Days of Our World Turns

 It has been a soap opera trying to follow the NCAA and the courts last week. Lawsuits from several states targeting the National Collegiate Athletic Association's transfer policy of players looking to transfer to another school a second or more time have made things much different in the course of a week. 

On Wednesday, a temporary restraining order was put on the policy, allowing players who were multiple-time transfers to play. That TRO was set for only 14 days. Then, the NCAA said those that did play may lose a year of eligibility if they play and the courts later decide the NCAA's policy should stay as written. Then, a short time later, the NCAA and the States involved in the lawsuit reached an agreement that any player that plays will be granted eligibility through the end of the spring semester. 

And with that, UT Arlington faithful got to see Phillip Russell this weekend against Air Force. I heard many good things about he's abilities, style of play and game smarts. Looking at his stat sheet from the last couple of seasons shows he had the talent as a freshman and sophomore.

Complete Load of ...

I needed to take a couple of days to let the pure emotion of UT Arlington's game against #25 Alabama sink in.

I need to first open with me saying how proud I am the guys fought through toughness. That road game sounded like a true test with the almost 12,000 in attendance. That's the only time I am okay with the Mavericks being outnumbered, the sixth man if you will.

But I'm going to come out and say it. In 160 plus posts on this blog you have never read the following statement. Those referees were such horse crap that they ought to be ashamed of themselves!

23 fouls to 13 isn't that big, but seven attempted free throws to 24. UTA made 31 out of 60 field goals to Alabama's 27 of 53. UTA won the FG percentage battle 51.7 to 50.9. UTA won the three-point battle in both shots made (ten to eight) and percentage (47.6 to 32). So offensively they were better. Translating that to the defensive side, UTA had the advantage. Add in the 33 to 28 rebounding margin and UTA clearly was the better defensive team.

CIT Bound

With the regular season over, the UT-Arlington men's basketball program had high hopes entering the Sun Belt Conference Tournament. After a rough stretch of four SBC loses in a row, already slim at-large chances to the NCAA tournament disappeared. There was a chance that their entire post-season possibilities could go up in flames if they didn't right the ship.

But right the ship they did, as they won eight of the next ten. Including in that streak was a win over Louisiana-Lafayette, which allowed them to jump a spot in the SBC standings. I think that would be one of the better wins of the year. It all but guaranteed a first round bye in the conference tournament as well. As it would turn out, UTA would clinch the third seed. The two losses in that streak were to the top two teams in the conference, Little Rock and Louisiana-Monroe though the last one was a tight affair.

That set the stage for the conference tournament. After getting eliminated last year by the Texas State Bobcats, UTA's in-state rival won their first round match-up, which would set up a rematch. After trailing at halftime, the Mavericks stormed back to take a 72-63 win, setting the stage for another shot at the Warhawks from Monroe. Things looked good early, as the Mavs would stake a 14-3 lead to open the affair, but that would really end the highlights, as the Mavs would end up on the short end of an 82-71 score that really wasn't that close.

For many Mav faithful, the season was over, but I knew it would go on. I didn't think an NIT invite was likely, and I certainly knew there was not going to be an NCAA invite. But I had a feeling the CollegeInsider.com Tournament, or CIT, was in the Mavs future, and that another game at College Park Center was on the horizon.

UTA Basketball in the Postseason

In the vein of This Day in UTA Football History, I want to point to a very significant day in UTA basketball history. While I won't make the UTA Basketball version a regular occurrence like I did for the football version, there are many games, the sport is still played, the history is easier to find, etc., I think I like the idea of spotlighting milestone or significant events.

The 1981 season was one of the best years for UTA basketball, especially up to that point. Since joining the four-year ranks in 1959, UTA basketball had just three winning seasons in its history. They were 14-12 in 1966-67 and 1971-72 and 14-13 in 1979-80. When a 13-13 mark in 1972-73 is also considered successful, you know a sport program is moribund.

In my opinion, the 1980-81 team, from a pure talent perspective, is still the best team that UTA has produced. I say that over the 2008 NCAA tournament team as well as the 2012 SLC champ and NIT team.

The Southland at that time was one of the better non-power conferences in the country. As a whole, the conference was 8-9 in the NCAA tournament with two sweet sixteen appearances from the 1979 tournament to the 1987 from four different teams. That time frame is specific since the conference changed drastically. UTA dropped football, forcing the men's teams out of the conference for a year as the membership rules required teams to sponsor the sport. That led a domino effect of Lamar, Louisiana Tech and Arkansas State exiting the conference and lower tier teams replacing them, especially in basketball. The first two teams combined for all eight of the NCAA tourney wins. The SLC wouldn't win an NCAA tourney game again until Northwestern State won a play-in game in 2001.

An Open Letter to the Men's Basketball Team.

