Much like football, our schedule in the SEC if you include tomorrow's game against SC will have 6 of the 7 against the worst teams in the league.

Hard to believe we keep getting these 'soft' schedules.

They aren't wrong. We haven't played top tier teams to know how good we are yet. This is MUCH better than I expected for sure and I'm excited about the future because he seems to be a really good coach. BUT, we really haven't been beating up the top tier teams.

We were predicted to absolutely suck so he is doing this with limited talent so excited to see what happens when he gets his guys

just keep winning and none of it matters. these outside narratives have no bearing if we just keep winning.

they will always doubt us until we actually win something of merit. you have to earn respect.

bobinator said:

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You're looking at it wrong. They're not the worst teams, they're down there because we put them there. The top teams in the SEC are only the top teams because they haven't played us yet.

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I like you more and more every day!!

Who makes the narrative and what the basis for it is matters. No one with any knowledge of the college game is going to run with that narrative right now because A & M isn't even being mentioned as any real threat .. yet. We're Just a good story about a team with low expectations outperforming said expectations right now.

When you start hearing that narrative in higher circles it means we're doing well because someone feels threatened

Our schedule can only suck at the end of the day if its because Texas, LSU and Oklahoma suck

Texas doesn't suck tho.

halfastros81 said:

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Texas doesn't suck tho.

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The point is that three games against those three is the only difference between our schedule and anyone elses

And it's a good point

Mhm well at this point it will be tough for us to not make the tournament. Check out teamcast on torvik

At least we're beating the crap teams. That's more than a lot of teams can say

BCG's first year schedule played in his favor which I noticed when he went undefeated in ooc. Yeah…some of those were awful teams, but we know now BCG was the real thing if a little tightly wound.

Cignetti and Bucky are softer personalities and just as good. The schedule doesn't make either worse coaches.

I already posted earlier in this thread that we've far exceeded expectations regardless of what may be said about our easier schedule. And I still hold to that. But in view of managing expectations from a W/L perspective for the rest of the season, I wanted to point out just how disparately easy our SEC schedule has been so far.

According to Torvik, we've had by far the easiest SEC schedule up to this point, and it's by quite a wide margin. Our opponent's average rating has been .7965 (Torvik's rating method). Everyone else in the SEC so far has had an average opponent rating between .8221 and .8949, with most falling around .8500 (which is the rating for our remaining schedule).

For context, .7965 is the rating for about the 60th rated team like California. .8500 is the rating for about the 44th rated team like Kentucky. .8949 is the rating for about 30th rated team like North Carolina.

https://barttorvik.com/conf.php?conf=SEC

Again, we've exceeded expectations even for the easy schedule. But our 6-1 record and sitting atop the SEC standings is no doubt largely attributable to the easy schedule. 6-5 or 5-6 the rest of the way would be a solid finish.

Gigemags382 said:

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I already posted earlier in this thread that we've far exceeded expectations regardless of what may be said about our easier schedule. And I still hold to that. But in view of managing expectations from a W/L perspective for the rest of the season, I wanted to point out just how disparately easy our SEC schedule has been so far.

According to Torvik, we've had by far the easiest SEC schedule up to this point, and it's by quite a wide margin. Our opponent's average rating has been .7965 (Torvik's rating method). Everyone else in the SEC so far has had an average opponent rating between .8221 and .8949, with most falling around .8500 (which is the rating for our remaining schedule).

For context, .7965 is the rating for about the 60th rated team like California. .8500 is the rating for about the 44th rated team like Kentucky. .8949 is the rating for about 30th rated team like North Carolina.

https://barttorvik.com/conf.php?conf=SEC

Again, we've exceeded expectations even for the easy schedule. But our 6-1 record and sitting atop the SEC standings is no doubt largely attributable to the easy schedule. 6-5 or 5-6 the rest of the way would be a solid finish.

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I like the idea of 12-6 in conference.

I will choose not to manage my expectations and just ride the wave.

What you're also not accounting for is that our SEC schedule is the easiest anyway by Torvik's projections. Our remaining schedule is only the 6th toughest. The Torvik projections have Florida and Vandy tied as regular season champions at 13-5, one game better than us at 12-6.

Swing a game our way that's supposed to go the other way (especially if it's the Florida or Vandy games) and we're right there for a chance at the regular season championship. And even if we fall short of that we've got a great shot at finishing in the top four and getting the double bye in the SEC Tournament.

This is also why Kentucky is swimming in some dangerous waters despite being 5-3 currently. They have the toughest remaining conference schedule. Kentucky still plays Florida twice, they come here, they're at Auburn, at Arkansas, and host Tennessee, Georgia and Vandy.

Can't dispute any of that. I'm just saying we could continue playing the rest of the way just as well as we have to this point, yet lose ~5 games in our next 11.

But yes our overall schedule is still easiest in the SEC.

And yes Kentucky is in big trouble in the SEC standings.

bobinator said:

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This is also why Kentucky is swimming in some dangerous waters despite being 5-3 currently. They have the toughest remaining conference schedule. Kentucky still plays Florida twice, they come here, they're at Auburn, at Arkansas, and host Tennessee, Georgia and Vandy.

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That's a shame.

I was fully expecting us to be bottom of the SEC this year. While it's nice to be on top now, I could see us going 0-5 in these next 5. I am hoping for 2 wins just because of the eye test thus far.

If we do flounder at 0-5, it's us what around .500, which honestly prior to the season if you had told me we would be .500 I would say it's a successful season. Anything above that is fantastic and shows promise. Winning 3+ of the next 5 would be a legit statement, but we have to rebuild next year…can Bucky do it again?

Quote:

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but we have to rebuild next year…can Bucky do it again?

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By comparison next year is just a remodel compared to constructing something from the ground up. Especially if we get Mgbako back.

We also keep finding out more players actually have eligibility left, lol.