With Tulane's surprising win at USM last night--and I say surprising because USM destroyed the Wave's midweek pitching at Turchin earlier this year--the Wave jumped to No. 73 in the RPI thanks to a schedule that has almost no bottom feeders, unlike the Rick Jones-era schedules that were chock full of them.
I don't pay attention to the what-if RPI projections that are out there because they have not proven accurate, hinging on the expected results of too many teams to be reliable. But with top-20 ECU coming in for a weekend series, a road series against top 35 UCF later and a road game at top 65 ULL, Tulane has the potential to jump quite a few spots before the end of the season.
Considering Tulane's pitching flaws and inability to string together wins, the best-case scenario in my view is a 30-26 regular-season finish and a run to the championship game of the AAC tourney. Obviously a win there would make the at-large possibility irrelevant, while a loss would leave Tulane at 33-27.
Would that be good enough? I don't know, but a 17-11 record (counting tourney games) in the third-toughest RPI conference in the country would be a huge plus.
To get there, though, requires a leap of faith in a team that has not won more than three in a row all year.
Tulane will not sweep ECU this weekend. Yes, I know ECU just got swept at home by Houston, but the Pirates were without their ace pitcher, Chris Holba, who is 9-0 with a 1.48 ERA. He was a late scratch due to illness, and coach Cliff Godwin made a mistake by moving his Saturday starter up to Friday instead of using a midweek guy or a reliever and trying to piece it together in the opener. That meant everyone moved up a spot, and Houston outpitched ECU in three relatively close games as a result.
Assuming Holba is OK, it's going to be hard to win Friday, but somehow Tulane has to find a way because it is 0-5 in conference series closers and has no one it can trust on the mound for Sunday. Godwin vowed his team would be fired up like never before for the opener against Tulane after the disappointing result last weekend, when ECU went from a likely national seed to a team fighting to host at all.
If Tulane wins the series, it absolutely has to sweep Memphis next weekend, and even considering the yearlong inconsistency, that's at least a 50-50 proposition. The Tigers are not good, and Tulane's starting pitching has been better at home.
Tulane then would have to beat ULL on the road. ULL is playing much better than when it beat Tulane at Turchin, but so is Tulane, making that game a toss-up.
So say Tulane is 28-25 entering its series at UCF. Again, I'm throwing out the possibility of a sweep since the Wave has won only five gams on the road all year. A series victory is unlikely considering what has happened to this point, but clearly not impossible. Let's give Tulane two wins there, making it 14-10 in the AAC and 30-26 overall. That might be good enough for second place in the conference and would put the Wave no worse than third behind Houston (13-5) and UConn, which is 9-6 but gets Memphis this weekend and owns the tiebreaker over the Wave.
Tulane is more equipped to stay in the winners' bracket of the AAC tourney this year than last year because Roper and Gillies are quality arms for the first two games. After that, it would be a pitch-and pray-scenario.
I don't expect any of this to happen. The more likely outcome is losing two of three to ECU, ending any at-large hopes, and finishing below .500 overall.
But thanks to the win last night, a run is not inconceivable. Roper needs to be at his absolute sharpest on Friday, and a victory against the to-this-point untouchable Holba would be a huge confidence boost for the entire team.
One other note: Tulane's RPI would have to climb to about 45 for it to not be a hindrance to the at-large hopes. There are 15 conferences for sure that will have automatic qualifiers who were not under at-large consideration and maybe four more where the tourney winner would not have been under at-large consideration. Do the math, and that means the RPI needs to be 45 or better. Tulane also won't be helped by its record against the top 50 (5-12 right now) even if it does well down the stretch. Its big selling point would be conference record, and at 7-8 right now, it's a leap of faith to envision it as good as my scenario has it.
I don't pay attention to the what-if RPI projections that are out there because they have not proven accurate, hinging on the expected results of too many teams to be reliable. But with top-20 ECU coming in for a weekend series, a road series against top 35 UCF later and a road game at top 65 ULL, Tulane has the potential to jump quite a few spots before the end of the season.
Considering Tulane's pitching flaws and inability to string together wins, the best-case scenario in my view is a 30-26 regular-season finish and a run to the championship game of the AAC tourney. Obviously a win there would make the at-large possibility irrelevant, while a loss would leave Tulane at 33-27.
Would that be good enough? I don't know, but a 17-11 record (counting tourney games) in the third-toughest RPI conference in the country would be a huge plus.
To get there, though, requires a leap of faith in a team that has not won more than three in a row all year.
Tulane will not sweep ECU this weekend. Yes, I know ECU just got swept at home by Houston, but the Pirates were without their ace pitcher, Chris Holba, who is 9-0 with a 1.48 ERA. He was a late scratch due to illness, and coach Cliff Godwin made a mistake by moving his Saturday starter up to Friday instead of using a midweek guy or a reliever and trying to piece it together in the opener. That meant everyone moved up a spot, and Houston outpitched ECU in three relatively close games as a result.
Assuming Holba is OK, it's going to be hard to win Friday, but somehow Tulane has to find a way because it is 0-5 in conference series closers and has no one it can trust on the mound for Sunday. Godwin vowed his team would be fired up like never before for the opener against Tulane after the disappointing result last weekend, when ECU went from a likely national seed to a team fighting to host at all.
If Tulane wins the series, it absolutely has to sweep Memphis next weekend, and even considering the yearlong inconsistency, that's at least a 50-50 proposition. The Tigers are not good, and Tulane's starting pitching has been better at home.
Tulane then would have to beat ULL on the road. ULL is playing much better than when it beat Tulane at Turchin, but so is Tulane, making that game a toss-up.
So say Tulane is 28-25 entering its series at UCF. Again, I'm throwing out the possibility of a sweep since the Wave has won only five gams on the road all year. A series victory is unlikely considering what has happened to this point, but clearly not impossible. Let's give Tulane two wins there, making it 14-10 in the AAC and 30-26 overall. That might be good enough for second place in the conference and would put the Wave no worse than third behind Houston (13-5) and UConn, which is 9-6 but gets Memphis this weekend and owns the tiebreaker over the Wave.
Tulane is more equipped to stay in the winners' bracket of the AAC tourney this year than last year because Roper and Gillies are quality arms for the first two games. After that, it would be a pitch-and pray-scenario.
I don't expect any of this to happen. The more likely outcome is losing two of three to ECU, ending any at-large hopes, and finishing below .500 overall.
But thanks to the win last night, a run is not inconceivable. Roper needs to be at his absolute sharpest on Friday, and a victory against the to-this-point untouchable Holba would be a huge confidence boost for the entire team.
One other note: Tulane's RPI would have to climb to about 45 for it to not be a hindrance to the at-large hopes. There are 15 conferences for sure that will have automatic qualifiers who were not under at-large consideration and maybe four more where the tourney winner would not have been under at-large consideration. Do the math, and that means the RPI needs to be 45 or better. Tulane also won't be helped by its record against the top 50 (5-12 right now) even if it does well down the stretch. Its big selling point would be conference record, and at 7-8 right now, it's a leap of faith to envision it as good as my scenario has it.