To the players, coaches and those who help the outcome on the court,

For better or worse, you are the spotlight of the Athletic Department. The perception of the entire Department, and to a lesser extent the University as a whole, lays on your performance. It may not be fair and it certainly isn't right, but it is what it is.

For years, the University just let the Athletic Department get by with no real active involvement. This is evident from the time the UTA Rebels joined the highest ranks of the NCAA until a few years ago. There was a long stretch of time where UTA was one of the worst performing teams in the Southland Conference from top to bottom with some of the most sub-par venues in the SLC.

But all that has changed. The University is actively involved now and has made Athletics a higher priority. Of course, College Park Center is one of the most visible signs. Going from Texas Hall, which never really was an athletic arena, to one of the finest basketball and volleyball places to play in all of the NCAA and would make many Big 12 teams jealous is the most obvious example, but nearly every sport is receiving some form of facility upgrade. Allan Saxe Field is almost an entirely new softball stadium. Clay Gould has received several upgrades of the last few years. Even Maverick Stadium has seen some improvements. With the baseball and softball teams now in their own locker rooms and the plans for doing so been in the works for years, the six track teams have better facilities at their disposal to train and practice. 11 of UTA's 14 teams has seen some facility upgrades in the last few years. That was unheard of when I was a student at the turn of the century.

But it doesn't end there. The admin was active in upgrading UTA's conference. The Mavericks went from a FCS/1-AA-football-centric conference with decent baseball and softball competition and bottom-level everything else to the nationally-known Western Athletic Conference. When the WAC had to exercise their nuclear option, the admin was active in securing membership into the Sun Belt Conference. While not as nationally-recognized, it was unmistakeably a step up from Southland and the now-WAC competition.

The budget is about double from when I was a student just a decade ago too. More money doesn't guarantee success, but it sure makes getting there a bit easier. The cynicist would say that is a byproduct of UTA's growth and the student fee, but the fact remains the Athletic Department is spending far more money now than at the rate of inflation.

The other big difference is the admin support. I try to make one of every sport played on campus a year, and in the higher-profile sports it is multiple. I have yet to attend any sporting event that President Vistasp Karbhari wasn't there, minus one baseball game. I can't recall one game of any kind where President Witt, President of UTA at the time I attended UTA, was in attendance. Though I concede I didn't really care then about presidential attendance and may have missed it.

All of this is a long way for me to say the U cares about your performance and is giving you the resources you need to compete. The downside is that expectations are there for a team to compete. One of the things I love about the UTA fan base is the incredible realism that we have. We know what to expect and don't have delusions of granduer. Keep that in mind as I go forward.

I know you guys as a whole are quite a young team. You are talented, but young. However you have shown an ability to compete, no matter the opponent. Problem is it ranges from the ranked team in the top 25, to an RPI-300 team. How can UTA claim wins over the top two teams in the conference, but have been swept by the last place team? It is very defeating seeing a team that should be a Sun Belt leader fighting for fourth place with little chance for third. Beat the teams that aren't even above .500 in conference play and you are at the top of the conference.

As a fan, most of us would like to see some consistency that has been missing the last few years. I'd rather be consistently middle of the pack and beat who we are supposed to, rather than do well against the top and poorly versus the bottom. As a fan, this yo-yo action and inconsistency on the court is tough to take. I'm a die-hard and will support regardless. The fairweather fans may be lost forever because of it. That hurts every athletic team in the process.

All UTA fans ask is a Maverick team playing at an even level night in and out. We are okay with losing to a better team. We get frustrated when the last place team in the conference sweeps you. We get frustrated when we have more wins over the top two teams than the bottom two.

So please, help build the fan base and don't play to the level of your opponent. Please don't look past anybody on the floor. Please take it one game at a time and do what you have to against those that you should do it too. Don't take any team for granted.

Beating ULM, Georgia Southern and Louisiana-Lafayette is a great accomplishment. Losing to Troy and South Alabama tarnishes that. You, the University and us fans deserve better.

UNT in the clear

So forget the first half of the previous post. The NCAA is granting a blanket waiver to all of DI who had issues with the DI-transitional schools counting as non-DI games. A large part of it was due to conferences like the Southland and America East who have these transitional members in their ranks.

While I disagree with them taking on these members day one - there used to be a time when these schools would sit in independent status until the transition was over - I can at least see the reason for conferences getting the waiver. But UNT?

Here's a school that had a DI school scheduled, dropped the DI school in favor of a non-DI school, ran afoul of the rules and then gets a waiver for something they did to themselves. On the one hand, the NCAA took criticism for its apparent over-zealousness in looking for rule breakers, now they have done a 180 in the other direction. Ignorance of the rules shouldn't be an excuse to break them.

Vote for the Mavericks

The NCAA is holding what is nothing more than a popularity contest. Basically, anonymous internet users are asked to vote for their favorite team. I found this on the Sun Belt Conferences twitter feed, so I don't know how old it is.

http://6thfan.ncaa.com/