ORUTerry Posted June 15, 2006 Share Posted June 15, 2006 Eagles will play at Kansas, Arkansas By MIKE BROWN World Sports Writer 6/15/2006 Sutton is looking forward to the arena's tough environment. Scott Sutton is continuing to schedule challenging games for his Oral Roberts University basketball team. But Sutton made a Nov. 15 trip to play the University of Kansas in storied Allen Fieldhouse sound more like a privilege. "It's one of those places you look forward to going as a player. It has so much tradition, and it will be fun to take our guys," Sutton said. ORU has also contracted to play Arkansas on a 2006-07 schedule Sutton hopes to finalize shortly. The Eagles would visit the Razorbacks' Bud Walton Arena on Dec. 22. The difficult road games replace Oklahoma and Minnesota, ORU's power conference foes from last season. "You always want to play a couple of great teams from the major conferences and we've got that with Kansas and Arkansas," Sutton said. "They have two of the best atmospheres in the country." With a capacity of 16,300, largest in the Big 12 Conference, Allen Fieldhouse has been labeled one of the best places in America to watch a college basketball game. KU led its conference in attendance for the 20th straight year and has 74 consecutive sellouts dating back to the second game of the 2001-02 season. The Jayhawks ended ORU's greatest season with a 93-90 defeat in the 1974 Midwest Regional final at the Mabee Cen ter. The teams have met 10 times, with KU winning seven, but not since 1993. KU head coach Bill Self was ORU's head coach for four seasons (1993-97) and gave Sutton his first coaching job as an Eagles assistant in 1995. "I owe a lot to coach Self. He got me over here, and it was a great experience working for him. I learned a lot," Sutton said. Sutton and Self haven't met as coaching rivals since December 1999, when Sutton's first ORU team upset Self's University of Tulsa squad that reached the Elite Eight. "I had a lot of unbelievable memories from the Mabee Center, but the last time I was there wasn't so memorable, so maybe we can turn the page on them this year," Self said. KU returns the key players from its 25-8 squad that won the Big 12 Tournament. Brandon Rush, Mario Chalmers and Julian Wright were outstanding freshmen. ORU lost six seniors from its first NCAA team in 22 years, but returns senior forward Caleb Green, the two-time Mid-Continent Conference player of the year, and senior guard Ken Tutt, a two-time all-conference honoree. Sutton said he and Self tried to schedule a game last year, but had too many conflicting dates. When he learned Self was seeking a game for the upcoming season, he phoned to get the ball rolling again. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vcboy2000 Posted June 15, 2006 Share Posted June 15, 2006 WOW Kansas and Arkansas! Way to go Coach! Why don't we just go ahead and add OSU to the mix too. Let's keep scheduling the regional powerhouses like the baseball team. These tough non-conference games will only help our guys come March. Kansas is going to go deep in the tourney this year, and Arkansas' incoming recruiting class is ranked in the top 10 by Rivals, (oh wait. that's football). But it still should be a great game. Having these games on the schedule can also be great motivators for the team in the off-season to keep working hard. When is March 2 Madness this year? I can't wait! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tmh8286 Posted June 15, 2006 Share Posted June 15, 2006 Although scheduling regional schools would seem to make sense, it's not as easy to accomplish as you would think. Getting these two teams to schedule us is a major coup for our coaching staff. Great job, guys! Get it on the schedule right now - ROAD TRIP!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tmh8286 Posted June 15, 2006 Share Posted June 15, 2006 So who do we know we have on the OOC schedule? Kansas, Arkansas (when I looked back at previous posts I found that we knew about that one already), TU and Montana. Do we know of any others at this point? I've heard about a couple from high up in the athletic department, but unfortunately I've forgotten who they were! Solid, but not big-time, programs, as I remember. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ORU GRAD Posted June 15, 2006 Share Posted June 15, 2006 I sure would like to see another home and away game with Utah State. They are a great match up with a super good coach. Shockers would be a nice addition too. ! What's up with the one star bit? I'm at least a three star on this message board. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ORUTerry Posted June 15, 2006 Author Share Posted June 15, 2006 We play TU and Montana at home this coming year. (edit... oops - I meant TU at their place) I know we tried to organize a tournament and had two of the three schools lined up, but could not get the third one committed. Have also heard we might be playing a Texas school - in Texas - this coming year. Have also heard that we might be playing another 'money' game against a Big 10 school around the holidays. Scheduling a Wichita State or Missouri State makes so much sense from a travel and regional rivalry stand point. The problem is that they do not want to play (and lose) to us. If note them, maybe another MVC school will schedule us. I wonder how many tickets Kansas will give ORU for the game? I would love to travel up there for the game. What are the chances that the game might be televised - at least locally? Wonder how the tickets will be allocated? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tmh8286 Posted June 15, 2006 Share Posted June 15, 2006 I sure would like to see another home and away game with Utah State. They are a great match up with a super good coach. Shockers would be a nice addition too. ! What's up with the one star bit? I'm at least a three star on this message board. Couldn't agree more, ORU GRAD. I don't know what the chances of that happening this coming season are, but Utah State IS a great Mid-Major program that hopefully we'll be seeing more of. They also sent me home to a near-sleepless night after beating us in our home opener last season!! Silly but true. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ttowncount Posted June 15, 2006 Share Posted June 15, 2006 IWhat's up with the one star bit? I'm at least a three star on this message board. I had FINALLY achieved "Golden Eagle" status ... but then we converted to the new format. Oh, well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
