[JK37]

A couple factoids for review:

1 - the RPI was not even in the room for use by the selection committee.

2 - the field was set before 10pm Saturday night, long before all ballots had been cast by coaches in the coaches' poil. Therefore, the final coaches' poll was also not used in the selection process.

The FCS Tournament is a break-even event for the NCAA money-wise. If it were a multi-million $$$ event such as the Div I Men's bball tourney, it would fall under much greater public scrutiny, and the committee would therefore be held far more accountable for their decisions. Since its not, they're not - and we have the good ol' boy system that snubbed LU this season.

[Purple Haize]

A couple factoids for review:

1 - the RPI was not even in the room for use by the selection committee.

2 - the field was set before 10pm Saturday night, long before all ballots had been cast by coaches in the coaches' poil. Therefore, the final coaches' poll was also not used in the selection process.

The FCS Tournament is a break-even event for the NCAA money-wise. If it were a multi-million $$$ event such as the Div I Men's bball tourney, it would fall under much greater public scrutiny, and the committee would therefore be held far more accountable for their decisions. Since its not, they're not - and we have the good ol' boy system that snubbed LU this season.

1. So the selection committee lives in a bubble and has no access to the RPI at any point of the seaason? You don't think they do their homework before locking themselves in the room?
2. What does that have to do with the price of eggs? There were no great upsets, so any movement would be minor.

[SuperJon]

The most interesting thing out of that article is that the polls weren't considered. If that were the case, there's no way that they could have used the Adjusted GPI which is the rating system that the committee has said they go by to determine at-large teams.

[Hold My Own]

There were no great upsets, so any movement would be minor.

I think the point being made was the process. If this is the process and there was upsets it still wouldnt have factored.

[El Scorcho]

Should have beat Robert Morris. Should have beat Coastal. Heck, should have beat JMU.

Should have beat Stony Brook last year.

Should have beat Presbyterian the year before that.

There's an easy way to get into the playoffs. Win your way in. I'm not interested in what he has to say on this subject until his teams win all of the games that they should.

[TDDance234]

Should have beat Robert Morris. Should have beat Coastal. Heck, should have beat JMU.

Should have beat Stony Brook last year.

Should have beat Presbyterian the year before that.

There's an easy way to get into the playoffs. Win your way in. I'm not interested in what he has to say on this subject until his teams win all of the games that they should.

[Rooster Cogburn]

Look we lost all those games TRUE. But so did NDSU. We should have won most if not all of those games BUT WE DIDN'T. NEITHER DID NDSU. You can go to this logic over and over but it still comes down to the committe passing us up.

Should have beat Robert Morris. Should have beat Coastal. Heck, should have beat JMU.

Should have beat Stony Brook last year.

Should have beat Presbyterian the year before that.

There's an easy way to get into the playoffs. Win your way in. I'm not interested in what he has to say on this subject until his teams win all of the games that they should.

[Mixitup]

Some of the conference games LU played were blow-outs. A lot of points were given up by 2nd and 3rd team players. I guess in the future, LU will get penalized for taking it easy on teams. That is no way to judge a teams performance(points allowed in conference play). LU has shown that no matter what the outcome of a game is, they can and will compete. I think Coach Roc has good reason to be ticked. The first time he was snubbed(after beating Elon) he kept quiet. This time he showed his team how much he appreciated there hard work and dedication they put in to make this season as special as possible.

[jack_sparrow81]

I'm not really that bitter over the snub. JMU should have been in. They beat us, only had one more loss, and they beat an ACC divisional team (and possibly) a BCS team. Maybe the committee didn't think it was right to put us ahead of a bubble team that beat us. Kansas is more impressive than Ball St. There were some games we struggled at this year that we shouldn't have--presby. I still agree that Liberty could've won a couple of games in the playoffs, but I'm just assuming what an outsider thought. South Carolina St. should've not been invited though. They had the same situation with the 3 way tie with FAMU and BCC. You might as well invited stony brook

[jbock13]

I'm still more ticked off about Western Illinois and Georgia Southern getting in. Georgia Southern lost to SAMFORD at GSU. While I'm never a fan of quality losses, not NDSU, WIU, GSU, or SCSU had the kind of losses to good teams that we had.

