By Dustin Dow
The Cincinnati Enquirer

Mike Bobinski, director of athletics, left and Phil Jones, director of the Cintas Center stand in front of the Cintas Center while it was under construction in this 1999 photo. (Craig Ruttle/file photo) | ZOOM |

Last week marked the beginning of Xavier's Atlantic 10 Conference title defense, which got off to a rocky start when the Musketeers lost to Richmond Jan. 6 at Cintas Center.

As No. 21 Xavier aims for its second consecutive regular-season championship, the rest of the league is left to play catch-up with the Musketeers.

Last season, Xavier rolled through the conference schedule with a 14-2 record, its best since joining the A-10 in 1995. The Musketeers won the A-10 Tournament, finished 26-6 overall and was the only A-10 member to make the NCAA Tournament.

Thad Matta was Coach of the Year in his first season in the league, and David West repeated as Player of the Year.

This season, Xavier was ranked No. 10 in the preseason and is the only A-10 team ranked in the Top 25.

Xavier's recent A-10 dominance raises a question. Is the school getting enough benefits from a conference that had just one team in the Ratings Percentage Index's top 50 last season, and which hasn't sent more than three teams to the NCAA since 1998?

Seven years ago, there was no question the Musketeers moved up in the national spectrum by joining the A-10 after 16 years in the Midwestern Collegiate Conference, a perennial single-entry league as far as the NCAA Tournament selection committee is concerned.

Xavier was often the team to get in, winning five of six MCC tournaments from 1986-91. But the school wanted to expand its Midwest footprint. By 1994, the A-10 became interested in expanding beyond the Eastern seaboard.

ENQUIRER ANALYSIS

• Examining the A-10 • Examining C-USA

"The driving force in us joining the A-10 was athletics, specifically men's basketball," said Seton Hall athletic director Jeff Fogelson, who was Xavier's athletic director during the move. Current Xavier athletic director Mike Bobinski said without an A-10 affiliation, the Musketeers probably wouldn't have seen the $46 million Cintas Center built or a television deal with Fox Sports Ohio.

Xavier (10-4, 1-1) has become the flagship team in the A-10, which continually lags behind other major conferences in RPI ratings and NCAA Tournament bids. Several A-10 coaches even joked at the preseason media day that the league's best race was for second place.

But it will be no joke if the Musketeers coast through the A-10 schedule while their RPI ranking drops because of their conference opponents' weak win-loss records.

In fact, XU athletic director Mike Bobinski said the conference's low RPI ranking might have contributed to the Musketeers missing the NCAA Tournament in 1999, even though they went 25-11, 12-4.

Xavier finished 70th that season in the RPI, which ranks teams according to win-loss records and schedule strength.

"A few years ago, we might have missed the tournament because of our RPI," Bobinski said. "But that's why you have to play a strong non-conference schedule, to balance against some of those teams that you have to play (in conference)."

Xavier's perceived weak schedule figured into its No. 7 NCAA Tournament seed last season despite a No. 14 RPI. Since joining the A-10, the Musketeers have never received better than a No. 6 seed, matching their highest while in the MCC.

This season, Xavier has the nation's seventh-toughest schedule, thanks to games against powerful teams such as Stanford, Alabama, Mississippi State, Cincinnati, Purdue and Creighton.

Unlike last season, Xavier will get some help from A-10 teams that played strong non-conference schedules, namely St. Joseph's and Dayton, which are both in the RPI's top 25. Even Massachusetts and Temple, which started the season miserably, posted wins against ranked teams in late December.

A-10 commissioner Linda Bruno hopes that shows Xavier's recent run is part of a natural rotation that has included Temple and Massachusetts dominating the league in the last decade.

"This league isn't just about one team," Bruno said. "It will recycle itself. No one is going to be winning forever."

Even more important than a cycle at the top is one at the bottom, according to Bobinski.

"We want every (A-10) program to have the NCAA Tournament as a goal," he said. "Other programs have to step up so you don't have the same teams at the bottom, which drags down your RPI when you play them. That has been a point of discussion. As long as those efforts to get better are being made, then we're fine, which is how we are now. If those efforts stop, then we would have a problem."

Bobinski doesn't foresee Xavier leaving the A-10, and the Musketeers aren't likely to receive any offers from major conferences without a football team.

"You never know about the future of college athletics," Bobinski said. "We aren't looking at other conferences, but we would want to put ourselves in a position to be attractive to a group of schools in the future."

The A-10 isn't a Division I football conference, which makes men's basketball the league's financial engine. It's therefore troubling that only one team qualified for the NCAA Tournament last season.

"The public reaction was like 'Oh my God,'" Bruno said. "But it wasn't over for the Atlantic 10. That was a blip on the computer. Everything just went wrong for teams - except for Xavier - at the same time. We're one of the top-10 conferences in the country, and I don't see us falling out of the top 10. The RPI numbers are one of our issues. We need to win our non-conference games, because that is what predicts conference RPI."

Bobinski said the A-10 can't crack the group of six major conferences, the Big East, Big Ten, Big 12, Pacific-10, Atlantic Coast and Southeastern, which are powered by football.

He's pleased with Xavier's progress, but conference cellar-dwellers such as Fordham and Duquesne haven't finished better than 135 in the RPI since the Musketeers joined the A-10. Fordham is currently 217th, while Duquesne is 199th.

The A-10 remained one of the top-10 conferences last season because of Xavier's strength. No other team was better than 62 in the RPI. Now, three teams are ranked in the RPI's top 50 but only six are in the top 100.

"When we joined the A-10, the question was: Can Xavier compete in this league?" said Wake Forest coach Skip Prosser, who coached the Musketeers from 1994-2001. "Now the question has become: Can the A-10 compete with Xavier?"

Overall records

Atlantic 10 Conference teams since 1995-96 season when Xavier joined (through Jan.3):

School	Overall	A-10	Coaches	NCAA bids
Temple	157-86	86-26	1	6
Xavier	160-68	79-33	2	4
UMass	139-96	73-39	3	3
G. Washington	127-94	65-47	3	3
St. Joseph's	134-91	63-49	1	2
Dayton	131-93	58-54	1	1
St. Bonaventure	116-104	51-61	2	1
Rhode Island	112-117	51-61	4	3
La Salle	81-129	37-75	2	0
Duquesne	67-145	25-87	3	0
Fordham	63-142	25-87	2	0
*Richmond	28-18	11-5	2	0

*Joined A-10 prior to 2001-02 season.

League's record in non-conference play

Year	Record (%)
1995-96	86-59 (.593)
1996-97	83-55 (.601)
1997-98	90-58 (.608)
1998-99	76-71 (.517)
1999-00	84-69 (.549)
2000-01	81-66 (.551)
2001-02	82-72 (.532)

Overall A-10 RPI rank

1995-96	8
1996-97	7
1997-98	7
1998-99	10
1999-00	10
2000-01	8
2001-02	9

Number of teams in NCAA Tournament

1996: 4 (George Washington, Massachusetts,

Temple, Virginia Tech).

1997: 5 (Massachusetts, Rhode Island,

St. Joseph's, Temple, Xavier).

1998: 5 (George Washington, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Temple, Xavier).

1999: 3 (G. Washington, Rhode Island, Temple).

2000: 3 (Dayton, St. Bonaventure, Temple).

2001: 3 (St. Joseph's, Temple, Xavier).

2002: 1 (Xavier).

E-mail ddow@enquirer.com