D1 National Championship Game is for BCS Conf. Topic

here are the changes in 2012 mentioning prestige:
  • Changed the logic for determining a team's recent success as applies to prestige so that the weighting of the past 4 seasons will be spread out more evenly, placing less emphasis on the most recent season.
  • Improved the logic that ranks players for the NBA draft to address the issue of big guys being overvalued and also to give more emphasis to players from successful, high prestige schools.
  • Reduced the impact of baseline prestige and conference strength, and increase the impact of actual team success in the logic that adjusts prestige after the season.
the first is what i thought you meant - you must have meant the third? i didn't even know that was changed - i don't see a significant difference in the way prestige has updated. do you? it would be interesting to see evidence of a meaningful change.

i thought originally you meant this from 2007:
Beginning next week, we will be introducing changes to how team prestige is handled. Prestige will be much more fluid based on the recent success of your team as well as the conference as a whole. In addition, prestige will be visible on both your office page as well as every team profile page as a letter grade (A+ through D-).

That change dramatically changed prestige and opened the doors for mid majors. That change dwarfs the change you are talking about, I guess I am assuming the change you mention is a tweak, which I don't think made a meaningful difference - but would be interesting to see if the evidence bears it out.

Minimally, there seems to be no dramatic jump in mid major success around that change that comes anything close, in scale, to the release of the new engine/recruit generation. If there really is evidence of a significant change in the impact of baseline prestige, I'll happily admit I was wrong in criticizing your post. I am genuinely curious to know if that change really made a difference or not.
3/11/2014 5:57 PM
and of course when worlds were new and there were no human coaches in BCS conferences, the mid and low DI schools coached by humans won the NCAAs
3/11/2014 6:02 PM
I'm referring to the third one.

As someone who stopped playing before 2012 and started now. I can tell you the prestige now is WAY different.

There would be a few A+ in D1 like tops 5. And it was VERY fluid. Typically the teams that were in the final 4 would become A+ and the old A+ would drop to A. Now theres 10+ along with more As.

This was one of the first things that blew me away when I first rejoined. How high prestige everyone in D1 was. 
3/11/2014 6:23 PM
I too was referring to the first part, I don't think the worlds would look different simply because the biggest appeal to this game is to one day coach Duke or UNC or Kentucky or a school like that. So people will always gravitate towards the major conferences. 

I do not think it would take a super elite group of coaches in a perfect location to be successful. A few years back the MWC was damn good in Tark, BYU and North Texas went to multiple Final 4s. There were some good coaches in the group but it wasn't the super elite. I'm look at what East Carolina is doing in Tark, even what I've been able to do lately in Tark with a conference that was mostly sim filled during my tenure and being in the backyard of the Pac 10. There's no doubt in my mind that if a group of coaches with a 6-8 being really good and the rest at least being competent they will succeed with time. It's not something that's going to happen after 4 seasons, it's going to take some time to build things up. 

MMT, I was in that SEC that you're talking about. I'm pretty sure I left Arkansas the same jobs period you took over LSU and I instantly wished I hadn't left because I knew with you there we could build something. But the fact was the group of coaches in the SEC was very weak, the ACC was overpowered and the Big 12 was very good. It was just impossible to win even with 10-12 coaches every season. So it's been proven if it's a poor group of coaches in a BCS conference they will struggle. 

There is a nice advantage for BCS schools but it's not impossible to overcome, and it doesn't take a group of super elite coaches. Simply because that's what there is in CUSA doesn't mean that's the only way. 
3/11/2014 6:48 PM
Using simple math of 8 seasons per year for each world for one-game-a-day and 12 seasons per year for two-game-a-day, you end up with the following championships for non-BCS teams (of the 8 worlds I'm in):

  Completed   1 year   2 year   3 year   4 year
Naismith 71 63 0 55 0 47 0 39 1
Rupp 71 63 1 55 0 47 1 39 2
Smith 70 62 0 54 0 46 0 38 0
Iba 69 61 0 53 1 45 3 37 3
Crum 65 57 0 49 0 41 0 33 1
Tark 88 76 0 64 0 52 1 40 0
Knight 69 57 0 45 0 33 0 21 0
Phelan 68 56 0 44 0 32 0 20 1
      1   1   5   8

So in the last two years there's a grand total of 2 championships, Girt/daalter in CUSA (Marshall) and Lostmyth in A10 (St. Bonaventure).