[ALAFlamesFan]

Should have beat Robert Morris. Should have beat Coastal. Heck, should have beat JMU.

Should have beat Stony Brook last year.

Should have beat Presbyterian the year before that.

There's an easy way to get into the playoffs. Win your way in. I'm not interested in what he has to say on this subject until his teams win all of the games that they should.

One of my favorite Dr. Falwell quotes came to mind: "If it is Christian it ought to be better".

Not sure it totally fits this situation but we can whine about how everyone is against us and it probably feels that way sometimes. I definitely believed that when I was in Lynchburg but as I have gotten perspective I believe the fact is most of the sports world doesn't care one way or the other about LU. They simply don't even think of us or haven't heard of us. We are going to have to MAKE them care about us! We can play the unfair card all we want but we put ourselves in the position to be overlooked. Let's resolve not to put ourselves in that position year after year! Just simply be better than everyone else on our schedule then we can't be overlooked. Thank you.

[Kricket]

Any good coach knows that working the refs is part of the game. This is just a longer term "working the refs" for coach Rocco.

[olldflame]

Any good coach knows that working the refs is part of the game. This is just a longer term "working the refs" for coach Rocco.

I agree. If what he was saying was just a bunch of , I'd say he should keep his mouth shut. It's not.

I'm all for excellence in any endeavor where Christ is being represented. That doesn't mean that in a nation and society which purports to have religious freedom and equality, we should be forced to meet a higher standard than secular institutions to receive the same benefits.

Actually, I doubt if our being a Christian university has been a factor in these decisions. It has more to do with a bias toward certain schools and conferences who have a "history" of making and succeeding in the playoffs. I believe it exists, even though I'm pretty sure the selection criteria specifically says it should not be a factor.

[Sly Fox]

Coastal Carolina coach David Bennett called up Flames coach Danny Rocco a few hours after everything shook out.

"I said, 'Hey thank you brother.' And he said, 'You better have a Christmas present Bennett.' And I said 'Any time you want to play golf down here at the beach, just holler,'" Bennett said.

Click Here for Full Story

[Purple Haize]

MVC - 16 RPI
BSC - 26 RPI

LU beats them in RPI and Top 25 rank by a negligible amount (2 in the RPI) but
MVC - 3 Top 25 Teams
BSC - 1 Top 25 Team

BCS Wins
NDSU beat Kansas (95 RPI)
LU beat Testy Tech errrrr Ball State (101 RPI)

"Worse Loss"
NDSU 189 RPI (The 4th place RPI team in MVC)
LU 188 RPI (The BSC AQ. A double whammy IMO. Our 1st place team ranks even with the MVC 4th place team)

Conference history:
National Champs in Youngstown State (even though they are not what they were)
VMI - They had Patton and Stonewall Jackson!

Reposted for ROOSTER's benefit/consternation

[El Scorcho]

Look we lost all those games TRUE. But so did NDSU. We should have won most if not all of those games BUT WE DIDN'T. NEITHER DID NDSU. You can go to this logic over and over but it still comes down to the committe passing us up.

We can't worry about NDSU. We can only worry about us. If we had done that and the committee passed us up, then we'd have something to whine about. We didn't do our part, so it doesn't matter what the committee does. We gave them the option. We should have forced their hand.

[col. nathan jessup]

I like DR and I hope he is around here for a long time. The way I see it however is quite simple. Man up and play a big boy schedule. With our budget and aspirations, we have no business playing the St. Paul's, Glenville State, St. Francis, Savannah State's so on and so on. There are tons of quality FCS schools within a reasonable distance from us that if we are as good as we think we are we should be able to compete with and beat from time to time. I have served on an NCAA selection committee (although not for football) and I can tell you that we would spend a lot of time looking at the strength of schedule and it is really quite easy to be biased against someone trying to sneak in by playing a large number of cupcakes. If you are the up and coming challenger you have to knock the champ out. You will not win a split decision or on points.

Col. Jessup Out

YOU WANT ME ON THAT WAll!

