• Welcome to OGBoards 10.0, keep in mind that we will be making LOTS of changes to smooth out the experience here and make it as close as possible functionally to the old software, but feel free to drop suggestions or requests in the Tech Support subforum!

2021-22 Wake Forest Basketball Season - 25-9 (13-7), KP#33

OblongPickle said:
Like I said, I haven't watched anything this year and didn't know anything about the schedule.

What are the advantages of playing such an easy schedule if going 10-1 OOC doesn't bump you at all? Still seems like going 8-4 in conference should be enough to get SOME votes. No matter how down the ACC is.

I guess make the guys and fans feel better with a winning record? Idk...just seems like a no-win situation.
Click to expand...

I don't think anyone expected this year's Wake team to be anywhere near as good as it is.
 
Yeah. National pundits get it. A reasonable goal for this team was 20 wins plus two ACCT games with a shot at the bubble.
 
PhDeac said:
Yeah. National pundits get it. A reasonable goal for this team was 20 wins plus two ACCT games with a shot at the bubble.
Click to expand...

If you looked at the Wake roster from outside, it wasn't impressive.
Wake recruits:
Fr PG who had moments but was over matched
SF who wasn't good playing out of position at PF.
C who was coming off major surgery and long haul Covid. Nobody knew how well or whether he would recover.
2G who had the body of a PG. How would that work?

Recruits: two three star guys. Not likely to be big contributors immediately. Two Brits who were giant question marks. The best HS player in Britain is how good compared to US HS talent? Nobody knew.

C from Colorado who had had major surgeries and hadn't played a lot of minutes per game.

C/PF from Mississippi who was well traveled and wasn't a star.

2/3 SoCon Freshman of the year. Torn Achilles, not expected to play.
3/4 from Indiana State. Stepping up a few levels. Would his game work against better competition?

2/3 role player/7th or 8th guy on a good Oklahoma team.


Forbes and staff have these guys playing at the high end of expected performance level. And has the group playing as a team. The preseason ceiling was wxpected to be middle ACC, not fighting for a top spot. The chemistry and player improvement has exceeded expectations.
 
From 2 years ago... After we fired Manning but before we hired Forbes. Chaundee had just transferred and I think someone was making the argument that it would make it tougher to attract a coach.

We were basically a last place team (again) last season... There is nobody looking at the WFU job and thinking, "If I can just keep this roster together, this job is worth taking!"

It is a rebuild. You can argue about how long it will take, but it's longer than the one year Chaundee was going to be here for.

I guess there is a (remote) possibility that a new coach can bring in a lovable rag-tag group of transfers to take advantage of the probable one-time transfer waiver that's coming... But even then, we're not going to be "good".
Click to expand...

I was off by a year in terms of a "lovable rag-tag group of transfers" and we're way better than I thought we could be.
 
OblongPickle said:
Like I said, I haven't watched anything this year and didn't know anything about the schedule.

What are the advantages of playing such an easy schedule if going 10-1 OOC doesn't bump you at all? Still seems like going 8-4 in conference should be enough to get SOME votes. No matter how down the ACC is.

I guess make the guys and fans feel better with a winning record? Idk...just seems like a no-win situation.
Click to expand...

Forbes set the schedule in September or earlier and did not anticipate how good we'd be, so he scheduled easy games to rack up wins and built confidence and fan support. This rebuild is way ahead of schedule.
 
Not sure where to put this, but just listened to an interview w/ Forbes where he casually mentioned he had COVID and that was why he missed the GT game.

I had known he was sick, but I thought it was non-COVID.

Doesn't matter at all, but it was the first I'd heard of it.
 
The team has improved from the non-conf schedule. The questions is was it better to play a softer schedule and lose 1 or a harder schedule and lose 4-5 (see LSU). And remember that we had OT win against a bad Oregon St. team, OT win at home against NW, a last second shot to prevent OT in a neutral site game with Charlotte and nearly kicked away the VMI game.

With basically a new team they needed to learn to play together and how to play defense. It's not like Forbes brought in a handful of one and done types that you could just depend on the talent being great enough to win tougher games.
 
Anytime a coach misses a game, a player is out “sick”, or a coworker is unexpectedly out, it’s bc they have Covid. It’s the new assumption that is almost always true
 
Deaconblue said:
I don't think anyone expected this year's Wake team to be anywhere near as good as it is.
Click to expand...

birdman said:
Forbes set the schedule in September or earlier and did not anticipate how good we'd be, so he scheduled easy games to rack up wins and built confidence and fan support. This rebuild is way ahead of schedule.
Click to expand...

this makes perfect sense

what also makes sense is that for future years, Forbes should have someone with an analytics background help him game out where the OOC schedule may be ranked by Pomeroy, etc. (too bad former WF hoopster Richard Carmichael has retired from the Math department)

Obviously there will be variability in teams' performance (just as there has been in WF's performance) but it shouldn't be too hard to give a range of SOS for a given set of opponents.

WF's 2022 non-con SOS is ranked #349 by KP...one can build a schedule with easy wins that is not that horrible.
 
If WF can win 5 more regular season games (and WF will be favored in 6 of those games, including WF as a 1 point favorite tomorrow), the OOC schedule isn't going to matter.
 
Pilchard said:
If WF can win 5 more regular season games (and WF will be favored in 6 of those games, including WF as a 1 point favorite tomorrow), the OOC schedule isn't going to matter.
Click to expand...

It will still matter. We'll probably be seeded 2 spots below where we would be with even a decent OOC.
 
I was thinking that myself, that you could get a schedule in 200's that would be pretty safe with a little bit of effort.
 
Valid point, but if you mix in a loss it probably washes out. Rather us have no bad losses than a tougher OOC schedule with a loss to Grand Canyon.
 
PhDeac said:
It will still matter. We'll probably be seeded 2 spots below where we would be with even a decent OOC.
Click to expand...

It won't matter as far as getting a bid or not. Getting in is the goal. Seeding is of secondary importance. If WF is a 9 seed rather than a 7 seed, not that big of an issue.
 
Pilchard said:
It won't matter as far as getting a bid or not. Getting in is the goal. Seeding is of secondary importance. If WF is a 9 seed rather than a 7 seed, not that big of an issue.
Click to expand...

8-9 game winner plays 1 seed game 2. Tough way to get to second weekend. 7 plays 10, then 2. 6 plays 11, then 3.
 
Getting a good seed and winning as many games as possible is the goal
 
Wake is an 8-9 seed on the high end and an 11 seed/last four bye team on the low end. Palm's projection is a total outlier vs the others.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top