Is the conference holding us back?

[XU-PA]

Just an observation now that the season is over.

XU had a super out of conference schedule. besides the Duke and Stanford matchups it was a challenging lost of teams.
Drawback to where we are. Those games did alot to get the ladies going at a top notch rate, but then we fell back into the A-10. those 25 and 30 point blowouts do nothing to keep your competitiveness in line with where you need to be come NCAA time.
I think it even showed in the A-10 tourney, struggling there was indicative of being in a months long schedule against sub par teams.
There is, I believe, a reason why those teams that have played through a big east, ACC, SEC schedule are the ones ready and raring to go come tourney time.
This is despite the fact that a-10 was ranked 7 in rpi, number one of the non Big 6. But looking at the numbers you must note that while we were a good chunk behind #6, we were not far ahead of #8 and the rest. The other thing about the conference rpi rankings, it basically ranks the conferences in the first 2 months of the season, so I think it's a nice number, but kind of like peeing your pants while wearing a dark suit.

anyway, what can you do in a sub standard conference, perhaps work in a couple ACC, Big East or SEC teams in february? Is that possible with the way scheduling works?

[xavierj]

I think a good start would be to work on not turning the ball over time after time late in close games. I think they need to work on closing out in close games. The had a great non-conference schedule and they still blew the Duke game in December or whenever it was like they blew the Louisville game in March. They also blew the Stanford game last year. It had nothing to do with scheduling or the A-10. Didn't the A-10 have multiple tourney teams? Most 6 graders would have made one of those layups last year against Stanford. Maybe its coaching.

[XU-PA]

My opinion, based on these facts.
This group of seniors is the best ever at Xavier, 108 wins, most ever for a class. Amber with her red shirt year tops that with 109 for the most ever as a player.
This staff is the best ever at XU, just look at the record. Mcguff is the winningest coach in the programs history.
This staff has recruited the best ever players to the program, Harris and Phillips, nuff said, but the rest of the crew is top notch. hese last few years have put Xavier into the upper echelon.
Coaches don't miss layups, don't throw errant passes, don't dribble the ball out of bounds. Those things happen, it's why this game is so fantastic. Very very good players sometimes don't win, we have very very good players.

The staff is fine, great in fact, there will be some movement probably in the upcoming years, as we've seen in the past assistants with successful programs do move up in the ranks. Morrow, Waugh and Neighbors are certainly on the radar across the country.
I do hope that Coach mcGuff sticks to what he said years ago when he came here, this was his dream job, and he has every intention of making it his final destination.

I love this school, I love this team, period!

[xavierj]

My opinion, based on these facts.
This group of seniors is the best ever at Xavier, 108 wins, most ever for a class. Amber with her red shirt year tops that with 109 for the most ever as a player.
This staff is the best ever at XU, just look at the record. Mcguff is the winningest coach in the programs history.
This staff has recruited the best ever players to the program, Harris and Phillips, nuff said, but the rest of the crew is top notch. hese last few years have put Xavier into the upper echelon.
Coaches don't miss layups, don't throw errant passes, don't dribble the ball out of bounds. Those things happen, it's why this game is so fantastic. Very very good players sometimes don't win, we have very very good players.

The staff is fine, great in fact, there will be some movement probably in the upcoming years, as we've seen in the past assistants with successful programs do move up in the ranks. Morrow, Waugh and Neighbors are certainly on the radar across the country.
I do hope that Coach mcGuff sticks to what he said years ago when he came here, this was his dream job, and he has every intention of making it his final destination.

I love this school, I love this team, period!

I like Kevin and I think he is a wonderful recruiter but every time I watch his teams in close games it gets ugly. Take the Louisville game for example. Any coach in their right mind would have played keep away and run an offense when they got up 9 but his team played Louisville's game and kept jacking up 3's and turned the ball over. We will see how good of a coach Kevin is next year.

[xu_fan]

I do agree that next year will really test coach McGuff's ability. If Xavier makes any type of post season next year it'll be amazing and if they somehow get in the big dance it'll be an amazing coaching job..

I think Kevin has done an awesome job at Xavier and quite frankly numbers don't lie...you CANNOT argue that so some people on here need to just quit trying!

As far as the conference is concerned I do think you have a point.. Think about it. There wasn't one game this whole year where Xavier had to foul at the end to try and get back into the game.. Those experiences I think help teams down the line... It would be a good idea to try and schedule a game against a good team in mid February...

Going back to next years team... Let's not forget they have 2 decent recruits coming in plus the crouch girl from last year who was out all year. Don't forget she was ranked the 25th best player in the country coming out of high school..add in the 2 transfers and I'm excited to see how they look. It'll take time for them to get used to playing together but as the year goes on I think we will all be a little surprised!

[XU-PA]

"xufan" I was thinking about Crouch today, having seen her still with crutches at the Cintas center I wondered if she would be ready to go comes november have to think she would be ready and raring to go.
I had forgotten how good a prospect she was, have to wonder if her healthy would have given Xavier that extra slasher that would have been that one extra piece of the puzzle this year.
For next year, think different, a much different team, perhaps much like a Boothe, Wallner, Henderson, Pippari, Waugh team.

[cinskyline]

"xufan" I was thinking about Crouch today, having seen her still with crutches at the Cintas center I wondered if she would be ready to go comes november have to think she would be ready and raring to go.
I had forgotten how good a prospect she was, have to wonder if her healthy would have given Xavier that extra slasher that would have been that one extra piece of the puzzle this year.

PA, I was recently discussing this with someone else. I have to believe that the combo of Askew and Rutan playing the 3 was not Coach McGuff's first choice. I would love to know if Crouch was expected to be an immediate impact player/starter and man the 3 this past season before the injury. I also wonder if Coach thought that Amber Gray would be further along than she was. Just some things to ponder.

[X-band '01]

Shoni Schimmel held the Muskies back almost single-handedly with her shooting on Tuesday, not the A-10. Funny how she looked like a freshman against Gonzaga, though.

[xu_fan]

The game was hard to watch yesterday for two reasons.. One was because Louisville looked bad and shoni looked like a freshman. If she plays like that against us we win easy. Secondly, we would have beat gonzaga. I truly believe that.

[HomerCecil]

We really have nothing to complain about, guys. We're the only 2 seed that didn't make the Elite Eight, and we lost on our home court. There aren't any excuses. It was still a great season, but the "we would have beaten Gonzaga" stuff is sour grapes in my opinion.

[cinskyline]

Next year the A-10 could be a positive. The easier conference schedule should be a big help should we struggle in non-conference play next year. We have a very tough non-conference schedule for a team that will be very young. I am very worried about non-league play next year. It could be very ugly early on.

I don't think league play really hurt us this year, even though half the league was a total joke. We just simply weren't as deep or as good. Last year we played the same terrible teams in league and still managed to get to the Elite 8 and almost the Final 4. So it can be done in a mediocre league. As it turns out, the Duke collapse and the blowout at Stanford should have been a warning sign of things to come this season. It was a good year -- but definitely a disappointing ending.