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The coaches allegedly hate these games. And there's also a certain segment of fans who wish-away the season in anticipation of 3 days in Cleveland. And that's fine. I really enjoy "measuring stick" games against like-competition. This Groce team has a lot to prove. They completely whiffed in the early OOC schedule. Yeah they were on the road...yeah it was a new group of players that needed to gel....yeah the teams are near the top of their respective conferences...etc. etc. etc. We lost every. Single. One. If we are going to have a shot at winning a 1st round NCAA game, we need to not only challenge ourselves with a tough OOC schedule, we need to start beating some of these teams. It's been proven that whipping downtrodden Buffalo, pathetic EMU and soon-to-be-Horizon fodder NIU doesn't prepare the Zips for squat. The bracketbuster was great. How else could I drive 20 minutes south of Hudson to see Top 25 team in the JAR? Nevada, VCU...great mid-majors like Oral Roberts and Creighton? I've seen crappy BGSU teams for 30 years. It is refreshing to see someone like Arkansas State, South Alabama, James Madison, etc. on our schedule. Beat South Alabama handily at home, like we should, and grow a bit. Prove something. We've lost 80% of our measuring stick games in the past. We always have a great MAC record. We'll have another one in 2025. Outside of our SWAC and OAC cupcakes we have yet to really ascend in OOC games. We're Kings of the MAC...which is great...but that's been our ceiling for 20 years. I'm greedy. I want more. Beat South Alabama by 15, run roughshod over the MAC, and beat somebody in the Big Dance.

I’ve waited nearly 4 years for this

I like it. We can call it ... Bracketbusters!

I watched the entire game to see exactly what state of condition this team was in. I get that they are dealing with unprecedented injuries and player issues, but they don't play good basketball. I don't equate winning basketball with good basketball. I was focused on how they played and what they were coached to do. Neither were impressive. Maybe they can turn it around next season, I hope so. But I saw nothing in this game that indicated the program has a solid footing.

I like the MAC-SBC challenge but would like to see a third and maybe fourth conference get involved. If we could get the CAA and SoCon in with the MAC and SBC this could become a premier mid-major event. It could still be a one game home one game away for each team just with more variety in whom the opponents could be. For example , Akron and Arkansas State are the top in each of their conferences but already played in Jonesboro. With an additional two conferences involved you could have top of their conference teams like Samford and College of Charleston being the return team to the JAR in the challenge.

Freeman is back with the Pacers and played 4 minutes with 1 rebound and 1 assist. Glad to see him back with the Pacers after not being with the team for a couple of weeks.

Yeah, I still have my doubts about this Freeman guy making it. 😉

The girls put up a great effort but just fell short. A couple of close calls in the last 3 minutes resulted in a 5 point swing for WMU. Shelbee Brown was amazing with 32 pts and 19 rebounds.

Dawson with 15 points and a huge offensive rebound off of a missed free throw to help seal the game in the Herd's 77-72 win over Arkansas State.

I hope we win obviously, but if we're going to lose a game it might as will be this one since it's somewhat meaningless and won't affect us at all in the MAC.

Looks like Bishop Neal is our new safeties coach.

I've heard there will be a cool giveaway to fans that night.

I found out a few years back that the sophisticated folks of the ACC don't drink like Midwesterners. I'll be prepared for the judgmental stares this time. GO ZIPS

Same can be said for just about any other away OOC game, no?

Quadrant 3: Home 76-160, Neutral 101-200, Away 135-240. Having a ~100 or better win on the resume is much better than 150+, which is what this is matchup is shaping up to be. Should we be fortunate enough to win on Saturday and continue our run through the MAC, we will be flirting with 12/13 seed territory in March and this OOC matchup matters in that scenario. For the MAC/Sun Belt Challenge to work, there has to be incentive for the top teams in both conferences. Akron risks quite a bit more with little to gain vs. South Alabama which has everything to gain and very little to lose. The same goes for Arkansas St. and Troy on the Sun Belt side. They play Kent and Miami respectively, both are in the ~140 range, while the Arkansas St. is top 90 and Troy is top 110. I understand you're not always going to achieve perfect matchups (JMU/App St were top 70 teams last year while the MAC's best were maybe in the ~90-110 range at the time), but automatically eliminating strong matchups in the later part of the schedule isn't helping either conference's top teams.

The MAC/Sun Belt Challenge needs to allow for rematches. It's rare, but I have seen instances with other teams' schedules where OOC teams play each other twice. Typically it stems from a regularly scheduled matchup coinciding with an early season tournament matchup. The first matchup in the challenge is always a guess of who the top teams will be. When the season is a week into February, it's no longer a guess. Quit spoiling guaranteed solid late-season matchups with the early season guess. The old school Bracketbuster matchups were the best because they were solely based around where the teams ranked at that point in the season. Arkansas State @ Akron for the rematch would be must-watch mid-major basketball. Instead, we get USA, and not in the greatest-country-in-the-world way. For any South Alabama fans that find our board, I mean no disrespect. It's just frustrating that this matchup went from being a potential top 100 game with a guaranteed Q3 resume building potential, to borderline Q4 which we have enough of on our schedule thanks to a garbage MAC. Side note: The MAC/Sun Belt Challenge should be for keeps. Winning conference gets the other conference's top school to join their conference the following year. I'm only half kidding as I would propose pretty much anything to get us away from Steinbrecher's awful leadership and Directional Michigans.

At the time this game was scheduled South Alabama was ranked #2 in their conference. Since then they have lost 3 out of their 4, 2 of which was to an abysmal ULM. Their lone win was an OT win against an equally bad Rajun Cajun squad. I'm not sure if they've dealt with injuries or what, but their play has regressed significantly in the past couple of weeks.

Nice gesture by the Cavs.

South Alabama thumped Coastal Carolina last night, 84-59.

Got my first save the date for this season, Sep. 27. It would be our first MAC game.

And this is why the coaches think this whole thing is just a waste of time. $50,000 expense for no return.