That night, we were all looking ahead to an NIT bid that most of us felt was inevitable.
Last night, UCSB defeated Utah State, destroying any hope by USU that they could make the tournament.
Now, USU must settle with an NIT bid and UCI may indeed find itself with no postseason.
It is still very possible that both teams will make the NIT, particularly given that the NIT has expanded its field to 40 to accommodate those mid-major conference champions that fail to win their conference tournament.
With UCI and USU both conference co-champions, we can only hope that both get invited.
If only one gets invited, it will be Utah State.
Last season, no-one expected UCI to sweep through the conference, lose only one game at Utah State, and have any postseason at all.
At the beginning of last season, to expect even an NIT bid was bordering on madness.
We witnessed UCI stunning California at the Bren Center and putting a good scare into UCLA on the road.
We also saw UCI beat Pac-10 school Washington on the road. Our only two losses during the preseason were at home to USD and at UCLA.
We celebrated wildly when the team beat Utah State at the Bren to claim sole possession of first place.
We believed in the magic as the team pulled game after game after game out of the fire, particularly the games at Boise State, Idaho, and Long Beach State.
However, last season, we tired and faded at the end, losing unexpectedly to the fourth place seed, Pacific.
This season, we raised our expectations because we had grown to expect more after last season.
We knew we had lost three seniors from the previous year but we figured that we had enough returning talent to make up for that.
Jordan Harris and Mike Hood proved more than adequate and midway through January it looked as if UCI had it all under control.
The peak, of course, was our beating Utah State at the Spectrum and then going on to Idaho and beating them soundly 28 points.
Who would have thought one week later we would see our 18-game home winning streak snapped by Cal State Northridge?
With that loss, I feel in retrospect, that UCI lost the magic that it had acquired in the last year and a half.
Actually, the warning signs were prevalent in the preseason. After winning both of our exhibition games and home games against St. Mary's and Pepperdine, we then traveled to Pittsburgh to play in the University Hoops Classic.
This was a three game exempted tournament which means that we get to play three games while only counting
against our schedule limit as one. Our first round opponent was Illinois State, a team that had been severely weakened by an injury to their star player.
If we had won that game, we would have played Pittsburgh, a team that is currently ranking in the top twenty.
By losing, we played Oakland University, a marginal team at best. We did win that game, but lost our third game against Kent State.
We had a great opportunity to score big in this tournament but instead laid an egg.
Winning on the road against Loyola Marymount was good, but falling 18+ points behind at home against division II UC Davis was not so good.
Thankfully, we rallied and eventually beat them, but we came awfully close to embarrassing ourselves big-time.
Still, I am afraid this helped led us into habitually falling behind and
then having to fight our way back. Also, why is it we can never beat the University of San Diego?
So how, really, does last year's team compare to this year's team? Last year the team finished with a Sagarin rating of 101 and an RPI of 71.
This year the team has a Sagarin rating of 84 and an RPI of 92. Last year's schedule is ranked by Sagarin at 218 while this year's schedule is ranked 150.
Most of this improvement is due to the conference rising in stature.
Out of Conference Schedules
UCI has been playing the same quality schedule (or lack of quality) since Pat Douglass first arrived.
We usually play one top 20 team, a couple teams in the top 50, and about 3-4 teams in the bottom 200.
We also schedule a division II opponent at home to give ourselves an extra home game and a win.
This made a lot of sense when the team was marginal at best. However, now this sort of scheduling is killing us.
What we really need to do is to win enough games to merit an at-large NCAA tournament berth.
Our team generally plays much better against better opponents while playing down to the level of their competition against weaker opponents.
By scheduling better opponents, we will most likely get more practice playing well than sloppy.
Many people rationalize our weak schedule by complaining that the major conference schools refuse to schedule teams such as UCI.
However, when Rod Baker and Bill Mulligan were coaches, we always had better schedules.
Our weak schedule is a choice that coach Douglass makes himself. Certainly, we can try to schedule teams such as Fresno State or San Diego State or UNLV or Wyoming or perhaps BYU and Utah.
We should also get into tournaments where we will face quality opponents.
The Pittsburgh tournament is a good example of this, but we needed to win that first game to get the full benefit.
So far, the team has successfully risen from conference doormat to conference contender.
Now we are challenged to rise to the next level whereby we can expect to at least garner an at-large tournament berth.
I think that to achieve this, we must upgrade our schedule to be at least on par with Long Beach State, UCSB and Northridge.
Utah State, by the way, needs to do the same.
A View From the Band
A number of interesting things happened at the Big West Tournament.
First, let me recount a short conversation that transpired on the Long Beach State message board.
I got a call today that our campus was defaced by some little moles over night.
It looks like some campus down the 405 has called us UC rejects, but they missed the mark.
The only UC rejects we have at CSULB our in our extension system trying to complete some hodge podge degree.
I thought we had only one hack school in UCSB, but looks like a pair of UC's will be a stain on the Big West, no offense to Riverside.
