NCDS: Jim Corrigan, Assoc. Head Coach - Old Dominion
By: Jim Corrigan, Assoc. Head Coach - Old Dominion
There is no place like home, no place like home!! Winning on the road in Division 1 college basketball is a very tough proposition under any circumstances. Most Division 1 teams play substantially better at home than they do on the road. Therefore, any road win is a good win. And the powers that be are starting to recognize this as the RPI is now weighting road wins significantly higher than home wins.
We are currently 7-4 against a very tough schedule, with 2 more very tough games before we start conference play in January. The breakdown of our current record is 5-0 at home and 2-4 away from home (2-2 away and 0-2 neutral). We have played some really quality opponents away from the confines of the Ted Constant Convocation Center. Missouri and Mississippi State were our 2 opponents out in Texas in the exempt event. And we also lost at Richmond and at Dayton in 2 very good games, along with a win at Georgetown. We have improved as the season has progressed, and we are playing better right now than we were a couple of weeks ago. But we had not seen the pay off in terms of wins on the road until our most recent game at Georgetown!!! It is really hard to go into someone's home arena and come away with a win on the Division 1 level.
Scheduling is one of the most difficult challenges for virtually every school on every level. Everyone is looking for the ‘perfect' schedule; one that balances winnable games with games that can have a positive impact on your RPI. We try to build a schedule that gives us a chance at an at-large bid, but also provides the opportunity to win enough games to get you into post season play regardless. One of the best ways to win games is to play as many at home as possible. Everyone plays better at home and will have a greater chance of winning on their home court. During a couple of seasons recently we were able to play 15 home games, and our record at home in each of those seasons was 14-1. That is a winning percentage of 93!! If we could schedule 20 home games on a regular basis, we would have a strong possibility of winning 18-19 every year. That would be a great head start on a good season.
One of the big advantages that some schools have over the majority is that they are able to play more home games each and every year. Some teams only play 10-12 home games in a year. This means that they are playing 16-19 road games, depending on if they are in an exempt event. By contrast, other schools are playing 18-20 home games per year. This results in a significantly different win-loss record in most cases. The NCAA is finally starting to make some adjustments for this, giving road wins a significantly greater value than home wins in their RPI calculation. There is now more incentive for teams to play road games, for it will help your RPI appreciably. It may help somewhat shift the balance of power, as more schools look to play road games. But I do not think it will have a tremendous impact on the number of home and road games that teams will play. The issue of budgets will still play a very important role in a team's need or ability to play road and home games.
Scheduling is a critical component of a team/program's success. Every school has their own unique issues that determine what they can and can't do. Often a program will take 3-4 years to arrange their schedule to have that one great year. There are so many factors that you can not anticipate, such as injuries, that can have a tremendous impact on the success of your team and how the schedule plays into that success. We spend a great deal of time working on our schedule, and we never know if we got it right until the season is over!!!
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