Going back 3 years you add 3 A10 teams in Iba, Gonzaga for Rupp, and North Texas for Tark.

Going back 4 years- Cal Riverside in Naismith, Gonzaga and Delaware for Rupp, 3 A10 teams in Iba, Wyoming in Crum, and Air Force for Phelan.


So why is this? Does nearly every championship caliber coach decide to go to a BCS school to coach their favorite team? Or is it more likely that coaches see the writing on the wall in terms of being in a half or near empty conference, wherein your prestige is capped due to the suck of the rest of the teams in your conference, and your ability to recruit championship caliber players is hindered due to not only a lesser prestige than your team should have due to performance, but also because the Big 6 schools can carry $20,000+  more dollars in their pocket due to the postseason cash advantages.

The question isn't "Is it possible to win a title in a non-BCS conference". That question had some debate, but under extreme circumstances, like CUSA, it can happen. Wherein you need a very good/great coaches to sacrifice their ability to get better higher prestige jobs and instead toil away for quite a few seasons teaming together for the eventual betterment of the conference.

The WCC in IBA is trying this as well as people dumped championship schools to go to D prestige garbage. If the commitment is there from everyone they may well be at the top of IBA, albeit it's tougher because their baselines are lower than CUSA. I've seen numerous attempts to try and cram good coaches at a mid-major just to see it implode when those good coaches decide it's just an easier path to success taking over the BCS schools.

Back to the point, success in a midmajor is an extreme outlier. If I want to make Marist, Robert Morris, or James Madison into a championship contender I need:

1) To be good at the game, obviously.
2) To be committed to the school, and not jump when a better opportunity arises.
3) The hardest: Get 8-11 other very good coaches to also be committed to the conference.

Doesn't #3 seem like one extremely high bar to clear?

Suggestions:
1) Make prestige more dependent on the individual team and less on the conference.
2) Dramatically reduce postseason cash and/or make more/all the cash go to the school that earned it. Problem here is that it would make an elite school coming off a good postseason run invincible, but would get rid of/reduce it being necessary for your other conference mates to be as successful.
3) Get rid of baseline prestige. I actually dislike this idea, but it gets thrown around. If you want everything equal, D2 and D3 are available.

I'll leave with this. The first team goes to the NT every season (even without the CT titles, would be in with an At-Large) and wins games (two Sweet 16s). The second team is in a BCS conference and makes the PIT 3/4 seasons, and gets some wins there. Despite much better individual success for the first team they have them same prestige, but if they're in a recruiting battle (with openings being even) the second team has a higher chance of landing the player due to their conference earning $24,000 more dollars per team.
3/12/2014 1:25 AM
Season Coach Overall Rank RPI SOS Prestige Notes
W-L
69 dwise89 29-3 14 24 90 B Conf Champion
CT Champion
NT (Sweet 16)
68 dwise89 26-4   48 165 B Conf Champion
CT Champion
NT (1st Round)
67 dwise89 28-4 16 15 49 B- Conf Champion
CT Champion
NT (Sweet 16)
66 dwise89 22-8   53 85 C+ Conf Champion
NT At-large Bid
NT (1st Round)
               
               
Season Coach Overall Rank RPI SOS Prestige Notes
W-L
69 yanks250125 17-12   82 63 B PI (2nd Round)
68 yanks250125 11--16   117 84 B  
67 yanks250125 18-15   43 35 B PI Champion
66 yanks250125 18-15   56 39 B- PI (Final Four)
3/12/2014 1:26 AM
I have a DI team in Smith, actually put a thread in to see if there was any interest in trying out the theory of the mid-major uprising. Not much interest generated. My team is a A+ in the SEC, but still willing to give it a go with the right group of other coaches.
3/12/2014 1:50 AM
I think the more interesting ? is can you win a NT without 10-12 decent coaches conspiring in a mid major conference?

