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Here is an awesome page showing our history in the NCAAT. Enjoy! Interestingly, our 66 total tournament games is approximately in the Top 10 of all programs. https://mcubed.net/ncaa/soccmd1/akron.shtml

It's not just football revenue. It's TV money as well. Even though football is the biggest revenue generator, basketball is still great for them to fill time slots on SEC or B1G networks. Basketball pays for itself. It's the other sports that football subsidizes.

And historically small schools success with March Madness has depended on having more team chemistry from four years of developing the same players in the same system, despite their being smaller, less athletic, etc. That opportunity has been wiped away. Also, football revenues now directly fund NIL for basketball players. Hence why the last men's NCAAT was dominated by the "Big Ten" and SEC...that's where all the football money is so they simply buy the basketball players.

The most criminal part is - they can steal your best players with zero restitution. In any professional sport you need to pay, or make a trade to land a coveted player from another team. In college football you just take them for free. We are a free minor league for the P5 programs...must be nice.

That's the sad reality of college sports. It's no different than Major League Baseball and why I freaking HATE P5 and major conference schools. You have two tiers of teams and we're just the farm system for bigger schools now. We develop the athletes and they have the money to poach them away. Maybe every few years a small school can make a run in the CFP or March Madness. But by the next year that program will be completely gutted and will have to start from scratch.

That's pretty much how they cover late games these days. 🤨

Back to our team…

BG is legit.

To quote my 9 year old son playing Fortnite, "We're cooked like fried chicken."

Ryan's next endeavor I fear. Adding insult to injury, MJ comes to the JAR with YSU on Saturday.

Just saw the ABJ article about the game. Adds absolutley nothing about the game. Not even a quote from Groce. Just a narrative of the game that could have been phoned in from any of us that watched the game. Shameful to not cover a great game.

0-4 Heidelberg can't get here fast enough.

I assume the Yale player that was the beneficiary to all the cuts to the basket also made it. His ability to finish at the rim was almost as vital as Townsend having the ability to always make the right basketball decision.

I would say that play and Barre fouling Townsend with .6 seconds left before the half-time buzzer. I'm almost certain Barre never saw the floor the rest of the night, deservingly so.

It could be like VCU in the old Bracket Buster. We could play them tight every year, and lose. Maddening to see us leave sharpshooters wide open for corner for 3's down the stretch. But the play that killed me the most was the inbounds play towards the end with only 4 seconds on the clock. The pass pulled the Yale player away from the hoop, so he's down to 3 seconds. He nonchalantly drives baseline and banks in a 2 footer. Soft D and no backside help, even though everyone in the building knew he had to shoot. How many bunnies did Eric Mahaffey smoke? Just as I talk the guy up, he has his most underwhelming showing of the young season. Scott and Tavari were absolutely awesome. Cheese/Banks, LCJ/Castenada, Buford/McLaughlin great. All-time Zips offensive performances. Yale played fantastic. Sliced and diced us all night long. Kudos to them. We definitely need to get better if we're to win anything beyond the MAC this year. Kenpom, SchmenPom.

Tavari and Eric Mahaffey made it. Townsend was the MVP unsurprisingly

I didn't stick around to listen and find out. Tavari was pretty much guaranteed to make it by half-time. I'm not sure of any others.

Then it's preferred! The cruelty is the point. FIFY.

Does anyone know if any of our guys made the all tournament team?

Ohio lost by 23 to George Mason. If anyone is sad about the loss to Yale, go get a pick-me-up by reading BobcatAttack. They're in shambles. Rumor has it Athens isn't sure if it has enough beer to endure the season. Buffalo beat VMI to remain undefeated. Bowling Green beat our future opponent Bucknell 71-66. EMU got plastered by Louisville.

Besides Barre, I’m hoping to see Oggie take a big step forward on the defensive end this year. His size and athleticism could have been a help to us if he was more experienced.

Oddly enough, the half court adjustment is what cost us the game. It took us most of the first half to figure out how to play in a half court offense, and that's where we saw the 4 turnover differential decide the game. We ultimately could never fully recover, although a large part of all of this is Yale never missing to allow for Akron runouts. Ce la vie. Just an incredible basketball game.

One last thought - the score was high in numbers, but it wasn't fast paced. I was worried if Yale slowed us down, we'd have issues scoring in a half court offense if we weren't running. Our half court offense was great actually, so that is good to see we have a variety of ways to score going forward. Just need a way to at least slow down post scorers going forward

I actually thought earlier this morning having Okonkwo might have been nice. He's not as offensively gifted as Lyles, but defensively he plays much bigger than Lyles. He might have done a better job at disrupting the shots near the basket while still being athletic enough to get up and down the court. I also think with Lyles developing more of a perimeter game they could both be on the court for stretches together if you needed to throw a different look in certain situations. Looking at his numbers in Utah through 3 games they have been underwhelming. I haven't watched Utah, but I wonder if they have buyers remorse.