The House of Blue

I hate this. And of course the national media is already all over it, attacking Cal when IU is the one who canceled the series.

Duke's overall schedule (obviously beefed up in that time span by ACC play) isn't the target of those barbs. It's about playing anyone with a pulse in a true, non-conference road game.

true Jeff. Everything has to do with the pocketbook now. Nevermind tradition. What do I get out of it??

Whats done is done... NEXT!!!!

I thought we didn't like those fat cats who never stand up and root for the CATS at Rupp Arena, lol. But I am tickled, I think we should ban iu from our schedule just because of boobie knight. And the media, let them hate, most all of them suck too. I now think its funny, especially when I think of the new display in Assembly Hall commemorating their last second shot against us, will be all they have to worship us by.

That is the real travesty here. UK is already much maligned for being viewed as playing a weak schedule and dropping UNC/IU will only strengthen those voices.

Dissapointed to see the series end, really enjoyed it. Hopefully we find a way to keep the UNC series.

Am I the only one here who is pissed about this? Seems like everyone is taking the approach of making fun of IU, but I'm really, really, REALLY pissed that we are now losing the IU and UNC games every year. I'm not pissed at Mitch or Cal, or the other schools even. I'm pissed at the situation. Like the national writers are saying, both of those series are huge for college basketball fans across the board and petty issues like whether the games will be played as home-and-home series (as they should be, in my opinion) or at neutral sites should not serve as a roadblock to end the games. Neither should a desire to make the schedules easier.

The idea of our biggest OOC games being against UL and whoever we happen to play in some random ACC/Big East/Big 10/etc. challeges or whoever else we can get to play us at a neutral site in some monsterous dome stadium really bothers me, and I think it should bother every other UK fan as well. I don't want to see this watered down to the point where going to play some random mid-tier program (or whoever the flash-in-the-pan team happens to be at the time) in a large arena somewhere just so a couple of recruits can watch us live is more important than having huge traditional matchups like UNC and IU at Rupp Arena and at their respective home arenas. I like having a couple of neutral site games per year, like where we go to a historic site like Madison Square Garden to play someone like UConn or Kansas or Syracuse or whoever, or when we have the early season tournaments like the Maui Invitational, but I don't like....no, I LOATHE...filling our OOC schedule with a bunch of cupcakes at home and then a handful of games against decent teams at neutral sites.

I get that marketing and visibility to recruits is a big deal, but I don't like that it seems to be taking priority over finding a way to keep series against teams like UNC and IU.

Here is a different take on why the series ended. Think about why Crean wants to keep it on campus even though IU will play at UK. He knows that next year he is going to have a good team with Zeller, Watford, and Hulls coming back. However, in 2013 Crean does not know what kind of team in 2013 and having the game in Assembly Hall will act as a security blanket for him. All you have to do is look at his road record and his neutral site record and you will find that he cannot win unless its at home.

Now looking at UK; Calipari has always said that he does not like a rigorous OOC schedule; IU will be a good team and playing them with UofL and the some of the other team will increase the toughness of our OOC schedule. Next, moving to a neutral site will give Calipari a chance to get his team to play in a tournament like setting. On campus does not give the team that kind of experience; also having another young team especially without a leader like Miller, will struggle a little more than his previous teams.

I just think the main reason why the series ended is that not one team is afraid of the other but rather each team is a going in a different direction and each coach sees that. I do not like that the series is ending but I understand the argument on both sides. Being a rival team I can see why people are overly emotional and thus the mudslinging on the message boards.

First, I am not a fan of Duke, but here is last year's OOC schedule:

Date Rk Opponent Result Location Record Conf
Fri Nov 11 4 23 Belmont W, 77-76 76 Home 1-0
Sat Nov 12 4 248 Presbyterian W, 96-55 69 Home 2-0
Tue Nov 15 4 3 Michigan St. W, 74-69 74 Neutral 3-0
Fri Nov 18 5 67 Davidson W, 82-69 73 Home 4-0
Mon Nov 21 6 61 Tennessee W, 77-67 71 Neutral 5-0
Tue Nov 22 6 29 Michigan W, 82-75 64 Neutral 6-0
Wed Nov 23 7 4 Kansas W, 68-61 65 Neutral 7-0
Tue Nov 29 6 2 Ohio St. L, 85-63 66 Away 7-1
Wed Dec 7 7 96 Colorado St. W, 87-64 70 Home 8-1
Sat Dec 10 8 54 Washington W, 86-80 80 Neutral 9-1
Mon Dec 19 10 269 NC Greensboro W, 90-63 74 Home 10-1
Fri Dec 30 10 181 Western Michigan W, 110-70 76 Home 11-1
Sun Jan 1 8 137 Pennsylvania W, 85-55 68 Home 12-1
Wed Jan 4 8 46 Temple L, 78-73 69 Away 12-2
Sat Jan 28 14 152 St. John's W, 83-76 71 Home 18-3

That is 8 home, 2 Away, and 5 Neutral. They played #2, #3, #4, #23, #29, and the weakest teams they played were #248 and #269.

