Jim Phillips remarks

[Sean Miller Fan]

Paraphrasing but in his media day, he said what we've all been saying:

- they hired someone to do a statistical analysis on scheduling and how it affects NET rankings in a response to the low number of bids

- making efforts to ensure "our coverage is appropriately reflecting the talent and the teams we have"

- highlighted ACCN as a positive but says without saying that they want better coverage on ALL (emphasized all) the ESPN networks

What I took away from this is what I and many of us have been saying. Lunardi and others have been too influential in getting into the heads of the committee. Remember, these AD's have 80 hour/week jobs and dont watch college basketball other than their own teams. They only look at NET rankings, non-conference schedules, and listen to what the analysts think. I'm not saying that anyone says "Well Lunardi thinks Pitt shouldn't make it so lets keep them out" but when you have a guy like that highlighting every single negative aspect of Pitt's resume without bringing up the good points (ie road wins and others), it reminds me of the 3 news channels telling only one side of the story. And he works for a company who has a business relationship with ESPN.

Its just not Lunardi though. The ACC isnt talked about as much on ESPN as the Big 13 and Big Ten.

- says the league has been "undervalued"

So seems like a lot of efforts are being made but the most thing this league can do is win the November/December OOC games. Those are the most important games of the season. Conference games dont help or hurt the league as a whole. You have a winner and a loser. For every team that picks up a Big W like Pitt over Wake, you have that Wake team whose resume gets dinged. This is why I say the league needs to play at least 2 and as many as 4 ACC games before Thanksgiving to prepare teams for crucial holiday tournaments and ACC/B10 Invitational. To me, it makes 0 sense to jam 18 games into January/February. Play more of those games in November and come up with a scheduling agreement with leagues like the Horizon, SoCon, etc to play some of those teams in Jan/Feb.

- also said he thinks the NET "point differential" is going to get tweaked but didnt make it seem like that's coming this year or what will happen. They should use my advice and "turn it off" once a team has like a 99% chance to win. So if Duke goes up 6-0 on St. Francis, the rest of the possessions in the game dont count. Now if St. Francis makes it interesting and are down by 6 at halftime, you retroactively turn it on. There are ways to tweak this. A team shouldn't be rewarded for winning by 50 instead of 20.

 

[DC_Area_Panther]

IMHO, it makes zero sense to be playing 20 games in conference with unbalanced schedules. that's too many in conference games.

 

[Sean Miller Fan]

IMHO, it makes zero sense to be playing 20 games in conference with unbalanced schedules. that's too many in conference games.

I'd play almost all conference games because the non-con hurts the ACC. I'd probably play 24. Gives you more chances for good wins. The committee doesnt care if you are 18-15 if your NET is good and you have a lot of Q1s and Q2s.

I'd probably do

24 ACC games (play 10 teams once and 7 teams twice)

3 holiday tournament games

ACC/SEC Challenge

3 other games of your choosing

 

[Fk_Pitt]

T

Paraphrasing but in his media day, he said what we've all been saying:

- they hired someone to do a statistical analysis on scheduling and how it affects NET rankings in a response to the low number of bids

- making efforts to ensure "our coverage is appropriately reflecting the talent and the teams we have"

- highlighted ACCN as a positive but says without saying that they want better coverage on ALL (emphasized all) the ESPN networks

What I took away from this is what I and many of us have been saying. Lunardi and others have been too influential in getting into the heads of the committee. Remember, these AD's have 80 hour/week jobs and dont watch college basketball other than their own teams. They only look at NET rankings, non-conference schedules, and listen to what the analysts think. I'm not saying that anyone says "Well Lunardi thinks Pitt shouldn't make it so lets keep them out" but when you have a guy like that highlighting every single negative aspect of Pitt's resume without bringing up the good points (ie road wins and others), it reminds me of the 3 news channels telling only one side of the story. And he works for a company who has a business relationship with ESPN.

Its just not Lunardi though. The ACC isnt talked about as much on ESPN as the Big 13 and Big Ten.

- says the league has been "undervalued"

So seems like a lot of efforts are being made but the most thing this league can do is win the November/December OOC games. Those are the most important games of the season. Conference games dont help or hurt the league as a whole. You have a winner and a loser. For every team that picks up a Big W like Pitt over Wake, you have that Wake team whose resume gets dinged. This is why I say the league needs to play at least 2 and as many as 4 ACC games before Thanksgiving to prepare teams for crucial holiday tournaments and ACC/B10 Invitational. To me, it makes 0 sense to jam 18 games into January/February. Play more of those games in November and come up with a scheduling agreement with leagues like the Horizon, SoCon, etc to play some of those teams in Jan/Feb.

- also said he thinks the NET "point differential" is going to get tweaked but didnt make it seem like that's coming this year or what will happen. They should use my advice and "turn it off" once a team has like a 99% chance to win. So if Duke goes up 6-0 on St. Francis, the rest of the possessions in the game dont count. Now if St. Francis makes it interesting and are down by 6 at halftime, you retroactively turn it on. There are ways to tweak this. A team shouldn't be rewarded for winning by 50 instead of 20.

Thanks for this. And yeah I’ve always felt that way. People say who cares about Lunardi. Well, he’s this era’s college basketball version of Walter Kronkite. His opinion is the opinion of one man. But it creeps into the conscious and influences people whether they think so or not.

 

[Sean Miller Fan]

T

Thanks for this. And yeah I’ve always felt that way. People say who cares about Lunardi. Well, he’s this era’s college basketball version of Walter Kronkite. His opinion is the opinion of one man. But it creeps into the conscious and influences people whether they think so or not.

