Quote Originally Posted by LA Ute View Post
Dead on. From what LK is saying lately it sounds like he gets that. I think the focus on "Quadrant 1" is stupid, but it's what the selection committee is doing now. Look at ASU. You win a couple of big games in the per-season and go 8-10 in your conference, and you're still in the Dance. What happened to the "body of work" concept?
Ultimately, I think Q1 is something you hope for, but don't necessarily schedule for. Take Arizona...they went 3-3 against Q1 teams during this year, but only had 2 Q1 opportunities in the non-conference (Texas A&M, Purdue) and they went 1-1. However, they had 4 Q2 opportunities in the non-conference (Went 3-1), and played 2 of those games on the road @UNLV and @New Mexico. They played Alabama at home, and NC State at a neutral site. They also played UCONN at home, which ended up being a Q3 game, but in most years probably isn't. So, in the non-conference, you have 7 of your 12 games as Q1/Q2 opportunities, and then 3 Q4, and 3 that ended up being Q3 (one was a loss to SMU). By the time you get to the league schedule, you've already played some challenging games and you are ready for what the league throws at you...and while it may have been down, it still is not easy to go on the road and win.

Ultimately, Arizona finished with 17 Q1/Q2 opportunities, and won 11 of those games. They also picked up two more Q1 wins in Vegas over UCLA and USC.

By comparison, Utah played 2 Q1 games in the non-conference (Butler, BYU), and went 0-2, and played 1 Q2 game in the non-conference and won...so that's 3 opportunities, verses Arizona's 7. Granted, nobody expected UNLV/Ole Miss to be as bad as they were, but again, and I've been beating this drum for a while now...if you know you can play another game and you get 2 in Vegas, then you move heaven and earth to do so. Period. If EWU is a road game, that's a Q2 win.

Looking at next year, as I did in the other thread...we have 4 neutral site games scheduled, with the potential to get at least one Q1/Q2 win if things fall right for us. BYU will almost certainly be a Q2 game, unless they fall apart, and Missouri will also be a Q1/Q2 game. So right there you've got the potential for 4 games, if things fall your way. I would like to see at least one more true road game, if not two, and see if you can't get some decent home and homes to round out your schedule. The new format will make it so that it behooves both P5 and Mid Major teams to travel more. If you are Utah, you just have to identify what those low-risk/high reward games are, and take care of business in your Q3/Q4 games, unlike Stanford did. If Stanford just wins their Q3/Q4 games with everyone else they have on the schedule, I think they are safely in the tournament.