Taking a look at academic accomplishments, bowls and hoops scheduling
The Roth Report
May 8, 2008

By Bill Roth

There aren't a lot of athletics events going on during the first couple of weeks of May, but here are some of the more important items of note the past couple of weeks that pertain to Tech athletics:

  • One of the real highlights of the year is the annual All-Sports Banquet at Virginia Tech, which was held last week. Each spring, Tech student athletes attend this semi-formal event - the ladies in dresses, the guys in coat and tie - to honor the top academic and athletic honorees for each Tech team. More than 600 people were in attendance at this year's event and among the most remarkable achievements were the 4.0 grade-point averages attained by 10 Tech athletes. Abby Barney and Stephanie Jones (women's swimming), Laura Haskins (women's basketball), Jeff Beyer (football), Ignaci Roca (men's tennis), Andrew Montgomery (men's track and field), Kelly Phillips (women's track and field), Megan Caligiuri (video), Cathy Jansen and Jen Albrecht (volleyball) all recorded perfect 4.0 grade-point averages for the 2007 calendar year. The dedication these kids put into their studies and their teams is remarkable.

  • One of the great athletes of our era, Angela Tincher, wraps up her Virginia Tech career in the ACC and NCAA Tournaments in the coming weeks. Tincher hit the 2,000-career strikeout mark last week in an 11-0 win over East Carolina. Tincher threw her 13th career no-hitter in the game, but it was the strikeout mark that is most remarkable. Only two players in NCAA softball history, Olympians Monica Abbott of Tennessee (2,440) and Cat Osterman of Texas (2,265), have hit the 2,000-strikeout mark. Those records go back to 1982 when the NCAA held its first softball championship.

    You can see one thing in the way she plays: Tincher is one heckuva competitor. Even if you don't follow softball, or know the techniques and fundamentals of what makes her a remarkable pitcher, you can see in her eyes that she plays with a ton of heart and really wants the ball. She simply attacks batters. She is aggressive. She is overpowering and not just because she has the skill, but because she's like a tiger in the circle out there.

  • The ACC will have a ninth football bowl tie-in starting this fall. The NCAA approved the new 'Congressional Bowl' to be played at either RFK Stadium or Nationals Park in Washington in December. Navy has agreed to play in the 2008 game and Army has committed for the 2009 contest. But can the ACC come up with nine bowl-eligible teams?

    A look at the final standings over the past couple of years reveals that the ACC hasn't had more than eight bowl-eligible teams since going to its current 12-team, two-division alignment in 2005. And prior to the ACC's 2004 expansion, the conference had never had more than seven bowl-eligible teams. So, bowl organizers have a backup plan.

    In the event that the ACC can't provide a bowl-eligible team, or if Navy in 2008 or Army in 2009 isn't eligible, a team from the Mid-American Conference will serve as the Congressional Bowl's backup option and would supply the new bowl with one of its bowl-eligible teams. You'll recall the ACC works with its bowl partners to ensure the best possible match-ups after the Chick-fil-A bowl. That means there really isn't a 'seventh,' 'eighth,' or 'ninth' pick, per se.

    Here are the ACC bowl ties-ins for 2008:

    1. Orange Bowl, Dolphins Stadium, ACC vs. BCS Conference Champion or at-large opponent

    2. Chick-fil-A Bowl, Georgia Dome, ACC vs. SEC

    3. Gator Bowl, Jacksonville Municipal Stadium, ACC vs. Big East, Big 12 or Notre Dame

    4-5-6: Champs Sports Bowl, Citrus Bowl, Orlando, ACC vs. Big Ten; Meineke Car Care Bowl, Bank of America Stadium, Charlotte, ACC vs. Big East; Music City Bowl, LP Field, Nashville, ACC vs. SEC.

    7-8-9: Emerald Bowl, AT&T Park, San Francisco, ACC vs. Pac-10; Roady's Humanitarian Bowl, Bronco Stadium, Boise, ACC vs. WAC; Congressional Bowl, RFK Stadium or Nationals baseball stadium, Washington, D.C., ACC vs. Navy ('08), Army ('09).

