Pre-Season Sagarin Out

[olddog71]

UAlbany comes in dead last, according to the first release of ratings by Sagarin. We come in as the 317th best team out of 330.

 

Here are the rest of the rankings:

 

135 Boston University

161 Vermont

212 Main

218 Northeastern

261 Binghamton

268 Hartford

288 Stony Brook

296 UMBC

305 New Hampshire

317 Albany

 

No team on UAlbany's schedule comes in lower ranked.

 

It will be interesting to compare these rankings with the final rankings next spring.

[reeder]

I think the Sagarin ratings are generally based on last year's performance. The do not have variables for new players...

 

Based on last year's performance alone, I can certainly see UA ranked last coming into this year.

 

I do think that many of the posters on this board know that UA will be much better than that.

[Patch]

I believe Brown has stated that he gambled last year when he took 2 transfers. He was looking at what was best for the program in the long run.

 

He felt last years team would surpass double digit wins and this year would be pretty solid. Then Jamar went down and any hopes for improvement went with him for the season.

 

This season we should seesignificant improvement but only if we avoid the "Injury Bug".

 

I don't like the news that Wilson may be hurt, and Dyson and "Q" aren't practicing.

 

Hopefully all will be well and we will improve tremendously and it will show in our RPI.

[Dane Pound]

This should only add to the storyline this year. How many news stories do you think we'll see that will begin with "they began the season ranked as the worst team in Division I and then went on to..." ...beat Villanova or whatever. People love stories like that.

[Dane96]

What story lines--The Times Union thinks Guilderland basketball or Academy Swimming is more important. Yes, another cheap shot at a $iena paper.

 

On a side note....this is what I think of the Sagarin rating:

[Dane Pound]

As much as it pains me to write it, $iena has earned it's media coverage with multiple NCAA appearances as well as hosting some NIT games. Albany basketball lacks those achievements (at least at the D1 level) as well as their fanbase.

 

In time (hopefully soon, really soon like the coming couple of months) UA will achieve some things of their own and the fanbase and the coverage will come but it won't be handed to us just because we've moved to D1. I would love a UA story in the paper and on the local news every day but it's not going to happen for a while. When we have a .500 record and maybe sell out the RACC we'll get our fair share of attention and it will be a lot of fun to be around when that happens.