NCAA Selection Sunday: St. Mary’s gets snubbed
Gaels headed to NIT despite 28 wins and RPI of 40
Randy Bennett’s team not among the 68 despite 28-5 record and top-20 ranking.
Unfortunately for Randy Bennett, he has plenty of experience dealing with the disappointment of St. Mary’s not receiving an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament.
So on Sunday afternoon, after the selection committee deemed the Gaels unworthy of one of those 36 at-large berths, Bennett expressed frustration about how his team, with a 28-5 record and a 40 RPI, again would have to settle for an NIT appearance.
“I’ve been consistent on this for a while now,” Bennett said. “You don’t know how to score the game,” meaning he’s not sure which criteria the committee uses in making its selections.
“They go in a back room and they decide. It makes you wonder. I know this: The back room doesn’t favor the mid-majors.
That’s for sure.”
The Gaels were listed as one of the first four teams out, along with Baylor (18-14, RPI: 68), Notre Dame (20-14, 70) and USC (23-11, 34).
On the TBS selection show, NCAA selection committee chairman Bruce Rasmussen gave his reasons for the omission of the Gaels.
“They didn’t play a very challenging schedule, even nonconference,” Rasmussen said. “Of their 28 wins, all but four were against teams in the last two quadrants.”
The committee broke down teams’ schedules into four quadrants, based on strength of opponent and site of game. The Gaels were 4-3 in the top two quadrants, 24-2 in the bottom two.
The WCC’s lack of quality teams beyond Gonzaga, St. Mary’s and BYU hurt the Gaels’ NCAA chances. Bennett also defended his team’s nonconference schedule.
“You don’t get to just pick, ‘Hey, we’ll play you, you and you — and we want you at home and we’ll play you away.’ It’s not like that,” Bennett said. “There are a lot of basketball economics involved in this thing.”
Bennett referenced wins over Dayton and Cal that normally would have rated higher than this season, with the Flyers owning a 147 RPI and the Bears at 216.
Teams that got at-large bids with worse RPIs than St. Mary’s included Syracuse (20-13, 45), Oklahoma (18-13, 49) and Arizona State (20-11, 66).
Not surprisingly, the St. Mary’s players were disappointed to not get a return trip to the NCAAs.
“They were pretty quiet. They’re hurting,” Bennett said of his players. “I talked to them a little bit afterward. … They’re a great group of guys. I think they’ll respond.”
Responding becomes the challenge for the Gaels, who quickly have to overcome their disappointment to get prepared for the NIT. St. Mary’s and Bennett endured similar circumstances in 2009, ’11 and ’16.
The Gaels will host Southeastern Louisiana (22-11) at 7 p.m. Tuesday.
“You can’t let this define you as a team,” Bennett said. “… We’re lucky. We get to play in a game in a tournament that’s relevant. …
“You get something that didn’t go your way, your attitude response has got to be the right one. Ours has to be the right one. And that’s, hey, we get a chance to do something about it and try to prove that they’re wrong.” Briefly: St. Mary’s needs one win to tie the school season record that it has reached in each of the past two seasons. … Jock Landale has 705 points this season, 19 shy of the school record set by fellow center Omar Samhan in 2009-10.