Beach VB, a fan who harbors a fair amount of hostility toward UCI writes the following response:
That was in retaliation of us going to their campus and carrying out a good number of activities (hehehe... those who read my posts before regarding this know what I meant) before the last game.
Trust me, WE DID A LOT MORE THAN THEY DID - their campus police just decided to clean it up before the campus community could observe it.
Oh well, they got us back.
Unfortunately for them, IT'S NOT TRUE! I know one thing - the UCI people are a bunch of UCLA wannabes - DID YOU HEAR THEIR FIGHT SONG YESTERDAY in Anaheim?!
My friends and I were looking at each other like: "ARE WE PLAYING UCLA RIGHT NOW?" I wonder what Travis Reed thinks about that...
Anyhow, they don't realize that we still have more high school valedictorians than them (the most in any California school)... many of my acquaintances that are President Scholars were 4.6 students in high school and could have gone anywhere they wanted...
AND COMMON, STATE? THEY'RE SO DANG DELUSIONAL THAT THEY THINK THEIR SYSTEM ISN'T FUNDED BY THE STATE! THAT'S RIDICULOUS!
Anyhow, IGNORANCE IS BLISS - they can talk all they want... but the FACTS ARE - their chicks are ugly, and THEY ARE NERDS...
I responded:
You are referring to Big C, the University of California fight song that UCLA stole. Actually, the only school that should be playing it is Cal. Cal actually tried to sue UCLA to cease and desist but they found that the song had not been copyrighted and was in the public domain.
Reference:
http://www.calband.berkeley.edu/calband/multimedia/calsongs/bigc.html
The UCI Band does not like playing it and did so only because the athletic department forces us to play it.
To this, Dansk responds:
Actually, Robert... While "Big C" is a Cal school song, written by a Cal student, it is not their official fight song.
Nor is it UCLA's. Cal's official fight song is "Fight For California", one of the best in the country.
UCLA's is "The Mighty Bruin Roar", which has to be one of the worst songs ever written by Henry Mancini.
Your band's version of "Big C" sounds more like the Cal version than UCLA's "Sons of Westwood".
BTW, Your band sounded very good at the tournament. They were much bigger, and played much better, than I remembered them when I visited the Bren this year.
You also one-upped Cal Poly with your halftime marching routine. Cal Poly always marches into and out of Mott Gym, but they've never yet ventured out onto the floor to my knowledge.
You also get two thumbs up for not playing the insipid and overdone "Will You Be My Girl".
Raspberries to the Pacific Band for being one of the 300 or so copycats that play that song.
Thankfully, Long Beach is not among them.
Bad Vibes Department
Even though the Long Beach band jeered our band when we performed our half-time show on the court, I still thought that they were rather congenial.
Perhaps it helps that we won the game. Regardless, I thought their band was pretty good even though they only seem to have about six charts in their repertoire.
My experience with the UCSB band, though, left me with no such warm feelings.
I was surprised that when our band went onto the court to do our halftime show, they jeered "Get off the court" and then about a dozen of them rushed to the sidelines to try to distract us and mock us.
We did our show, though, ignoring them as best we could. As we walked off the court, our cheerleaders congratulated us and the CIA members gave us high fives as we returned to the stands.
Later, as we played Louis Louis (#18), the cheered after I performed my solo.
Now I must admit, we might have brought on some of that ourselves with all of the obnoxious signs were were displaying for their benefit.
The most obnoxious was one that read "Del Pueblo High wants their band back."
We also displayed a sign whenever they played a tune a second time reading "We heard that already".
UCSB had their own signs they displayed against us but I had a hard time
reading any of them. At the end of the game, Eric Sanchez must have been feeling particularly tweaked and insisted on us playing a tune after each of UCSB's tunes.
Most of us were all ready to leave after the first tune. We went on to play another four to spite the UCSB band.
As we left the arena, Eric stopped us outside the arena because the UCSB band was having a "party" by their bus.
He did not relish having us all have to walk by them to get to our cars.
Bob Briggs then instructed the band to simply say nice game, good luck against Utah State, and be good sports about it.
As we walked by them, we did just that, but some of their band members proceeded to shout profanities at us.
This led one of our band members to become quite incensed and write the following on our UCI band message board:
Seeing as how SB was rude to us, if they were to start a Kappa Kappa Psi colony would we support that? I can't see myself having brothers from a band like that especially after what was said in the parking lot. Also since more likely UCLA would help them start up like they are helping us now, would be petition to have them NOT start up?
Then on the Anteater Forum, another message board, he writes:
Anyways thanks to all the fans out there that also cheered the band on. Thanks to stereotypes we more than often get that "band geek" label. Also Santa Barbara's band are a bunch of fags. We go over to give a congrats and they just answer back with profanity. Unlike sports, bands are supposed to leave everything on the court and not take it outside. I have no respect for Santa Barbara. If they ask us to help them start a chapter of Kappa Kappa Psi I will refuse to do so. They have no honor and no respect.
