Part of me, the more I have been thinking about it, thinks that maybe it is better if we drop a few fluke road games in conference to at least drop us into the range of getting a 6 or 7 seed instead of getting a 4 or 5, and the reason is that as hard as it is already to win NCAA games with the crowd behind you, it's even harder having the crowd against you as people who don't otherwise care about the teams are going to get behind the 12s and 13s. Even as a 6, people are more likely to get behind the 11, but not that many otherwise impartial fans are going to get that into cheering for a 10 over a 7 just cause the teams are seeded 10 and 7. And in the grand scheme of things, there is little difference in how tough the opponent is going to be between 10 and 13.

I can still remember the one year 11 seed Central Michigan beat 6 seed Creighton in Salt Lake, and someone I know was showing people the pictures and just referred to it as "the upset" without even remembering the teams. I also remember going to the NCAA's in Boise when the arena got behind Wisconsin over Florida State just cause Wisconsin was the 12 and Florida State was the 5. The funny thing is that those four teams could meet again at the same sites, but with Central Michigan as a 6, Creighton an 12, Wisconsin a 5, and Florida State a 12, and 90 percent of the fans would cheer the opposite way.

Having crowds against us in the NCAA's is one thing we haven't had to deal with. I do remember hearing the last time we won, we had the Greensboro crowd behind us. Maybe some people who were at the Kansas game in Oklahoma could confirm or deny this, but while there were alot of Jayhawk fans, I know we also had alot of Oklahoma and Oklahoma State fans behind us to counter them, wanting us to win cause of hating them. In 2005 and 09, it was easier for our "actual" fans to go to Boise plus we had the Boise State fans behind us. This year, impartial people in Columbus were not going to care either way between us and Washington.

There might be a few fans that are hardcore into college basketball that normally get behind 12s over 5s just cause their 12s and 5s that would be less excited about an upset cause of our drought of wins, that wouldn't cheer for us, just wouldn't cheer against us either. And maybe if we are a 5 or 6 with Texas or Wisconsin as the 11 or 12(an actual bracketology projection) we would be able to get fans who normally cheer for upsets behind us cause of our conference affiliations and theirs.

Of course, maybe if we this year, cause of our status as conference favorites, have to deal with conference foes having bigger crowds for us than the average game, it would prepare us for an NCAA game as a 5 with everyone behind the 12. If we win a good share of our tough road games, a crowd that favors a 12 cause they are 12 would maybe be less of a problem, and if we lose too many of them, drop to 7 or 8 where we have an NCAA game where the crowd doesn't care.

I also wouldn't mind having to deal with NCAA crowds against us after we can start winning in the dance first. It's like how Gonzaga could get crowds behind them as the underdog, then became the favorites and had to start dealing with crowds against them.

dogie wrote: ↑

October 29th, 2019, 7:38 pm

AggieFBObsession wrote: ↑

October 29th, 2019, 7:28 pm

We won't get that good of a seed until we prove we can beat a p5 on the road first. When was the last time it happened? The Florida game would count. What about on a neutral floor?

The Aggies have played a lot of high majors on neutral courts over the years, but I think you might be able to count true road games against high majors in the past 25 years on one hand.

Until a few years ago, USU never played one and done road games in basketball. In recent years I can remember road one and done games at Duke and Georgetown. They also played Mississippi State and USC home and home. They haven’t played Utah on the road since they joined the PAC-12. I can’t think of any other true road games against high majors since maybe ever.

And they lost the four games I mentioned.

I can remember neutral site victories over USC and Minnesota and either Vanderbilt or Iowa (?).

We beat Iowa. Lost to Vanderbilt in 2007.

I’m focused on us beating College of Idaho...

Only half-joking.