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Final RPI numbers and NCAA selections reflect need for upgrade 2023 scheduling

Diamond Dogs are not playing any tournament ball this year. Mississippi State's absence from both last week's SEC Tournament and the upcoming NCAA Tournament is entirely self-inflicted. So, we who care about college baseball in general watched today's pick-up show out of public interest and to see who deserves a draw.

Who to pull against, well, that's so simple this or any year. All fans in the United States of our special non-favorites wish the worst of the tournament destinies. And yes, that's part of 'fun' college sports, too.

But what does the 2022 NCAA Tournament Stadium worth studying in Mississippi in terms of getting the program back on track? Or for that matter the official NCAA Power Index rankings, whose final edition came out this morning?

Here is one takeaway that became frankly obvious by mid-March if not earlier. Even if the Bulldogs were competitive this season, the 2022 schedule left no margins for struggles.

That is why the final Lord of the state (gloomy #110 as it turned out) and more to indicate the opponents of '22 are published. While agreeing that my Lord is not all and the end of it all in the debate over the status of the NCA contest-the final numbers show how strong this timeline is.

Now to be fair, some were beyond any control. Who would have expected Texas Tech, a permanent team of top twenty types, to get # 45 My Lord? Or for Tulane to collapse down a stretch, cost the boss his job in the process, and just come in at # 87? Even the strongest non-conference opponent, No. 17 Miss South, did not reach the national seeding level due to difficulty may extend.

The bigger issue is simply that seven of the state's opponents, who counted twelve games, had Reese at 200. This included No. 299 Arkansas Pine Bluff, third to last in the NCAA Final issue. To save you trouble the two teams worse off in both the standings except you and my lord than and father were 4-24 miss. Valley State and 3-28 Korn state, both of which were on many previous state lists and are likely to be again.

But should they? Playing SWAC teams is certainly convenient for the state and guests. And it's not always fatal at all, as Jackson State's 2021 Super Bowl was a help, not a hurt, for the Bulldogs RBI team. The real purpose of these games is still to provide easy (usually) winning and roles to the dog's reserves, and comes at a cost to RBI and SOS.

So he was playing hapless Princeton early in the year and northern Alabama late. Again to be fair finding a 'snowbird' that comes to cachexia in February is the standard procedure. Still, scheduling an Ivy League team is just about getting Ws fast. Of course as ' 22 played out those victories were a rare positive in the first half of the state Season.

More fairness: who can imagine the esteemed Long Beach State program could have a bad year? But that made losing twice in the opening weekend hurt all the worse. Perhaps only one drop into the Humble north of Kentucky did more damage.

Though, ironically, one of those low-key opponents also delivered his only victory over the conference champion. Kudos to Binghamton, who won the IC Championship and scored the NCAA automatic berth. They swept all three games in Orono, Maine, a place we went to in the 1991 regional that we can remember well.

It is a good place to visit in late May. Just don't do what some of us did and drive by Stephen King's house at night-or roll up to the spooky gate used in the pet cemetery in the middle of the night. Trust me on that.

More to the point, we have to trust that Mississippi State learned a lesson about scheduling a little too soft. Because the dogs had managed to avoid sweeps by Florida and Tennessee and win one more at Missouri, they still had come short of an NCAA bid. Today's picks showed how important the performance indicator is, especially in this rather odd season; and how schedule strength factors in as well.

Oh, and for the record, the state was 8-19 this year against teams playing in the NCAA Tournament.