[jcmanson]

#15 in Coaches
#17 in TSN

[Cider Jim]

Saying we are a top 20 team and co-champions (again) will help with recruiting.

[Kolzilla41]

So the best 20 teams make the playoffs. We finish no worse than #17 and we don't get a bid

[BigAl57]

So the best 20 teams make the playoffs. We finish no worse than #17 and we don't get a bid

that is the 20 best in the committee's view point

[jcmanson]

You can't really go by that because there are teams ranked ahead of us that didn't make it, and teams ranked below us that did.

[Cider Jim]

But I wish Kallander would have used the rankings to determine which Big South team is the champion, esp. since Stony Brook and Coastal are barely over .500 and LU is 8-3 and ranked.

How do other conferences determine a tie-breaker? Are the points allowed in conference a pretty common formula?

[Chris Lang]

Using rankings would not be the right way to do it. Liberty had a better record than Coastal. So what? Liberty also played St. Francis and Savannah State while Coastal played an out-of-conference schedule that included Richmond, Georgia Southern, West Virginia and another CAA road game (Towson had a bad record, but it also played well against JMU and UMass at home). The only cupcake was Delaware State.

Using rankings brings bias into play, and we've seen how unreliable The Sports Network poll is. I don't think the SID at Texas State, say, knows anything about the Big South other than that he knows Liberty has won the league several years in a row, so if he's going to rank anyone, it's going to be LU. Kind of like the bump South Carolina State gets for being historically good.

I wrote in my blog Sunday that I think the tiebreaker system is flawed, because when you're trying to break a tie between three teams that have all beaten each other, the rest of the league shouldn't come into play, nor should a garbage-time touchdown against second stringers in October. The tiebreaker should be the aggregate score in the games between the teams.

For Coastal, that score would have been 73-69.
For Liberty, it would have been 85-73.
For Stony Brook, it would have been 66-82.

Therefore, Liberty wins the tiebreak with a plus-12 margin. That's the most fair way to do it. I hope they'll take a look at that change.

[olldflame]

Using rankings would not be the right way to do it. Liberty had a better record than Coastal. So what? Liberty also played St. Francis and Savannah State while Coastal played an out-of-conference schedule that included Richmond, Georgia Southern, West Virginia and another CAA road game (Towson had a bad record, but it also played well against JMU and UMass at home). The only cupcake was Delaware State.

Using rankings brings bias into play, and we've seen how unreliable The Sports Network poll is. I don't think the SID at Texas State, say, knows anything about the Big South other than that he knows Liberty has won the league several years in a row, so if he's going to rank anyone, it's going to be LU. Kind of like the bump South Carolina State gets for being historically good.

I wrote in my blog Sunday that I think the tiebreaker system is flawed, because when you're trying to break a tie between three teams that have all beaten each other, the rest of the league shouldn't come into play, nor should a garbage-time touchdown against second stringers in October. The tiebreaker should be the aggregate score in the games between the teams.

For Coastal, that score would have been 73-69.
For Liberty, it would have been 85-73.
For Stony Brook, it would have been 66-82.

Therefore, Liberty wins the tiebreak with a plus-12 margin. That's the most fair way to do it. I hope they'll take a look at that change.

[prototype]

That actually sounds like a good way to do it.

[olldflame]

Of course, I must admit I would have been all for any tiebreak format which had us coming out on top!

[thepostman]

Using rankings would not be the right way to do it. Liberty had a better record than Coastal. So what? Liberty also played St. Francis and Savannah State while Coastal played an out-of-conference schedule that included Richmond, Georgia Southern, West Virginia and another CAA road game (Towson had a bad record, but it also played well against JMU and UMass at home). The only cupcake was Delaware State.

Using rankings brings bias into play, and we've seen how unreliable The Sports Network poll is. I don't think the SID at Texas State, say, knows anything about the Big South other than that he knows Liberty has won the league several years in a row, so if he's going to rank anyone, it's going to be LU. Kind of like the bump South Carolina State gets for being historically good.

