(03-17-2024 08:48 PM)Lopes87 Wrote: (03-17-2024 08:07 PM)TexanFan Wrote: So a UTA player “accidentally” hits Tarleton’s leading scorer and best player in the mid section. And a UTA player intentionally shoves a GCU player and another UTA player throws the ball at same GCU player who throws down a dunk which the UTA coach admitted UTA did the same thing to Seattle, and this is all being blown out of proportion?
Truth is UTA embarrassed their team, their school and the WAC.
I also did a little bit of research, just a little as I’m kinda lazy, and one official was on the court for the Tarleton-UTA game and the GCU-UTA games. He was the head official for both games.
To these UTA fans you are more than welcome to go to a less competitive league like the Southland and get beat by McNeese State or the Summit and get whooped by South Dakota St... You guys had a million turnovers had tired legs for some of your players down the stretch. UTA is a good team and caught GCU last night on a bad shooting night. So they did what they have done when needed as 3 separate times vs UTA nonetheless and got to the line and shot FT's.
UTA FG% 49%
GCU FG% 39.7%
UTA 3P% 37%
GCU 3P% 30%
UTA FT 14-22 67%
GCU FT 37-50 74%
Fast break points
UTA 3
GCU 8
Rebounds GCU has 2 more 36-34
Turnovers UTA 26 GCU14
Double the turnovers as the team you keep fouls while it looked like UTA players didn't adjust their game plan but GCU did once they couldn't hit a shot to save their life they went hard to the hoop and got rewarded
Where do we all want to tournament to be placed if not Vegas? Huntsville, Alabama like CUSA? Boise like the Big Sky? Hosted by the top seed like other leagues (Would have been GCU)? Lets go play it in Hawaii? Vegas is a hotbed for conference tournaments
Another thing is UTA had 15 home games and had an average of 1777 fans per game...ACU had 1544 on average for 14 games. Lets worry about getting ppl in your local areas to come watch your schools in their home communities before we jump right to the idea of moving WAC Vegas to WAC Topeka or WAC OKC lol.
UTA has a winning record all-time vs. McNeese and their coach that got them to their success this year is out the door already. We'd be fine.
At this point, honestly, I'd rather be in the SLC with a legit chance to play for something higher than second place than here with these terrible refs and the clear bias I saw all year. That's the first time I have said going back looks attractive.
On the SBC board, for 9 years, someone always complained about the quality of the refs. I never joined and never believed there was a wholescale problem. At best I thought there might be isolated incidents of human error.
But this year, I saw some component of every school in the WAC upset about the GCU bias. It's a problem for the league and there already was an issue because GCU's budget is a concern. You can debate for-profit, diploma mill, online cash cow or whatever is happening, but upsets happen.
But the appearance of the refs being on the GCU bandwagon/payroll/alumni ( heard some of these on social media, some from fans on streaming broadcasts) will be an insurmountable issue. Tarleton is already out the door when FBS calls and UVU has said on the record they have multiple options. There's constant speculation of Seattle and CBU to the WCC.
If I'm ACU, SFA, UTA and UTRGV, it might be time to look at joining Lamar, McNeese, Northwestern State, Southeastern Louisiana, Nicholls and Texas A&M-Corpus Christi and forming a league that would be on par with the Sun Belt. No clear favorite there, the WAC schools break free from the absolute travesty of what I saw from the WAC this year and the SLC break away from the bottom-feeders in the conference. UTA never would lead that charge though. Athletics are just something that's there.
As for WAC Vegas, I don't give two craps where it is. Kudos to GCU for getting fans there. But if your solution is "F everyone else," then don't be surprised if a day comes when those peers do the same to you.