VBC wrote:

When John Chaney was coaching Temple he reached the NCAA tournament 17 times including a streak of 12 in a row by having teams that got better as the season progressed.  Without researching the actual numbers, I feel it is safe to say that his record for the month of February would have been the best of his records for any given month of the season.  The brutal schedules he had for the non-conference portion of the season prepared his teams for league play and thus his Owls were able to dominate A-10 play in February year after year.

Last year in Jim Ferry's first season on the Bluff the Dukes managed to win only 1 game in February, against the Owls, oddly enough.

That makes this February very important, in my opinion.  One win will not be acceptable.  We need more.

If we're giving letter grades I think we'd all agree that last year's 1 win for the month earned an F.  That's the same grade I'll give the coach if he can't improve on that this year.  Lumping the 2 games in March (not counting the A-10 tournament) with those in February I would grade the coach on the following scale:

0 or 1 wins - F
2 wins - D
3 wins - C
4 wins - B
5 or more wins - A

I want to see the Dukes be a program that can boast a streak of 12 or more NCAA appearances in a row.  I want to see us make deep runs in the tournament as John Chaney's Owls did frequently.  I want to see the road to such success begin this season, not necessarily with a tournament appearance, but with at least 4 more wins this season.  An upset today over the Explorers would be a great start on the road to future success for the Dukes.

It will be tough with 6 of the last 10 on the road, and home games vs 2 of the top 4 teams in the league.

That was a very good win last night.  Any win on the road is good, and we have 7 of them this year (best since the 8 road wins in the last NIT year and 8 in the last CBI year).

Although winning at SLU was a very, very good win, I was waiting to see how they would respond in the following games.  3 losses in a row would have really taken the shine off of the SLU win.

VBC, kudos on the grading system. The C+ grade is a fair one in my book.  Do you now give them an "extra credit" question; the A-10 tourney, to raise their grade to a B with a win over Richmond?