Finally, on yet another message board, I think it is he who writes:
This weekend was the Big West Basketball Tournament and I got a chance to see how the other bands were like from California. One thing that I have noticed that separates college from high school pep band is the amount of trash talk and disrespect that goes on. In my high school we couldn't say things like "you suck" or anything along those lines. In college anything basically goes. Since coming to college I have joined the music fraternity of Kappa Kappa Psi. Some of the bands at the tournament have chapters of Kappa Kappa Psi but most don't. Of those that didn't have chapters of KKPsi most were rude to us even after we went over to congratulate them on a win. I always thought in the end off the court or field we were bonded by the brotherhood of music. To those of you applying for college and interested in joining a college pep band, please keep respect and honor in mind.
I am quoting this because it gives a feeling for what happened Friday night.
However, I do not think our band is entire blameless. We showed a reasonable amount of respect to the Long Beach band.
For whatever reason, we chose not to show much respect to the UCSB band and that disrespect started from the very beginning.
Still, they should have probably recognized this as good fun and let bygones be bygones at the end.
After all, they won and we lost and I think that if it had been the other way around, we would have been gracious to them as we have always been in the past.
Still, I can't help but feel a bit soiled by the whole experience.
On an up note, I am very pleased at how well we worked with the cheerleaders and the CIA members.
I really hope that maybe next year we can make more of an effort to work together.
To close, let me quote part of an exchange that happened on our band message board regarding the cheer squad.
This whole discussion took place about a month ago, like around January 30.
One member writes to start off the thread:
I think that lately, the band has been doing things that are really mean spirited to the cheerleaders. It's fun, but I think lately we've been taking it a little too far. Yes, yes, cheerleaders are the band's mortal enemies, but come on, there's a limit to it all. I think it's time to stop, or at least tone it down.
Another member responds:
You are right..... then the cheerleaders would appreciate us more, perform to our music instead of recorded music, and cheer
in front of us (like the majority of other colleges) so we can co-ordinate the cheers more. YEAH RIGHT!!!
A couple responses later, the first member writes:
I really don't think the way we are doing things now will ever help the band in the future with the cheerleaders. As it stands, I think it will
further the divide there is already. Think about it, if someone made fun of you, wouldn't you be more inclined to be uncooperative with that person?
Another members writes in response to this:
What we did was just all in good fun. I don't think they took it personally. Plus that would signify to them that maybe we need more practice together. That would lead to more Pep Band/Cheer cooperation......also chances to socialize with the cheerleaders and possibly get a number or
two ... or four and such. I'm all for it.
Then, another individual writes in defense of the cheer squad:
I've felt pretty strongly about this situation for some time, but the band is a mob and it can be quite difficult to express an unpopular opinion.
Several times throughout the year, a few of the cheerleaders have spoken with the band, and have tried to cooperate with the band... even get to know us. They've extended a hand of friendship, giving us complements, and candy, and smiles... yet all I see the band give them is crap.
The cheerleaders have tried numerous times to cooperate with the band, but all they get are screwed up eight claps, taunts at the baseline, ignoring
their unbiased suggestions in order for them to perform more successfully, and negative talking behind their backs.
Quite honestly Bob, you do make fun of the cheerleaders and you lead the band in destroying any attempts at a partnership, and you tend to put them down no matter what they do.
They're trying to do their best and no... they don't understand that the band has been clapping faster than their pom-poms can move for the past decade, so they haven't practiced their drill at our tempo... they're not doing anything on purpose to ruin the band, and I don't see why we should try to ruin them.
If you open your eyes, and your mind, you'll see what I'm saying is true. They've done nothing to deserve our tauntings. This subject is not well out of proportion. The cheerleaders are there to support UCI just like we're there to support UCI, and they deserve our respect.
(...and Bob... it would be beneficial to respect the thoughts of others, even if they're completely opposite to your own.)
To this I respond:
We have historically taken an us versus them attitude. Has our leadership ever tried to talk to their leadership? Have we ever tried to schedule a joint rehearsal where we play and they dance? Have we ever tried to send a delegation of say 4-5 to talk to 4-5 of them about common interests and concerns? Have we even thought about inviting them to participate in our drill? Have we ever invited them to join us after a game for pizza or whatever?
I would guess that they may well think that we don't like them, don't want to have anything to do with them, and are downright uncooperative. This is a classic case of poor communication.
Maybe our leadership and their leadership should start having regular meetings and start planning a few joint social activities so that we can meet each other and start getting to know each other so maybe we will both feel inclined to start cooperating with one another.
This whole discussion took place around January 30. Since then, I do believe things have improved.
Last night Bob hosted a party (one of many) for the Band and invited the cheerleaders to it as well.
I do not know at this moment whether any of them attended, but this is definitely a step in the right direction.
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