TypicalTribe
November 25th, 2013, 01:02 PM
I know this might be hard to stomach given the amount of griping going on around here, but there isn't a single team that can legitimately say they got Woofed this year. Every team on the outside looking in fell on their face in the last couple of weeks of the season and lost at least one, if not two or three games that they knew would put them in the playoffs. If you can't win these de facto playoff games, then why do you deserve to play actual playoff games?
Now, there are clearly arguments against several of the teams that made the playoffs, but that is different than there being arguments for the teams that didn't get bids. For example, I see nothing on the level of Towson getting left out last year after closing the season strong and throttling UNH in the last week. Nothing on the level of a 10-1 Lehigh getting left out or some of the Coastal, Cal Poly or, yes, Wofford snubs from years ago.
What we saw this year is what happens when you have so many at-large bids that the only choices left are all mediocre. I think more than anything, when we are arguing the merits of 5 loss teams, it is the best argument against expanding any further, or else we can look forward to discussing the merits of whether you need to be above .500 to be eligible.
In short, it's the first year I can remember where it was a challenge to find enough deserving teams to fill out the bracket. Hopefully, this was just a random year, but I'm worried it will be the norm in the era of 24 team playoffs.
Now, there are clearly arguments against several of the teams that made the playoffs, but that is different than there being arguments for the teams that didn't get bids. For example, I see nothing on the level of Towson getting left out last year after closing the season strong and throttling UNH in the last week. Nothing on the level of a 10-1 Lehigh getting left out or some of the Coastal, Cal Poly or, yes, Wofford snubs from years ago.
What we saw this year is what happens when you have so many at-large bids that the only choices left are all mediocre. I think more than anything, when we are arguing the merits of 5 loss teams, it is the best argument against expanding any further, or else we can look forward to discussing the merits of whether you need to be above .500 to be eligible.
In short, it's the first year I can remember where it was a challenge to find enough deserving teams to fill out the bracket. Hopefully, this was just a random year, but I'm worried it will be the norm in the era of 24 team playoffs.