  • Proponents of a college football playoff were disheartened with the results of a vote taken at the BCS Commissioner's meeting in south Florida. SEC Commissioner Mike Slive officially raised the idea of a 'plus-one' model at this year's meeting. The plan would have taken the top four schools in the final BCS standings and formed a mini-tournament, with No. 1 facing No. 4 and No. 2 playing No. 3. The teams would be seeded (that's a word that basically means 'playoff,' no?). The winners would then meet for the national title.

    As we know now, the plan was met with very little support. The ACC and SEC were the only two conferences that showed any interest in even continuing discussion of the plan.

    The proposal had one major potential problem: say that following the bowl games, the teams seeded No. 1 and No. 2 teams had already met in a bowl game. Would they have to play again?

    Also, the desire by the Rose Bowl and its partners - the Big Ten and Pac-10 - to maintain the status quo remains a major sticking point to any future change in college football's postseason. Television ratings are high and attendance at bowl games last year set new records. While the BCS will certainly be tweaked at some point in the coming years, don't expect a full playoff anytime soon, if at all. Proponents of such a plan should be encouraged that the topic was at least discussed this year. That's a baby step - if nothing else.

  • Now here's a change that is inevitable: at the upcoming ACC meetings, men's basketball coaches and university administrators will discuss adding two games to the ACC's regular-season schedule. Currently, teams play 16 regular-season games. Some administrators would like to move to an 18-game schedule, an idea the league's coaches have vehemently opposed in the past.

    Will this help come Selection Sunday as some ACC administrators suggest? A look at the numbers shows that the ACC has won just 19 NCAA Tournament games over the past three seasons, which is the league's all-time low for a three-year period since the field was expanded to 64 teams. The Big East and Big Ten, which play 18 conference games, got more teams into the tournament and have won more games, arguably at the ACC's expense.

    The Pac-10 went to 18 games to ensure full round robin scheduling of all its teams. The Big East went to 18 games after it expanded its membership to 16 teams. The result - intended or unintended - is a perception that those teams play tougher, more demanding schedules than their ACC counterparts.

    But will playing 18 ACC games help the RPI of the teams? If you're familiar with investors' "dollar cost averaging" theory, you can understand that every team's RPI will be closer to the median by playing more games against each other than if teams would schedule more powerful non-conference foes. Yes, the RPI's of the middle and bottom teams in the ACC will be helped by playing 18 conference games, but what about the top team? The coaches will go over the numbers in the upcoming meetings.

    The sound arguments for going to an 18-game schedule are financial - for two major reasons. The lure of additional conference games remains a lucrative chip when negotiating a new television contract. The current deal expires following the 2010-11 season. With 10 percent more conference games, the television rights should increase.

    Secondly, administrators want to slow the skyrocketing cost of the 'guarantee' games, or 'buy' games. You're familiar with those early-season games when ACC teams are paying $30,000-$75,000 per game to some low Division-I team. It's a win - usually - for the home team, and the visitors get a big check. Now, with each ACC team paying out $200,000-$450,000 per year in guarantees, we're looking at total over $3 million dollars being thrown at smaller conferences. Why are ACC men's basketball programs paying to fund the Olympic sports programs in the Big South, Southern and other leagues? That's a good question.

    If the ACC wants to get more teams into the NCAA Tournament, it needs to win more regular-season non-conference games against teams in the top 50. If it wants to save money, it should be more selective about who it schedules in November games.

    Eventually, the ACC - like the Big East, Big Ten and Pac-10 - will play an 18-game schedule. It's likely to occur once the current TV deal expires in 2011.

    • The Roth report appears weekly in hokiesports the newspaper and is posted for the general public on hokiesports.com.

    The opinions expressed here are solely those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Virginia Tech Athletics Department, hokiesports.com, or its advertisers.