I think most people believe that the 3 news networks influence voters. So how can those people NOT believe that ESPN analysts and bracketologists dont influence this version of voters? We are all human and subject to influence whether we think we are or not. Another quote. Phillips is really getting on ESPN it seems:

"We're going to be promoting in a heavy way. We just have to. We have to tell our story better. That's on me. We just have to do that relative to the outlets that we have. We have one of only 3 collegiate networks but then we have this great partner in ESPN so I think you're going to see that ratcheted up."

Getting one of those last NCAAT bids isn't a whole lot different than winning an election. You need to stay on message. You need help from media, especially friendly media. You need to be in front of people. I honestly think the ACC should do a media buy in March with commercials highlighting the league and essentially doing campaign ads for Pitt, Wake, etc (using last years teams as an example). Something needs to change. Pitt not getting in last year was a disgrace. If the Mountain West games again and is in the same position, I'd even do negative advertising against the Mountain West. Its ashame it has to come to this but the ACC is a better league than people believe and it deserves more teams.

 

[TD_6082]

I think most people believe that the 3 news networks influence voters. So how can those people NOT believe that ESPN analysts and bracketologists dont influence this version of voters? We are all human and subject to influence whether we think we are or not. Another quote. Phillips is really getting on ESPN it seems:

"We're going to be promoting in a heavy way. We just have to. We have to tell our story better. That's on me. We just have to do that relative to the outlets that we have. We have one of only 3 collegiate networks but then we have this great partner in ESPN so I think you're going to see that ratcheted up."

Getting one of those last NCAAT bids isn't a whole lot different than winning an election. You need to stay on message. You need help from media, especially friendly media. You need to be in front of people. I honestly think the ACC should do a media buy in March with commercials highlighting the league and essentially doing campaign ads for Pitt, Wake, etc (using last years teams as an example). Something needs to change. Pitt not getting in last year was a disgrace. If the Mountain West games again and is in the same position, I'd even do negative advertising against the Mountain West. Its ashame it has to come to this but the ACC is a better league than people believe and it deserves more teams.

Lmao. I'm almost positive that I've read posts from you the last few years that say things like, "All the good coaches are in the SEC." and "The ACC is historically bad." ...yada yada yada...

The ACC's image problem isn't hard to figure out. One of it's biggest brands, Louisville, has been straight ass the last couple of years. Another, Syracuse, has been mired in mediocrity. The two flagship programs saw both legendary coaches hang it up, and the transition has probably knocked a little off their perception. Hubert had the magical run to the title game as an 8 seed, but really didn't seem to find his footing in Chapel Hill until this past season. Duke has been good, but nothing special. The last couple of years has been a struggle for Virginia.

No, it wasn't a "disgrace" that Pitt got left out last year. In all of college athletics, there is nothing I have less sympathy for than some double digit loss team from a major conference crying about getting left out on Selection Sunday. I find it particularly weird that you were proclaiming in mid-January (before Pitt lost to Miami, Clemson, and Wake) that Pitt had to win out to get to the tournament, and when they didn't win out, you're on a soapbox about how it's the greatest injustice in sports that they were left out. The last statement is hyperbole, but you get the point.

 

[cruzer]

Wow. They're going to analyze the statistics. Welcome to 2024. At least he didn't say that their strategy was to ask Chat GPT how to improve the number of tournament bids for the ACC.

 

[Sean Miller Fan]

Wow. They're going to analyze the statistics. Welcome to 2024. At least he didn't say that their strategy was to ask Chat GPT how to improve the number of tournament bids for the ACC.

Yea, I was thinking it took that long? He also said things like coaches know the point differential thing now and what other things affect NET. Said told coaches not to be sensitive but he called out coaches for things they need to do better with NET.

 

[Sean Miller Fan]

Lmao. I'm almost positive that I've read posts from you the last few years that say things like, "All the good coaches are in the SEC." and "The ACC is historically bad." ...yada yada yada...

The ACC's image problem isn't hard to figure out. One of it's biggest brands, Louisville, has been straight ass the last couple of years. Another, Syracuse, has been mired in mediocrity. The two flagship programs saw both legendary coaches hang it up, and the transition has probably knocked a little off their perception. Hubert had the magical run to the title game as an 8 seed, but really didn't seem to find his footing in Chapel Hill until this past season. Duke has been good, but nothing special. The last couple of years has been a struggle for Virginia.

No, it wasn't a "disgrace" that Pitt got left out last year. In all of college athletics, there is nothing I have less sympathy for than a some double digit loss team from a major conference crying about getting left out on Selection Sunday. I find it particularly weird that you were proclaiming in mid-January (before Pitt lost to Miami, Clemson, and Wake) that Pitt had to win out to get to the tournament, and when they didn't win out, you're on a soapbox about how it's the greatest injustice in sports that they got left out. The last statement is hyperbole, but you get the point.

He did say they had a drag at the bottom of the league that has affected NET. As far as my previous comments, everything I said is true. Yes, the ACC has been historically bad. However, its not worse than the Mountain West's best year and even in the ACC's worst year, it deserves more than 33% of the league getting in which is what we always get. In a bad year, the ACC should get 7. In really good years, they should get 10 or 11 (in the old 15 team model). They haven't been really good recently but 7 is a minimum.

 

[Joe the Panther Fan]

- they hired someone to do a statistical analysis on scheduling and how it affects NET rankings in a response to the low number of bids

And as soon as that person understood what the NET was measuring, he (or she) said, "oh, yeah, I get it. Play better. It's that simple. Play better and your rating will improve. Play worse and it will drop. Your opponent basically doesn't matter. Just play better."

 

[Joe the Panther Fan]

He also said things like coaches know the point differential thing now and what other things affect NET.

Any coach who didn't understand that point differential mattered as soon as they read what the NET was and what it is measuring is a completely moron, and their boss ought to consider whether someone that stupid should be allowed around the fine young men of this country.