I would guess the circumstances that are needed is a top notch coach, in a market that is not heavily populated with d1 coaches and especially NOT in the middle of a d1 major conference hotbed.

I think this is the example proving how the game got changed with recruit generation. 

My first d1 job ever, when all my other teams were d3 or d2, was at St Francis in NYC.  Even with little knowledge of how the d1 game was played / recruited, and in the era where major conferences were still 'drafting' on their confernce boards and you'd get a half dozen sitemails most times proposing collusive deals, I think I made the elite 8 in three years.  It was that easy.    I just looked it up, I was wrong, final 4 in my second year of d1 ever, st Francis of New York.

Game has changed a great deal.

My oldresorter handle is banned from posting, ryan75 is my alias.

3/12/2014 12:15 PM
My thoughts:

1. If you want even, there's D2 and D3.
2. In RL, when was the last non-BCS conference champion?  I think Louisville '86.  My wife wasn't even born yet.  The era of realisitcally great non-BCS teams is long gone.  You get the novelty runs (Butler, Zaga, VCU), but those teams are not even close in talent of the BCS conference champions.
3. HD is more about talent in winning games, not coaching.  I'd argue that Butler's talent has been coached up to win.  This is the bigger reason that the non-BCS teams don't win championships, not the recruiting setup or anything like that.
4. As said many times before here, it's a matter of where the talent (in coaches) goes.  In HD 95% of the top talent in D1 decide to coach in the BCS conferences.  If all of that talent avoided the BCS conferences, the BCS conferences wouldn't win.

3/12/2014 12:34 PM
Posted by asher413 on 3/12/2014 12:34:00 PM (view original):
My thoughts:

1. If you want even, there's D2 and D3.
2. In RL, when was the last non-BCS conference champion?  I think Louisville '86.  My wife wasn't even born yet.  The era of realisitcally great non-BCS teams is long gone.  You get the novelty runs (Butler, Zaga, VCU), but those teams are not even close in talent of the BCS conference champions.
3. HD is more about talent in winning games, not coaching.  I'd argue that Butler's talent has been coached up to win.  This is the bigger reason that the non-BCS teams don't win championships, not the recruiting setup or anything like that.
4. As said many times before here, it's a matter of where the talent (in coaches) goes.  In HD 95% of the top talent in D1 decide to coach in the BCS conferences.  If all of that talent avoided the BCS conferences, the BCS conferences wouldn't win.

+1

Except I think it was UNLV the last non-BCS to win.
3/12/2014 2:41 PM
Posted by MyGeneration on 3/11/2014 12:16:00 PM (view original):
Posted by irapost on 3/10/2014 4:53:00 PM (view original):
In the past 30 seasons (and probably more) no mid-major team has made the D1 Championship Game. That's telling me that if you do not coach in a major conference (BCS) you have no chance to even get to the NCAA D1 Title game. Is that something that is built into the SIM at this time? Can it be that hard. There are a lot of great coaches that have come up the ranks in mid-major programs. Not good.
If the assertion were changed from "no chance" to "a minuscule chance," there could be no credible opposition to the assertion. If one posits "always" or "never," one counterexample (see Girt) defeats the proposition. However, look at how incredibly hard people have had to reach to prove that it is not impossible to win a D1 championship with a team outside of the power conferences. It's silly season. 

This is the unassailable truth: due to the advantages inherent with the elite programs (Baseline prestige and lots and lots of cash), "if you do not coach in a major conference (BCS) you have no chance a miniscule chance to even get to the NCAA D1 Title game. "Oh, but back in the day, LostMyth ...." "And Girt ...." 

Miniscule: tiny, minute, small. That fits the bill.

Next topic.


