The Art of the Blowout: Can Winning Big In Non-Conference Lead to Success Come March?

The Crier has returned to put pen to paper and give you something to do before the next episode of The PCP comes out. It is funny how the opinion of a basketball team can turn in a matter of 30-minutes of dominant basketball against the Merrimack Warriors.  Back at the office today, sleep-deprived from last night’s game my roommate O-Zone sent a very interesting text regarding this year’s Friars. It raises a very poignant question and that is does winning big in the non-conference lead to future success? The amount of games that the Friars have won by 20+ points in the non-conference is as follows in the Ed Cooley Era.

2011- 2 times

2012- 2 times

2013- 3 times

2014- 4 times

2015- 3 times

2016- 4 times

2017- 4 times

2018- 2 times

2019- 4 times (In 5 games!)

Let us take a quick look at how the Friars finished in those seasons, shall we?

2011-2013- 15-17, 15th pl in BE

2012-2013- 19-15, NIT Quarter Finals

2013-2014- 23-12, Rd of 64 NCAA

2014-2015- 22-12, Rd of 64 NCAA

2015-2016- 24-11- Rd of 32 NCAA

2016-2017- 20-13, First 4 NCAA

2017-2018- 21-14, Rd of 64 NCAA

2018-2019- 18-16, 1st Rd NIT

2019-2020- ???

 It appears that the Friars need 3 of these to at least make the NCAA tournament and they’ve already wrapped that up so that is encouraging. Oddly enough the one time that they won in the NCAA tournament they only ended up getting 3 blowouts under their belts. I think it is pretty evident though that winning big in October, November, December is correlated to having a successful season. Just look at last season where the Friars barely got past Siena, Farleigh Dickinson and Holy Cross and then ended up having as bad of a season as Coley’s first at the helm. Now the Friars through 5 games sit at 4-1 with the one loss was ugly against Northwestern, the rest they’ve won in convincing fashion. A lot of people were upset after the Northwestern and rightfully so. Those tempers spilled over to the St Peters game and the first ten minutes against Merrimack. I think it is safe to say that the Friars won’t be as bad as they were in Evanston, IL and they probably won’t be as good as opening night at the Dunk. As long as they can meet in the middle of those two spectrums expect a big season in Friartown. If anything these numbers point favorably to the Crier Prophesy (If you don’t know by now 2020 Final 4). That’s all I got for tonight but have a great weekend, hope to see you at the Dunk on Saturday vs Penn, should be a good test.

 

-The Crier

 

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