teams. But if it's a near-tie, I say, again quoting from that same post:

When in doubt, give the little guys a chance. The big guys have plenty of chances during the regular season to prove themselves (and their opportunities, unlike [most mid-major and low-major teams' opportunities], occur both at home and on the road), and if they can’t take advantage of enough of those chances to even finish in the top half of their conference, they simply don’t deserve the benefit of the doubt over a mid-major or low-major team that has a plausible at-large case, especially a conference champion or runner-up.

As Lunardi puts it, “You’ve got to achieve something against the standard of competition where you sit.” ... What have Florida State (5-7 in the ACC), Georgia Tech (5-6) and other such teams achieved? If they can’t even get to .500 in conference play, why should we care about them? Honestly! ...

I’d much, much rather see teams like Winthrop, Davidson or App. State (or, yes, VCU, Old Dominion or Xavier) get a shot, rather than seeing the eighth-place team from the ACC, or even the seventh-place team from the Pac-10, go up against the same sort of competition that they’ve already lost to repeatedly.

Different strokes for different folks, I guess. The committee usually does a pretty good job of achieving a reasonable compromise between the Loy/Glockner/Lunardi view and the Packer/Knight view. Indeed, most of their mistakes in recent years have had little to do with this debate, and more to do with seedings that make absolutely no sense, and a few ridiculous at-large selections that nobody is happy with (see: Air Force and Utah State, 2006). I think the only omission in recent years that was pretty glaring, in terms of not following through on their own statements about rewarding mid-major teams that play & win games against tough OOC schedules, was Drexel last year. That was egregious, to keep them out while letting Arkansas and Stanford in. But they usually do a good job with the selections. I just hope they do better with the seedings this year than the last two...