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Message: [QUOTE="Coach Orange, post: 2044363, member: 2260"] That's kind of you to say. Thank you. :) I think it depends on what we mean by "talent" and by "mid-major." If we define talent in terms of pure athletic gifts, any team could occasionally get one of these players. After all, Steph Curry went to Davidson. That said, the upper mid-majors--Conference USA, Missouri Valley, West Coast, etc.--may have some comparable athletes to the P6 teams (Power 5 plus Big East), but likely not as many per team every year. But the small conferences--Patriot League, etc.--don't have nearly the number of athletes in the P6 profile. When these teams play their peers, the stats are likely to be like us playing Pitt, Virgina, Louisville, UConn, or other teams we may consider peers in terms of talent. However, those small-conference teams play programs with far more superior talent in the pre-conference season. Those talent discrepancies are just likely to skew stats so that more teams in the small conferences will be lower in the overall NCAA rankings. The Opponent Effective FG% rankings demonstrate this. Year-to-year, very few P6 schools appear lower than 275. Please understand that I'm not saying one of these teams couldn't pull an upset over a P6 team in a game. It happens in the NCAA Tournament every year. However, these rankings are for entire seasons, not just one game. For many of these teams, those seasons include some double-digit losses (sometimes multiple blowouts) to teams with superior talent. For example, Maine of the American East played Duke this year. What do you think the final score was? 94-55. Imagine what Maine's Opponent Effective FG% for that game was and how it affects them in the overall Opponent Effective FG% rankings. They also lost to Providence by 20. Another example: North Florida is 4-1 in conference this year. Good team, right? Their record stands at 9-13, and they lost to Miami (didn't we beat them?) 94-56. They lost to Auburn 83-66. They also lost to some team named Syracuse 77-71 before losing to Arkansas 91-76. Weber State is leading their conference standings right now. They lost to Stanford by 18 and BYU by 11, while second-place North Dakota lost to Iowa by 11. One thing to note: these teams have to go on the road for many of these games. Home games may close the gap some, but not enough in all games to suggest major reshuffling of the overall season rankings. Not all teams have equal talent. In essence, Syracuse should, in theory, be at least top-60 most years in major defensive categories built around having 7-9 games a season against lesser talent. Top-60 is good, but it's certainly not elite by any means. I hope this helps clarify. :) [/QUOTE]

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