DISARMING IN THE POSITIONAL ARMS RACE?

Now that both representatives of the Mid-American Conference have exited the women's tournament, and the round of four comprises the four top seeds from the regional rounds, the powers that be are thinking about competitive balance.

In the landscape of women’s college basketball, the major programs dominate the polls, the NCAA Tournament, and the headlines. While the sport is still struggling to get attention from the media, schools such as UConn, South Carolina, Notre Dame, Tennessee and Mississippi State, among few others, dominate the limited coverage.

Because of this, one of the sport’s biggest criticisms that the NCAA Tournament isn’t exciting because the best teams always win and there are never any upsets or Cinderella runs. But that just simply isn’t true.

I suspect the absence of above-the-rim play and fandom's preference for defensive breakdowns leading to spectacular stuff shots has more to do with that "isn't exciting" gripe.  The pool of talent probably follows a power rule, which makes strengthening an up-and-coming team not among the usual suspects a challenge.

For South Carolina head coach Dawn Staley, who spent eight seasons as head coach at Temple, she understands how difficult it is for these mid-major programs to find success in the tournament.

“The struggle for me was to make the tournament and then advance through at least the second weekend of the tournament, and you need talent,” Staley said. “Ten years ago when I was at Temple, you really couldn’t get the talent.”

Somewhere, too, the "Connecticut's success is bad for the sport" people appear to be living in Connecticut coach Geno Auriemma's head.

While these runs from mid-majors are beginning to become more commonplace, Auriemma hopes to see it happen even more frequently.

“I think that’s the best thing that ever happened,” Auriemma said, referring to the two 11-seeds in the Sweet 16. “I think that’s the best thing that could happen to our game.”

Staley echoed those sentiments and noted how every upset inspires the potential for another one in the future.

“The fact that Buffalo and Central Michigan are here, playing in the Sweet Sixteen, gives other coaches hope to keep on coaching,” she said. “It gives them a little boost of energy to know that it could happen. It can happen. You can get out of the first week and on to the second week and compete at the highest level.”

One of the best parts of March Madness is the upsets that happen throughout the month as well as the annual Cinderella runs by smaller, lesser-known schools.

Thus, a call for a scholarship limitation treaty?

Auriemma suggests lowering the scholarship limit from 15 to 13, allowing more good players to make an impact at a small school instead of riding the bench at one of the powerhouses. At the moment, mid-major coaches have to be creative in their recruiting — many recruit international players heavily.

“Sometimes you have to go that route in order for you to get some quality players,” Staley said. “When it comes down to it, it’s not [a fair game]. To be able to play for a Power-Five school is always greater in most people’s eyes.”

Another key for these schools is targeting the players they think best fit the program and building relationships with said players as opposed to selling recruits on history or facilities.

“I think kids want to play for people and they want to go to a school to learn,” [Buffalo coach Felisha] Legette-Jack said. “They don’t talk to buildings, they talk to the assistant coaches.

However, another issue is a lack of coverage for smaller programs. They’re rarely on television and never have photos taken of their games for use.

In order: assistant coaches and head coaches likely have a good idea of who their opponents are starting, are recruiting, and thus who among the recruits are likely to be four-year reserves elsewhere.  "Ride the bench at Connecticut or sign with us at DePaul, and pay them out" might work for some kids.  Next, if facilities aren't that important, there's probably a sports economics paper identifying the role of all those financially strapped convocation centers in the Mid-American in getting teams capable of getting to the round of sixteen.

I have to wonder if a change to the tournament pairing method mightn't make things more interesting.  My preferred method remains the Swiss system used in chess.  The current method used by the selection committee might have helped the Mid-American teams get to the second weekend.  Whatever magic goes on in the committee room before the white smoke comes out of the Sistine Chapel, Hustle Belt sports pundit James Snyder suggested the cardinals in conclave assembled neglected the computer-generated power rankings.

[Two of the four teams with a computer ranking of thirty or better] are the MAC teams, and they were the first two. They stuck it to the poor MAC, or so they thought.

[An eleven seed] for either MAC squad was terrible. Both were clearly in the top 40 in the country, by the eye test, wins and losses, and the RPI.

As the nerves were kicking in when I was watching Buffalo take on host Florida State and Central Michigan was taking on host Ohio State in the second round, these thoughts were rattling around in my head.

Apparently, a lower seed is a more favorable seed in the second round (and sometimes, in the notorious and probably apocryphal case of the twelve at the five, in the first.)

My brain wasn’t meshing the fact that once the second round hits, getting shafted still matters, but getting really shafted actually helps. While counter-intuitive, their seeding slight actually worked to great advantage. Buffalo, if an 8 or 9 in their region, would have been squaring off against UCONN. CMU would have had to take on Megan Duffy’s Alma Mater Notre Dame.

Anything is possible, but I wouldn’t bet on Buffalo beating UCONN to reach the sweet 16, and while CMU would (will) have a chance against ND, the Irish are a more complete team than the Buckeyes.

So let’s all raise a toast to the NCAA, for being so wrong that it’s right!

Under the Swiss system, Buffalo and Central Michigan would have drawn Florida State and Ohio State in the first round, while the six-seeds they had to beat would have hosted fourteens.  Perhaps the cardinals in conclave assembled set the field in the way they do so as to have the possibility of more interesting weekend games, with the lowest seeds sent on their way with their participation trophies while nobody is watching on Friday.