Mar 6 / Rob

We Are Rooting for VCU and You Should To

For the next 24 hours, JMUSB is fully on board the VCU bandwagon. Sure everyone with a soul was pulling for them to beat George Mason, because well, it was George Mason and we hate them. But tomorrow night is different. Virtually every bracketologist, talking head, and college hoops writer in the country has George Mason as a lock for an at large bid. And I’m pretty sure that they all have ODU in as well. Therefore if VCU wins tomorrow night and secures the conference’s automatic bid, the CAA will be looking at 3 bids to the big dance. That’s right, the Twitter hashtag #3Bids4CAA created by our friend Georghe: The Blog, could actually be legitimate.

Three bids would be unprecedented for the CAA. The league has been in existence since 1983 and has only received multiple bids in 3 seasons, in 1996 when Richmond and Navy were selected, in 2006 when Mason and UNCW were selected, and in 2007 when ODU and VCU were selected. It seems blatantly obvious, but fans of all CAA teams except for ODU should be jumping on the VCU bandwagon with us. You’re not a bad fan or betraying your team by doing it. I’d actually argue that you’re betraying your team if you don’t. 

Let me spell it out for you, more bids for the league is better for the league.  Getting more teams into the dance validates the CAA and ups its profile. Each school could recruit better players because coaches could legitimately tell kids that a CAA Championship wasn’t the only way to go dancing. The schools would have greater success going head to head recruiting against A10 and MVC schools, and maybe in a few years start to snag more recruits away from power conferences. The league’s television profile, which is probably a subject for a post of its own, goes up. Instead of scrambling to watch the first few rounds of the tournament online or on regional cable, maybe ESPN would broadcast them. Instead of having the quality of tournament officiating called into question, maybe the league would actually get some refs that didn’t suck. It’s really a no brainer.

I’m as disappointed as anyone that JMU bombed out of the tournament Friday night. And while I certainly share some of Todd’s frustrations with Coach Brady and don’t dispute that he got outcoached by Shaver, I definitely think he’s got the program pointed in the right direction. A VCU win tomorrow could help accelerate JMU’s forward progress. VCU loses and they’re NIT bound. If VCU wins, it’s probably a lot more likely that the Dukes get an NIT bid.  The NIT isn’t where anyone wants to be, but it’s better than playing in the CBI or CIT and it would give Brady a chance to prepare his team for sqauds from bigger and better conferences. It’s the basketball version of spring football, but it could be an important step for the JMU program. So, this might be the only time you ever read this words on the blog, but GO RAMS!

7 Comments

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  1. GTB / Mar 7 2011

    If VCU wins tonight and the CAA does NOT get three bids next Sunday I may have to spend the rest of my existence wandering the earth like Caine from Kung Fu, hunting down each individual member of the 2011 NCAA Tournament Selection Committee.

  2. Todd / Mar 7 2011

    On the NIT front, the Missouri St. and Vermont losses were daggers yeasterday since they’ll now get autobids. Do the CBI/CIT still exist?

  3. Matt / Mar 7 2011

    It would be an absolute travesty not to get 3 teams in if VCU wins. With ODU and GMU sporting top 30 RPIs, there is NO REASON at all not to be in the field. They probably deserve to be home seeds too (8 or higher). With this tournament playing out as it has, i see both of them getting 7s or 8s.

  4. Rob / Mar 7 2011

    Todd, I can find info about this year’s CBI, but can’t find anything about the CIT. The CBI appears to be a go at least.

  5. Christine / Mar 7 2011

    This looks like the CIT information: http://www.collegeinsider.com/tournament/results.html

Trackbacks and Pingbacks

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