SIU finished #125 in KenPom last year. They're at #131 right now.
I wondered what the difference was between this year and last year. I looked at the overall and non-conference strength of schedules. This year, overall is 225 and non-conference is 270. Last year, overall SOS was 138 and non-conference was 311.
That means the non-conference schedule was marginally better this year (with Oklahoma St., UNLV and SLU) than last season and the conference opponents are significantly worse than they were last season.
SIU really dominated the bad teams last year and just lost to the good teams, a lot of them in pretty close games. This year they're struggling against the bad teams like Alcorn State, Chicago State, SEMO, Illinois State, Southern Indiana, and UIC.
The Valley is also way down this year. It's good at the top with Drake and Bradley and even Indiana State sneaking into the top 100 now but the bottom is such a huge drop-off.
After reading all this I am convinced...we are doomed for mediocrity.
@mr_woogers If it was Hornecker's decision to remove the redshirt, shouldn't he still get playing time in one-sided games, like at Drake?
@mr_woogers If it was Hornecker's decision to remove the redshirt, shouldn't he still get playing time in one-sided games, like at Drake?
I don't think it was Hornecker's decision. The way I see it, they sort of panicked after the Ebube injury and Muila was out. The fact that he can't play in blowouts is not encouraging.
This entire season has been one big disappointment despite the record.With all do respect, what does this statement mean? This season is a disappointment as long as you don’t look at the most important number when evaluating a team? I get the NET number being a disappointment (and KenPom for the group on here that worships that metric). But I’m sorry, that statement literally makes no sense.And I know the UIC win by 2 was ugly, but let’s remember…Drake beat Valpo in double overtime.
Drake beat UIC in overtime.
Belmont beat UIC by 6.
Bradley beat UIC by 7.
Bradley went to overtime against Illinois State.
Northern Iowa got beat by Evansville for God’s sake.All of the results above would definitely be considered disappointing from their fan bases, but it happens…especially in conference play.I don’t necessarily mean to call you out as I know you do a ton of work for this site, but some people cherry picking the bad on here drives me nuts. We’re 1 game out of first, with a chance to run the table (certainly far from a lock, as I know we are scuffling right now).
@salukiworld Unless it’s changed recently, a player can refuse the redshirt. Coaches cannot force it.
I'm not sayin' -- I'm just sayin'!
I feel like if SIU had a really good NET or KenPom right now, people would be using it to show how great SIU was. We did that back in the day with RPI when that was a thing.
I just don’t know what expectations people have with this program anymore. They’re not going to be making an NIT for the 15th year in a row. This team plays 4 Seniors extremely heavy minutes and hasn’t done a good job of developing or playing their young guys. Rupert, D’Amico, and Banks are the only non-Seniors that get minutes on this team. This is a team that should be competing for postseason tournaments and they’re not. They’ve been building up 4 years for this season and if the Seniors aren’t back, you’re looking at another rebuild starting next year.
I guess we should all just give up
I guess we should all just give up
I don’t think people should give up but I think we should expect postseason tournaments here after 15 years of nothing.
Barry was killed on this board for not making postseason tournaments. I was 100% fine with firing Barry but if this current team can’t get past Friday in Arch Madness for the fourth straight year, can anyone argue that these 4 years so far have been much more of a success than Barry’s 7? I guess we’ll cross that bridge when we get there.
I am sort of at a loss with this season. We are a game out of first and have 4 winnable games left, but at the same time it feels a little disappointing. The metrics aren't good but I think that has everything to do with NET being set before we even enter conference play, it's a BS metric. Anyway, I don't have a strong sense of if we have had a good or bad season, I really don't... I would say many valley teams at the top of the conference feel the same way. I feel like the valley may be stuck in this in between area where they are too good and beat up on each other to be a multi bid league but also not good enough to dominate the non conference so it shows up in the metrics when at-large time comes... I have decided I am just going to enjoy it and take it game by game, hopefully we win out and Bradley beats Drake, would split the regular season.
I think a lot of the commentary above is fair/reasonable. The Drake game was a gut punch because it looked like SIU was exposed as a pretender. More than most years, given some of the gray area this season, I think a lot will come down to Arch Madness. The program badly needs a good weekend in St. Louis with this veteran squad.
While I agree with most about the season and the conference after taking a new look at the game on Saturday I have a new perspective we are all very compassionate about the Salukis want them to win games conference championships play in the post season but as far as Drake it was disappointing but no different than other games in similar circumstances we just take it a little harder because it happened to us no someone else look at scores on any day this happens to someone
In the many years of my attending Saluki basketball games, this may be the most forgettable. That’s exactly what I will do. My take is : Drake is not as good as they were Saturday and The Salukis are not as bad as they showed.
I agree with @Cowboydawg. Our guys are much better than this as a team and Drake walked on water - that had to have been a fluke, just look back to our first match against them earlier in the season. Domask is probably tired and rightly so...he can't be the best man on the floor every night for a whole season when he plays so many minutes every game. I love Lance Jones, but he has to knock off the 3PT shenanigans this year. His shooting success this year has been awful from outside and it shows no sign of changing. I think Ebube can add valuable minutes and Cade should be able to come in for 5 or so minutes a game at least to get some experience on the floor for the rest of the season. Those 2 might not make or break the Arch Madness tournament, but how fun would it be if they had some confidence and we actually have a solid inside game?
This season isn't a wash out, even if parts of it have been frustrating. Go DAWGS!
Even if it was Hornecker's decision to not redshirt, I certainly think he should get some playing time. The few minutes he has played weren't perfect but were a plus for the team. A 7 footer in the middle is going to alter every team's inside shot, and he is easily the best shooter among the bigs..and a good FT shooter.
