2024-25 Rankings

SJUDave said:
While I understand where you're coming from, I hate this. You know more than me, this program has not had much to celebrate, ESPECIALLY in the last 25 years, so why would your first feelings about being ranked this early in the season be "hold my applause." If anything it should be the opposite, you can't take this positive momentum for granted. Sure, is it all for nothing if they lose the next 5 games of course, but this is a big deal for optics, and relevancy. Something this program has been more than struggling with for a long time.
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Dave, I love your podcasts and your optimism. I'm probably tainted by being a Johnnies fan for 60 years and hearing time and time again about how good we're going to be and we end up being disappointed.. We haven't won an NCAA game in almost 25 years. When I was an undergraduate (late 60's-early 70's), we were ranked #4 in all time wins. Look where we are today. Forgive me for not singing cum baya just yet. In fact, it's ridiculous to even have AP Top 25 polls this early in the season, where 90+% of the games being played are cupcake matchups. It's hard to gauge which teams are really good and which are merely padding their record with worthless victories. If we do well in the next stretch of games against stronger competition, there will be a big smile on my face. Until then, I choose to reserve judgment.
 
MarkRedman said:
Dave, I love your podcasts and your optimism. I'm probably tainted by being a Johnnies fan for 60 years and hearing time and time again about how good we're going to be and we end up being disappointed.. We haven't won an NCAA game in almost 25 years. When I was an undergraduate (late 60's-early 70's), we were ranked #4 in all time wins. Look where we are today. Forgive me for not singing cum baya just yet. In fact, it's ridiculous to even have AP Top 25 polls this early in the season, where 90+% of the games being played are cupcake matchups. It's hard to gauge which teams are really good and which are merely padding their record with worthless victories. If we do well in the next stretch of games against stronger competition, there will be a big smile on my face. Until then, I choose to reserve judgment.
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Just an fyi. Kumbaya will get you into less trouble than what you wrote.

But yes, we will know more after the Bahama triangle games.
 
MarkRedman said:
Dave, I love your podcasts and your optimism. I'm probably tainted by being a Johnnies fan for 60 years and hearing time and time again about how good we're going to be and we end up being disappointed.. We haven't won an NCAA game in almost 25 years. When I was an undergraduate (late 60's-early 70's), we were ranked #4 in all time wins. Look where we are today. Forgive me for not singing cum baya just yet. In fact, it's ridiculous to even have AP Top 25 polls this early in the season, where 90+% of the games being played are cupcake matchups. It's hard to gauge which teams are really good and which are merely padding their record with worthless victories. If we do well in the next stretch of games against stronger competition, there will be a big smile on my face. Until then, I choose to reserve judgment.
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This is about finally being relevant. No one who follows college basketball believes this top 25 list will be the same in March. We're on the list now and hopefully, we'll be on the list after Wagner and New Mexico.

The list gives us relevance. It means we'll be followed by all the networks who put top 25 results in the bottoms of their reports. It means it'll be tougher for the selection committee to ignore us assuming we end with the same record we had last year. On the negative side, teams will be up for us rather than seeing us as a cupcake on their schedule.

The bottom line is Fordham proved it's no cupcake after the Seton Hall game and Quinnipiac may still win its conference. Not really cupcakes and we blew both out. We've earned the ranking so far.

We all love lists!
 
Re: early ranking, team enjoys it, fans too, but of course it is nothing to hang our hats on yet. That said, feeling ok with it does not equate to assuming success. I appreciate the better optics, but will get really excited when we come out impressively in the ooc games v better teams. This group impresses me, not perfect, but capable to dance and make noise there. Enjoy the ride, early ratings or not.
 
paultzman said:
Re: early ranking, team enjoys it, fans too, but of course it is nothing to hang our hats on yet. That said, feeling ok with it does not equate to assuming success. I appreciate the better optics, but will get really excited when we come out impressively in the ooc games v better teams. This group impresses me, not perfect, but capable to dance and make noise there. Enjoy the ride, early ratings or not.
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It puts (good) pressure to go at least 2-2 in the NM/Baylor/UVA or Tenn/GA games.
 
bucketshardy said:
how would we know the next stretch is “stronger” if not for Rankings…?
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C'mon, you don't need official rankings to know which teams are good and which aren't. I'm not anti-rankings. I just think that it's way too premature to judge teams at this point in time. The majority of the games being played now are "buy" games and they tell you absolutely nothing about how good teams are. I would much rather be ranked in March than November.
 
MarkRedman said:
C'mon, you don't need official rankings to know which teams are good and which aren't. I'm not anti-rankings. I just think that it's way too premature to judge teams at this point in time. The majority of the games being played now are "buy" games and they tell you absolutely nothing about how good teams are. I would much rather be ranked in March than November.
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No disagreement, everyone would rather be ranked in March than November. But
don’t think that diminishes the significance of a program like ours being ranked in November.
 
NCJohnnie said:
No disagreement, everyone would rather be ranked in March than November. But
don’t think that diminishes the significance of a program like ours being ranked in November.
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The bottom line is there is no downside to ever being ranked but unless the Johnnie’s stay there, or at the very, very least, remain sniffing the rankings all season, being ranked now has no lasting significance. The next couple of weeks are going to be telling obviously.
 
Being ranked matters. We saw last season that only the three Big East teams that were ranked made the tournament. The others didn’t, us included. I know many on here feel like last season was an aberration. But, The Big East has already had some bad losses this season. If we don’t pick it up as a conference in the remaining OOC schedule then the result will be the same as last season. Only the ranked teams will make it. Beginning Sunday against New Mexico, we better win at least two of the four games against NM, Baylor, Tenn/Virginia and Georgia. If we lose more than two of those games we will not keep our ranking and the conference doesn’t look as strong as we thought it would be. To finish the season ranked if we lose our ranking after the Bahamas , we would need to finish top 3 in conference.
 
Top 25 my ass. Maybe later but not now. Just a horrible excuse of a basketball game (33-30 14.42 in the 2nd half) right now.
 
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