My Two Cents: Miller Has His Own Case for Getting NCAA Bid
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. — Who would have ever guessed that the "Road" to the Final Four is actually Sesame Street.
That's what we learned Saturday when Indiana coach Archie Miller went off on a rather lengthy tangent about the Hoosiers' NCAA tournament hopes and what he thinks about the so-called bracketology experts who blather on day after day on TV this time of year.
Indiana was on the right side of the bubble prior to Saturday's 60-56 loss to Big Ten champ Wisconsin. Now, they're likely out unless they win a couple of games in the conference tournament in Indianapolis. Indiana is the No. 11 seed, which means they have to play opening night on Wednesday when the four worst teams in the league play. Indiana will have to win against Nebraska, more than likely, and then probably win the next night too to be NCAA tournament eligible.
It's all a crapshoot, which is why listening to all the talking heads this time of year is a waste of time, Miller said.
Here's what he had to say, all of it:
"If you watch Sesame Street and you listen to all the characters on Sesame Street talk and everyone gets all — uh-uh-uh — when you listen to the guys on Sesame Street, it's a children's show. Every bracketology is a children's show.
"Bottom line, what our resume is, it's strength of record, and that's undeniable it's a top-25 strength of record. If you don't put in a top-25 strength of record team with the wins that we have, you know, somebody is going to have to answer some questions.
"You know, maybe we didn't win on the road. All right. There's about 15 teams that didn't do that. Well, maybe they didn't beat enough (good teams), but there's some teams that have maybe of half the amount of quad one and quad two games that we had. When you look at our wins, I think we had three wins against the top 10 in quad one. There's 2-seed Florida State, you beat this team.
"Since December 3rd, we have not played one team that's not a high-major team. No one's done it. But when you start to go through the bracketology and you listen to the Sesame Street cartoon guys on TV. who need people to click and do all this stuff, the bottom line is strength of record: Who did you play, what did you beat?
"If you look at our wins, there's very few teams in the country that can say they have beaten the Florida States, Michigan States, Iowas, the Penn States, who are clearly in the field. So if you are beating six, seven teams in the field, you should be in the field.
"Everyone is going to say, you don't have a .500 record in the league. They have already stated that a .500 record in the league doesn't matter. It's your body of work. Because there's certain teams that played the 330th nonconference strength of schedule, which we didn't do.
"So if you add it all up, we scheduled to make the tournament. We got a lot of good wins. Played in an unprecedented season in the Big Ten in terms of the depth, and when you have that many teams competing for the tournament, 12, most of the year, and you beat each other up, my hope is that they just don't take it for granted how hard it is to win in the league.
"I think today was our 25th straight power five game. I mean, who does that? You know, we did. Everyone wanted to bust our chops to start the season on our nonconference schedule, but it worked out. Princeton is going to be in the final four (in the Ivy League), -Conference USA, there's Louisiana Tech. South Dakota State won their league. We end up playing UConn and Notre Dame, but some of those games are a crapshoot sometimes. Both teams have had pretty good years, and we beat them away from home. In league play, it is what it is. Who did you play; who did you beat? ...
"So when I look at the stuff that really matters, the net is considerably different than any other number that stacks us, and that's because the net now goes into margins.
"So they don't really care if you win a great game on the road by one or did you beat a really good team on the road by four. Now there's some efficiency and things that go into the mini-margin of the game and some efficiencies that go into the net that don't add up, you look at KPI, BPI, Sagarin, you look at all of the metrics, Kenpom and the top 35, strength of schedule is like 14 on all of them. Who did you play, who did you beat? At the end of the day, our record is like 26 coming into the game.
"If you have a strength of record of Top-25, you had a good schedule and you beat good teams, you should be in the tournament.''
Miller walked off the podium, but he wasn't done talking.
"When I was in the Atlantic 10, Joe Lunardi was my best friend. Now he's crapping on Indiana to get people to watch his Sesame Street show. Now he can go back in the trash can where he came from.''
What's most striking in this political season is that Miller had to be up on the podium stumping for votes in the first place. Indiana could have eliminated all doubt right out there on the court.
But they didn't — blowing a seven-point lead in the final minutes — something that's happened at home before, most notably against Arkansas and Maryland. Indiana. It's been the same problem, a failure to make shots down the stretch, which has allowed teams to claw their way back into games in the final minute.
Indiana is 19-12 right now, and they finished 9-11 in the Big Ten. What's sad is that even just a win Saturday would have been enough. Indiana shouldn't have had to worry about the selection committee poking holes in resumes. They could have done it on the court.
What's amazing about this up-and-down season is that if they had just held on to those three last-minute leads, the entire story line would be different. Can you imagine if they had added Quad 1 wins against Maryland and Wisconsin and a Quad 1 or close win over Arkansas. That would have been "best in the country'' type of numbers on their resume
A 22-9 record, even at 11-9 in the league, would have probably been more of a six-seed or so in the tournament. There would be no "Archie Miller can't coach'' angst. There would be no "I'm so sick of this team'' vitriol. It's a completely different narrative, just playing better in the final minute or two of games.
Now, they must still do work.
Miller was entertaining, which he can be up on the podium. But there's the problem, and it's a big one.
It's just too easy to poke holes in his argument. Sure, Wisconsin has ben hot — they won eight straight to claim at least a piece of the title — but Indiana had that game won. The committee, not totally beholden to computer printouts, sees that game and asks one simple question:
"Why look to us to put you in when you could have done it yourself?''
Right? Agreed?
There's totally validity to that. Indiana just needed to finish the deal Saturday and they were in, no question. They didn't do it themselves.
So Miller and Oscar the Grouch and Big Bird and The Count all need to step back. It's not on the Sesame Street characters, not on the bracketologists.
This one's on the Hoosiers. They let a golden opportunity slip away —again. And if they don't make the NCAA tournament, they have no one else to blame but themselves.
And you can stick that in the trash can, too.