I wrote in my blog Sunday that I think the tiebreaker system is flawed, because when you're trying to break a tie between three teams that have all beaten each other, the rest of the league shouldn't come into play, nor should a garbage-time touchdown against second stringers in October. The tiebreaker should be the aggregate score in the games between the teams.

For Coastal, that score would have been 73-69.
For Liberty, it would have been 85-73.
For Stony Brook, it would have been 66-82.

Therefore, Liberty wins the tiebreak with a plus-12 margin. That's the most fair way to do it. I hope they'll take a look at that change.

I was talking to a friend and I said point differential would be the best way...but this is even better. 3 way ties are hard...it is tough to do overall recored because of the difference of non-conference schedules..but points allowed just seems ridiculous...Chris, your idea is by far better then anything I have come up with...

I like it a lot...and I even would like IF we didn't come out on top on it

[Rooster Cogburn]

Again Chris Lang's ideas are superior to those making the rules. I LIKE it!

[prototype]

has it been said before that we need a new conference?

That would help too.

I know people will argue that in the BSC, we get a chance to win every year, but I think Liberty's mission is bigger than that. We want to compete against the big boys in every sport - that will give us a bigger stage and give us a better opportunity to get the best players in the world...

[olldflame]

Is it too late for them to change it this year?

[TDDance234]

has it been said before that we need a new conference?

While a new conference would certainly be welcomed...if we would have to just beat Presby, Stony Brook and Coastal with the season on the line, we'd be in the playoffs.

We may need a new conf. but if we'd just take care of business in the one we're in now, we wouldn't be having this discussion.

[jcmanson]

has it been said before that we need a new conference?

While a new conference would certainly be welcomed...if we would have to just beat Presby, Stony Brook and Coastal with the season on the line, we'd be in the playoffs.

We may need a new conf. but if we'd just take care of business in the one we're in now, we wouldn't be having this discussion.

[jcmanson]

I have a great tiebreaker- win your games!

[BJWilliams]

That is a GREAT idea manson...here's the thing...if we win our games and they win their games what are we gonna do if we're STILL tied?

[From the class of 09]

That is a GREAT idea manson...here's the thing...if we win our games and they win their games what are we gonna do if we're STILL tied?

What?

[SumItUp]

That is a GREAT idea manson...here's the thing...if we win our games and they win their games what are we gonna do if we're STILL tied?

If we win our games we won't be tied.

[LUconn]

The entire point of the tie breaker is to find the best stat to differentiate the 3 teams WITHOUT the tie breaker itself indirectly causing teams to run up the score. Point differential would still give the motivation to a team to do that. The conference doesn't want to be responsible for making some of it's teams look pathetic.

[olldflame]

I see no ethical difference between "running up the score" and "holding down the score" by leaving your defensive starters in, blitzing, etc. in a lopsided game. (I'd be interested to see how deep Bennett went into his defensive bench against CSU when they were up by 50 and 60 points.)

I like the idea of not having numbers of any kind against lower teams count and making it only the games between the teams who are tied. Lang's idea of total aggragate score makes the most sense to me.

[SuperJon]

Maybe you do points allowed in those three teams? Aggregate scoring isn't the best in my mind because a win 3-0 is just as good as a win 36-24.

Then again, I don't like points allowed either.

Every solution has a problem.

[BJWilliams]

That is a GREAT idea manson...here's the thing...if we win our games and they win their games what are we gonna do if we're STILL tied?

If we win our games we won't be tied.

Look at how things worked out between CCU, SBU and LU...CCU beat LU, LU beat SBU and SBU beat CCU...now if LU beat CCU then Id see your point.

[TDDance234]

That is a GREAT idea manson...here's the thing...if we win our games and they win their games what are we gonna do if we're STILL tied?

If we win our games we won't be tied.

Look at how things worked out between CCU, SBU and LU...CCU beat LU, LU beat SBU and SBU beat CCU...now if LU beat CCU then Id see your point.

What part of IF we win our games can't you understand?