The Selection Committee is all about quality wins. But it's such a huge disservice to mid-majors. I would never, never put Syracuse or Oklahoma in over Middle Tennessee or Saint Mary's. Everyone always quips back, "Well, don't schedule cupcakes all season." If we do some pretty simple math, it's obvious that the margin for error is so razor thin for these mid-majors. If your typical D1 school plays 13 games out-of-conference, and you want games against the top 50 programs, that means there are only 650 OOC games available against top 50 teams. 650/351= 1.852. The average D1 school is only going to get 2 top 50 games out of conference. You can't build a resume on that. Having a single bad loss in the conference can be completely derailing for a team's resume.
Saint Mary's won their only top 50 game OOC against New Mexico State. They beat Gonzaga and BYU on the road, went 16-2 in the conference.... they went 2-1 against the top 50 and 4-3 against the top 100. Not crazy impressive, but dang they went 28 and 5. I'd rather have a team like that, especially with a player of the caliber of Jock Landale, than another P5 school with 13 losses... It's only going to get worse when conferences start going to 20-game seasons. Major conferences will soon have an even lager disparity in the strength of schedule. Now, let's look at how several at-large bids did in Quad 1 Games:
Ohio State: 3-5
Seton Hall: 4-8
TCU: 4-8
Creighton: 2-9
UCLA: 3-7
Kansas State: 4-9
Texas: 6-11
Syracuse: 4-8
Butler: 4-10
Yes, they inevitably have more quality wins. But, look at all those losses they're piling up. The winning percentage against quality teams is what is concerning to me.