praetorfenix86 Posted June 15, 2006 Share Posted June 15, 2006 I've heard the Big Ten school we are playing this year is Illinois. And that would mean that we could beat every school that Bill Self coached at after ORU in one year. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest EagleBackr Posted June 16, 2006 Share Posted June 16, 2006 Here's what we know for sure: @ Kansas @ Arkansas @ Tulsa Montana here (Bracket Buster return game) Louisiana-Lafayette here (return game of home-and-home) Chicago State here (non-conference game now, remember?) ...plus, a Bracket Buster game, either here or on the road. that's seven non-conference games, plus 14 conference games, for 21 games. Add a couple of non-D1 home games (ala Oklahoma Wesleyan), and a "money game" or two between December 15- January 1, and you're about done. Sure would be nice to add a couple more games against other mid-major teams either home or on the road, though... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
89rabbit Posted June 16, 2006 Share Posted June 16, 2006 Nice job on getting Kansas and Arkansas. I think we are still looking for a few games. Here is our schedule so far: SDSU's tentative '06-'07 schedule: Nov. 10-12 at BCA Tournament ? (The BCA Classic, which will be at Ohio State and includes Ohio State, Princeton, Kent State, Loyola-Chicago, IUPUI, Portland State, South Dakota State and VMI) 27 Arkansas State Dec. 16 at Wisconsin-Green Bay 19 at UMKC 22 Montana State Jan. 3 Middle Tennessee State 13 at Butler 25 Utah Valley State 27 Texas Pan-American Feb. 3 North Dakota State 8 at New Jersey Tech 10 at IPFW 15 at Texas Pan-Am 17 at Utah Valley State 24 at NDSU Mar. 1 IPFW 3 NJ Tech TBD Idaho Central Florida Utah State Tennessee State at Idaho at Wisconsin-Milwaukee at Denver at Minnesota at Montana I know some of you will go crazy over the suggestion that our two schools play next year. That is ok, blast away. P.S. I like the new board! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VUFreak Posted June 16, 2006 Share Posted June 16, 2006 One quick comment about playing Missouri State, Wichita State, etc... For years, Valpo struggled to get schools to play them, having put a good image on the Valpo program with NCAA appearances year-after-year... Those schools don't gain anything with a win (in terms of RPI - did some math, if ORU went unbeaten last year, RPI would have been somewhere in the mid-40's - for comparison, Valpo around 50, Centenary 75...) and they would have a "bad loss" if they didn't win... Winning one year makes the next year's schedule tough... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mickeyb Posted June 16, 2006 Share Posted June 16, 2006 Here's what we know for sure: @ Kansas @ Arkansas @ Tulsa Montana here (Bracket Buster return game) Louisiana-Lafayette here (return game of home-and-home) Chicago State here (non-conference game now, remember?) ...plus, a Bracket Buster game, either here or on the road. that's seven non-conference games, plus 14 conference games, for 21 games. Add a couple of non-D1 home games (ala Oklahoma Wesleyan), and a "money game" or two between December 15- January 1, and you're about done. Sure would be nice to add a couple more games against other mid-major teams either home or on the road, though... Pretty sure we'll be traveling to Chattenooga to a return game with UTC from 03-04, and our bracket buster game will be at home (read somewhere that any given team can't be either home or away in the series for three straight years). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bogus Smith Posted June 17, 2006 Share Posted June 17, 2006 I had heard that we were playing the Akron Zips at home this season, too. Although they aren't a well known team, they are supposed to be an upper division team in the MAC this coming year. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ORUTerry Posted June 17, 2006 Author Share Posted June 17, 2006 Okay, here is what we think our schedule looks like so far: @ Kansas @ Arkansas @ TU @ Illinois (?) @ Lamar (?) OOC Home Games: Montana Louisiana-Lafayette Akron Tennessee-Chattanooga Bracket Buster opponent Chicago State Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sterns78 Posted June 17, 2006 Share Posted June 17, 2006 Are we going to get some visitors seats at KU? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ORUTerry Posted June 18, 2006 Author Share Posted June 18, 2006 We will get some, but I would not think it would be very many. Most of them will go to players' families. I am hoping that there are enough available for some rabid ORU fans. If not, I will have to wrangle some tickets from a customer who has season tickets in Lawrence. Those are normally tough tickets to get. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
89rabbit Posted June 18, 2006 Share Posted June 18, 2006 Ticket brokering is legal in the state of Kansas. If any of you want to go to the game you can always get tickets they will be more expensive then face value but you can get them. Below is one that I have used in the past. They are located in Oak Park Mall in Lenexa, KS (sub. of Kansas City). Ace Sports: http://www.acesportsandtickets.com/tickets/index.cfm Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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