www.roanoke.com

If Big 12 deputy commissioner Tim Weiser had returned my call Thursday, I would have asked if he really said Virginia’s baseball team had a “less than stellar” record against teams with an RPI under 100.

According to my calculations, UVa was 17-11-1 against top 100 teams. I’d say that’s closer to stellar than “less than stellar,” particularly when you consider the Cavaliers’ 7-5-1 record against teams with RPIs in the top 15.

If the RPI on the NCAA’s website is the one that was used in the selections, how could Virginia be ranked No. 6 overall but not get one of the 16 No. 1 seeds?

Not only did UVa get a No. 2 seed, but the Cavaliers were sent to California for the second straight year to play in a subregional with three California teams.

“We can certainly understand Virginia getting sent to the West Coast seems like punishment,” Weiser was quoted by Kendall Rogers of Yahoo.com. “But the Cavaliers had a less than stellar record against top-100 RPI.

“Some are going to say this is punishment, but I look at it as more rewarding other teams for playing well against some of the top RPI teams.”

In another article, Weiser was quoted as saying that Virginia did not play an impressive non-conference schedule.

"They are a strong team and that is a strong regional," Weiser said. ''But Virginia was sixth in the ACC and had a triple-digit non-conference schedule. They only had 17 wins against the top 100."

I will agree that Virginia did not play a strong non-conference schedule. The Cavaliers played 24 non-conference games, including 22 at home. The other two were at VCU and against Radford in Salem, and UVa probably had the largest fan following at those games.

Should UVa have done a better job of scheduling?

The only game the Cavaliers scheduled against a non-conference team ranked in the NCAA’s top 100 was a date with Coastal Carolina. The threat of bad weather cancelled that game before Coastal Carolina boarded its bus.

“Maybe some teams are playing more non-conference away games,” UVa athletic director Craig Littlepage said Thursday, “but this is a very complex topic.

“When you look at non-conference scheduling, schools in our region are going to be playing more home games than teams from the north and the Midwest, etc. That is a factor determined by weather.

“Let’s pick a team arbitrarily, say Seton Hall. When they start their schedule in February, you’re not going to see them playing a lot of home games. That is one situation where our locale may favor us.

“The second thing is, you’re playing your non-conference games primarily in the middle of the week. Either for academic reasons or budget mandates, schools were told last summer that ‘you’ll be playing your non-conference schedule in state or in the region.’

“I don’t think anybody is making the case that we deliberately scheduled a soft non-conference schedule, but it just happened this year, based on whatever those numbers are.
You can argue those factors or disagree with them, but those are the facts.

“We played more home non-conference games than not and that’s because teams come to us. We’re not going to be taking flights away from home for non-conference games. There’s no reason for us to do that when we’ve got teams from throughout the state that are willing to travel here or maybe we’ll travel there.”

In-state teams like to play at Virginia in football and basketball because they get guarantees that help them meet their budget. Littlepage implied that there is also some compensation in baseball.

“Using another school arbitrarily, let’s say Michigan State’s spring break is in late March, when they could come to our place,” Littlepage said. “We might not be able to go to their place because of our academic calendar when it might be otherwise advantageous to go.”

“Does all that make sense?”

Just out of curiosity, I checked some of the non-conference games played by the four ACC teams that received No. 1 seeds:

North Carolina had three non-conference road games (North Carolina-Wilmington, East Carolina and Charlotte).

Georgia Tech had six such games (two at Georgia Southern, one at Kennesaw State, one at Georgia, one at Georgia State and one at Western Carolina). Georgia State is located in Atlanta.

Clemson had five non-conference home games (two at South Carolina and one each at Georgia, Furman and Western Carolina).

Florida State played at Auburn, at Florida and against Florida in Jacksonville and North Florida in Jacksonville. Those final two sites would have to be considered neutral.

All four No. 1 seeds played better non-conference schedules than Virginia but not a whole lot better. If the Virginia-Coastal Carolina game had been played, would that have gotten the Cavaliers a No. 1 seed, probably not?

But what gets lost in all the discussion is the fact that Virginia won the ACC Tournament.

For Weiser to refer to UVa as a sixth-place team and then not mention the Cavaliers’ ACC championship is really cheesy. What becomes increasingly evident is that UVa’s four straight victories in Durham, N.C., didn’t count for much and that’s simply wrong.

Share/Save