+1
3/12/2014 5:18 PM
Good luck finding a group of coaches willing to see it through. We attempted to make the MWC in Phelan a perennial top 4 conference (20 some odd seasons ago) and myself a couple of others passed over great bcs opportunities to see it through. The MWC was close to breaking through and sure enough one of the more accomplished coaches ran off for cherry gig in a bcs conference. It's hard enough to trust real life friends, but hd conference mates are nearly impossible to trust. The point is mid majors can compete with terrific coaches seeing through but to find that collection of coaches on the same page for long is the real fat chance of this topic.
3/12/2014 5:54 PM
Posted by fatchance on 3/12/2014 5:54:00 PM (view original):
Good luck finding a group of coaches willing to see it through. We attempted to make the MWC in Phelan a perennial top 4 conference (20 some odd seasons ago) and myself a couple of others passed over great bcs opportunities to see it through. The MWC was close to breaking through and sure enough one of the more accomplished coaches ran off for cherry gig in a bcs conference. It's hard enough to trust real life friends, but hd conference mates are nearly impossible to trust. The point is mid majors can compete with terrific coaches seeing through but to find that collection of coaches on the same page for long is the real fat chance of this topic.
This is the illustration of the point Asher made about the best talent tends to head to the BCS conferences. BCS conferences have much lower turnover than non-BCS conferences. It's not uncommon to see a handful of coaches in a BCS conference at their school for 20+ seasons, you rarely if ever see that in the lower conferences. BCS gigs are generally destination jobs, not many people's destination job is Wichita State. 

The non-BCS schools will always struggle and it's not because it's nearly impossible to overcome the advantages of BCS schools it's because these aren't destination jobs and the coaches with the resumes to coach a good BCS school will often leave before giving his non BCS conference the chance to become a real power. 
3/12/2014 6:08 PM
My overall thought: It is too hard to be really successful at non-BCS schools.

Is it possible? Yes. Do I think an elite coach could do it even if they didn't have a full conference of great coaches? Probably. That said, I think the degree of difficulty is way too high ... and that's coming from a guy who has generally pleaded for a higher degree of difficulty in HD.

I'm extremely pleased with our success in C-USA Rupp. I think we've been #1 in conf RPI for eight straight seasons, and sometimes #2 isn't even close. But to be fair, we've pretty much genetically engineered that to be successful -- the coaching talent is stupendous, and we're geographically spread out. And when coaches have left, I've been lucky enough to be able to go out and recruit some terrific replacements.

Our success shows that it can be done, no question. But is it too hard to achieve? Again, I think so. It shouldn't have to take getting a bunch of beasts together in one conference just to make it work.

(I've toyed with the notion of grabbing a crappy DI team in Allen from a barren conference and seeing if I could get them to the elite level ... I suppose that would be the final frontier. But even if I could do it -- or aejones, tianyi, billyg, etc -- doesn't mean that the degree of difficulty is appropriate.)

3/12/2014 9:31 PM (edited)
I don't think the major issue is money-related (although it goes without saying that is a contributing factor). As I'm fond of pointing out, the postseason cash situation has been the same forever, and it used to be quite common for non-BCS teams to be great.

Exhibit A: In Allen (where I spent a lot of time), the following teams either won the title or finished as the runner-up between Seasons 29-40: Southern, Yale, Cleveland State, Boston U, UNLV, Maine, Weber St, Utah, Morris Brown. That's 10 teams in a 12-season span, with a bunch of others making the Final Four. And the postseason cash was just as it is now. Since then (Seasons 41-68), not a single non-BCS school has made the title game.

So what happened? What changed?

The recruits. They "fixed" recruit generation so that there wouldn't be so many elite players. And to be sure, there were way too many elite players. It was a little silly. But the fix went too far, and made it so now only the top teams can get enough top-notch players to be real factors nationally. So, with very rare exceptions, you have to be a top team, and for the most part that only exists in the BCS conferences.

3/12/2014 9:01 PM
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