Here is UK's:

Date Rk Opponent Result Location Record Conf
Fri Nov 11 1 247 Marist W, 108-58 76 Home 1-0
Tue Nov 15 1 4 Kansas W, 75-65 74 Neutral 2-0
Sat Nov 19 1 127 Penn St. W, 85-47 66 Neutral 3-0
Sun Nov 20 1 99 Old Dominion W, 62-52 67 Neutral 4-0
Wed Nov 23 1 309 Radford W, 88-40 76 Home 5-0
Sat Nov 26 1 278 Portland W, 87-63 70 Home 6-0
Thu Dec 1 1 152 St. John's W, 81-59 79 Home 7-0
Sat Dec 3 1 7 North Carolina W, 73-72 65 Home 8-0
Sat Dec 10 2 11 Indiana L, 73-72 70 Away 8-1
Sat Dec 17 2 258 Chattanooga W, 87-62 76 Home 9-1
Tue Dec 20 2 271 Samford W, 82-50 60 Home 10-1
Thu Dec 22 2 126 Loyola MD W, 87-63 65 Home 11-1
Wed Dec 28 3 113 Lamar W, 86-64 75 Home 12-1
Sat Dec 31 3 15 Louisville W, 69-62 79 Home 13-1
Tue Jan 3 3 177 Arkansas Little Rock W, 73-51 63 Semi-Home 14-1

They played 10 at home, 1 Away, and 4 Neutral. They played #4, #7, #11, #15, and the weakest teams on the schedule were #278 and #309.

You can go back to other seasons and make the comparisons if you want. However, for last year, I fail to understand how you can argue that Duke played a weaker OOC schedule than UK. My view of the last 10 years, I summarized. I simply did not look at the final numbers are spit them out. I looked at their schedules in an attempt to understand what was behind those end of season SOS numbers. In my opinion, UK and Duke have played similar schedules in 8 of the 10 years [excluding the 2 Gillispie seasons] with Duke playing a tougher OOC schedule 4 of the 8 years, and UK playing a tougher OOC schedule in 4 of the 8 years.

Again, just so some people don't misunderstand, all of the ratings I cite here, there, and everywhere are Pomeroy ratings, and have absolutely nothing to do with the wire service polls.

Prof,

#2 Ohio S.?
#3 Michigan S.?
#23 Belmont?

Really?

Michigan st. played no one, their only big win were against conference foe. Looking at Pom ranking, Big Ten seems to benefit from its ranking system. (Having Ohio State #2, Michigan st #3, and etc.)

Belmont at #23? Joking right? They beat no one, they won bunch of conference game against weak foes. #23... this is why looking at NUMBERS are only for support, not argument. They got blown away from memphis, are they even in top 25 team?

You have to look past numbers sometimes. UNC is clearly the number 2 team. If they had Marshall, it would have been UK vs UNC in championship for guaranteed classic. I don't even think it's close that they are ranked #7..( i think that's crazy stupid). We played 1 game where we played well, and yet struggle to win. That was UNC. Jones came out, Gilchrist came out, Teague was solid, Lamb was solid, and Davis was okay.

^^^^^^^^^^^^ this^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ I have to think that this is the real reason because Cal has mentioned many times that he hates to play against a good friend. UK has never played like they were ready for IU in any game Cal coached against them until they played in Atlanta in the sweet 16. I think that Cal really wants Crean to succeed so badly that he would rather drop the series than to pin an L on his friend. I think they created the sticking point and are going to run with it.

....after what happened last year? Why, because you got beat? Please do not say that it is the tired old diatribe of "our fans were abused" etc. etc. I was sitting in the 8th row on the floor and I can see all the way up into the main level, and I saw NOTHING of any UK fans being abused. Face it: that was just some people who were not even there, trying to stir up IU fans because they were so upset that UK lost.

I love how UK fans just took this story and ran with it. Kind of like "Rupp's not a racist", Emery Air Freight was a plant by a UCLA fan, Eric Bledsoe is a math genius, etc. There is no fanbase in the country capable of revising history as well as UK fans have for the past 70 years.

A lot of people have brought up the benefit of playing in domes/neutral settings for the NCAA Tournament, but has anyone thought of the benefit of playing in places as hostile as Bloomington was in terms of winning games like Vandy, Florida and Mississippi State on the road in the SEC, which ultimately allowed UK to get the No. 1 overall seed and best positioning for a national title run?