What I like about Lon's scheduling

[pnkranger]

We don't play 5 or 6 bottom of the bucket teams every year like Arkansas Pine Bluff and Mississippi Valley State or Grambling State or Maryland East Shore. Instead he picks middle-tier teams like UT-Arlington, George Mason, Mercer, North Texas that are athletic enough and have a good player here or there so that we can actually work on our skills without jeopardizing the win-loss column too much.

Here's how this year's non conference opponents break down in terms of Ken Pom's rankings (last year's rankings used):

9 Michigan State
60 Alabama
90 Louisian Tech

105 Texas A&M
119 Mercer
122 Seton Hall
138 George Mason
162 UT- Arlington
178 Tulsa

208 Idaho
228 Arkansas Little Rock
265 North Texas (they have better athletes this year)

317 Corpus Christi

9 of 13 Non Con games against top 200 teams (and 7 against top 150) will give us a solid SOS base. We only play 1 team that will be in the bottom 100 (I'm projecting North Texas to be better), which means we don't have any real negative draws against SOS.

Early season games against MSU and Alabama will help boost the SOS overall. Add in that we only "waste" one game against a glorified high school team, and we get a lot of mileage as a team out of a schedule like this.

 

[schoonerdriver]

Need more Fang!

 

[SoonerTraveler]

Need more Fang!

Agreed!!

It was worth the price of admission just to watch Fang on the sideline.

 

[Swans]

Hmmmm...I think we have to beat #122 in order to play #9....should be no problem!

 

[MNsooner]

Well, it is very early, but according to the RPI link we're currently number 2 in the nation. Obviously this will change a lot as more games are played, but it always helps to have the computers on your side.

 

[ArdmoreSooner]

I think scheduling is one of Lon's strengths. If you are a bubble team it does help. Get wins, have to work a little, but you usually come out on top. He has proven to be a great hire so far. The negative on him was suppose to be recruiting and I think he has done really good so far in that area as well.