[BJWilliams]

Thanks for your input Col...we want to play better opponents for sure but as Ive said, it takes two to tango. Most of teh big boys only want a one way game or a two-for-one and Liberty wants an even home and home and that is what many of them tend to balk at. a win over Liberty still isnt a good enough win to boost the GPI for them, but at the same time, a loss is bad enough that theyd get positively hammered in the polls which comes into play come at large time...so really it leaves us in a catch-22

[jbock13]

Perhaps its a slight hyperbole, but we're sort of the Boise State of FCS. No team wants to play us because they don't want to make the trip to Lynchburg, and no team wants to play us because beating us doesn't do anything for them.

Of course, Boise State is way better then us, and we may not be that much of an FCS power yet, but I think the analogy works.

[LUconn]

I completely disagree about our schedule. If we've learned anything its that its allabout wins. They don't care about GPIor ranking. If you have 9 wins and are in an auto bid league, you are in. I say schedule savannah st as many times per year as you can.

[jbock13]

I completely disagree about our schedule. If we've learned anything its that its allabout wins. They don't care about GPIor ranking. If you have 9 wins and are in an auto bid league, you are in. I say schedule savannah st as many times per year as you can.

Couldn't agree with you more.

[jenkins]

no team wins every game that they should win in any sport ever. It's ridiculous that that keeps being brought up. The Presby loss was inexcusable, other than that, the otehr teams we have lost to are talented enough that they can beat quality opposition on any given day. VT should've beat JMU, probably Boise, should they not make a bowl game because they didn't win every game they should've??? The fact is we do win the vast majority of the games we should win. It's ridiculous to think that we should be ok with being left out of the playoffs because we didn't win a game here and there that we should've won when ALL the teams involved this year other than APP ST. or Delaware lost a game or two that they shouldn't have.

[Purple Haize]

no team wins every game that they should win in any sport ever. It's ridiculous that that keeps being brought up. The Presby loss was inexcusable, other than that, the otehr teams we have lost to are talented enough that they can beat quality opposition on any given day. VT should've beat JMU, probably Boise, should they not make a bowl game because they didn't win every game they should've??? The fact is we do win the vast majority of the games we should win. It's ridiculous to think that we should be ok with being left out of the playoffs because we didn't win a game here and there that we should've won when ALL the teams involved this year other than APP ST. or Delaware lost a game or two that they shouldn't have.

And this is the key flawed argument. Basically, you are saying we should be in the playoffs based on the quality of teams (with the exception of Presby) we LOST to. Not BEAT but LOST to.
Now if we BEAT JMU and LOSE to Coastal, then you MIGHT have a case because there is a ...........wait for it..............WIN!!! Or if we beat Coastal, JMU and lost to SB we would have a case because....you guessed it there is a WIN involved. Or if we beat RMU, JMU and SB......you get the point. ANY positive scenario begins with that whole pesky WIN thing. You can weather a lose or two IF YOU WIN. (Just ask LSU)

[El Scorcho]

no team wins every game that they should win in any sport ever.

The 2010 Auburn Tigers disagree. (So far.) There have been others like them and there will be more.

Point being, that's bull.

Look at the Top 10 BCS teams. 1 loss and you have no shot at the championship game. 2 losses and you're lucky to be in the Top 10. Probably not going to a quality bowl game.

We're lucky to be in the FCS system where all we have to do is make the playoffs to have a chance at the championship. This is FOOTBALL! Winning every game in a season is not impossible. A one or two loss season is not unreasonable at all for a playoff/championship caliber team. Assuming we continue to schedule decent FBS schools I don't think one-loss seasons are out of the realm of reason.

My point is that all of our games were winnable this year. I was at the JMU game. We controlled the first half on the road and failed to score. Our defense continued to play lights out in the second half. That game should have been ours. RMU? Pfft. We were not ready for Coastal, but we could have been. And we won our FBS game this year.

We can't lose and expect to go to the playoffs. Especially not in conference.

Expect to win.

[olldflame]

News flash scorchy. We don't play in FBS. There are no undefeated teams and only one 1-loss team (Bethune-Cookman) in the FCS playoffs. Jenkin's point is perfectly valid.