Purdue
- Thread starter marothisu
- Start date
It's possible ISU would have won the Big 10. We finished tied for second in a conference that was ranked behind just the ACC in strength. Would we have, though? I don't know. Prior to Feb 4, ISU was 5-4 in the Big 12 conference. The significance of that day is that was the day we won at Kansas, and that started the current tear we are on, in which we've won 11 of the last 13 games, including 5 wins over RPI top 25 (current metric used by the selection committee - as bad as it is). But, compare this to Michigan, who was 4-5 on Feb 4. They are on a similar tear as us, winning 11 of the last 14 (they had to play one more game in the Big 10 tournament than we did). Even on that roll, Michigan only finished 5th in the Big 10.
I guess what I'm saying is it's possible we could have won the Big 10, but with the way ISU was playing before Feb 4, I wouldn't have put money on it.
I've always kind of liked Purdue as a big 10 team since they remind me of us. Engineering school and have to deal with annoying fans from an instate rival. I remember watching Glenn Robinson play for them when I was a kid.
A friendly piece of advice. Some of your posts are coming off a little defensive and seem to be looking for an argument. This is a Cyclone message board; of course you're going to hear some trash talk about our opponent. But, I've been here long enough to know most opponent posters are welcome and treated just fine provided they don't act like tools. If you want a good example, check out Nevada's posts. If you want a bad example of how to act as an opposing fan, read any in-state rivals thread.
To the game at hand...if ISU plays the way they've played the last month, we win this game. If shots aren't falling or we revert to hero ball we saw early in the season, we don't.
Side note - I saw a nice story on Haas and his sister early in the year, and have a great appreciation for him as a person and brother.
The thing is...in hindsight we played better competition than we gave them credit for. I think Cincinnati, TCU, Iowa, Miami, and Vandy all ended up being better than we thought at the time.
Even though the offense wasn't clicking, I think we would have won games against that schedule.
I didn't mean to disrespect your team @Boilergrad. Obviously I think ISU is good and since you are 1 PT favorites your team is very good as well.
Vermont went for a few long touchdowns yesterday. Their guard was a nice player and on the receiving end.
My hope is ISU doesn't try to force it but it was there yesterday.
Many here are proponents of the objectively best form of conference schedule, the double round-robin, which we are fortunate to use in the Big 12. I have no idea how Purdue's conference strength of schedule compared to, say, Wisconsin's (and I don't care honestly, that's in the past and has no bearing on tomorrow night) but the comment alluded to that.
Here's one way to look at it.
Purdue
Won - 8 non tourney
- 6 tourney (a 6 seed, three 8s, and two 9s)
Lost - 2 non tourney
- 2 tourney (a 5 and 7 seed)
Iowa State
Won - 6 non tourney
- 6 tourney (a 1, 3, two 10s, two 11 seeds)
Lost - 2 non tourney
- 4 tourney (1 seed, 3 seed, two 4 seeds, and a 9 seed)
We played 2 more tourney teams than Purdue and 2 fewer non tourney teams. Purdue had 2 more wins and 2 fewer losses than us. The math obviously doesn't straight translate to us winning in the real world, but it certainly suggests that we could have.
Win the B10, why take the pay cut. We tried for second in the B12 and got a 5 seed and we didn't start playing until half way into conference play.
I know, I just responded to you to carry on the conversation.
I think all of the metrics (i.e. not Jon Rothstein eyeballing it) have the Big 12 as the best overall conference this year. Big 12 not as flashy as ACC at the top but doesn't have the anchors that are auto-wins either.
