The Heritage Conference (FBCB)
 

So I've been trying to come up with a storyline for a while and didn't have anything that stuck. But the other idea, I thought about this idea of a D1 conference of fictional schools in the Midwest called the Heritage Conference.

The idea is that due to the Great Migration, there are a bunch of historically black colleges & universities that sprout up in the 1940s and 1950s as post-war alternatives for black students and urban ethnic immigrants from Europe living in cities. These schools would provide the next generation of teachers and other skilled workers for communities around the midwest and help cities stave off their eventual decline into the post-industrial era.

But in this parallel universe, the midwest HBCUs eventually decide to form a conference of their own -- with a few non-area schools -- with the desire to compete at a national level and with a hope of becoming a kind of Big Ten for the HBCU set.

Their first season in college basketball is 1984-85 and the conference has seven schools as charter members. They do not get an automatic bid to the NCAA during that first year.

Here are the charter members:


I haven't decided what the punchline will be or even where the story arc will take us, but I'm intrigued by the idea of following their progress over the next couple of decades.

Because I created this conference in my main NBA feeder, I doubt I'll go as fast as I normally do, but we'll see how the story evolves.

After 3 years as a non-NCAA automatic bid league, Chicago State and Tennessee State joined the Heritage Conference for the 1987-88 season and the NCAA tournament expanded to 65 teams.

Interesting idea. Will be following along and rooting for the hometown NWISU team.

With the additions of Freeman College (Creve Coeur, MO), Denver State (CO) & University of Grand Rapids (MI), the Heritage Conference now has 12 teams. The league in 1987-88 rebrands as "The Heritage League"

DENVER STATE BASKETBALL 1990-91

After languishing in the first three years of the program's D1 history, Denver State receives a new university president in Dr. Martin Staff, a former All-American basketball player at Princeton who wants to transform Denver State into a national power and invests in basketball as a way to increase the name recognition of the institution.

Before they can be a national power, they've got to get out of the Heritage League basement. First up, hiring an entirely new coaching staff.

I'm going to do a Game of the Week style dynasty to start. I need to get a better sense of the league at large to make it easier to get immersed into the team itself. We'll go around the country looking at interesting teams, finding storylines and of we'll get better acquainted with the Denver State team too.

That'll make tournament-time a lot more interesting because we'll at least have a better sense of the programs outside of their historical legacies and can start to know them in this particular universe.

Plus I just don't necessarily find the early years of writing about a low-major program all that interesting if you're not coaching games and playing them out (which is not something I want to do or even have time for.)

Recruiting abroad
 

The Heritage League lost Chicago State and Tennessee State back to their original conferences, so the league is back to 10 teams.

For recruiting, I've decided how to jumpstart this storyline. Denver State is going to focus exclusively on recruiting talent in-region & overseas and ignoring everyone else.

If we do it right, eventually the team can improve through foreign talent sourcing and eventually getting better local players to stay nearby. I'm starting with Denver State, but might eventually become more expansive in the league to create a more competitive setup.

I'm still going to try to do a Game of the Week style focus too, so we can get better acquainted with the rest of the league, too.

1990-91 DENVER STATE PROWLERS

The Prowlers had a breakout season and made the NCAA tournament as a #8 seed. First up, Loyola out of the Missouri Valley Conference.


In the Round of 32, we fall to top-seed Creighton to end our season.



Harry Porter and Archie Johnston are both seniors, but Reece Porter comes back with a loaded freshman class and we'll have high hopes for next year.

1991-92 DENVER STATE PROWLERS

1993-94
Iowa Poly = Carver Polytech
New Jersey A&M = Robeson University
Pennsylvania A&T = Garvey Institute
Grand Rapids closed replaced by James Baldwin College (Harlem, NY)

Wisconsin State (Beloit, WI) is the newest program in the Heritage League, joining in 1995.

I've simmed through the 1997-98 season. The Heritage League is actually one of the best mid-major leagues in the country, though they haven't had much tournament success to show for it yet. They have been a great showing in the NIT the past few years, three straight NIT runner-ups have come from the Heritage League.

NCAA CHAMPIONS


NIT CHAMPIONS

HERITAGE CONFERENCE CHAMPIONS (through 1997)
 

CONFERENCE CHAMPS
TOURNAMENT



REGULAR SEASON

For the upcoming 1998-99 season, Heritage League teams were renamed to their state monikers, just for immersion/ease of figuring out where the fuck they are reasons.

My favorite factoid discovery of the day - Central Connecticut State - had the same head coach from 1940 until the 70s. They've only had four head coaches in their history so far.

Tony Alexander is the losingest coach in this league's history with 760.

FINAL FOUR TEAMS (through 1997

2000-01 is the first season of the 68-team tournament in this universe.

I updated the league HTML. Have no idea what I'm doing with this, but...I keep convincing myself there's a game in here somewhere, even if it's just playing fantasy basketball around my simulated league.

Went through the archives and stumbled upon this gem of a 1982 championship game. Not only is the result bonkers - UK losing to SIU for the national title - it's the score that's insane.

There has never been an undefeated national champion.

Only two programs have finished the season with a single loss:


Double-digit losses while winning the national championship:


Mid-major national champions:

Pardon me if I overlooked it somewhere... how have the Heritage Conference members done in the NCAAs? What's the farthest anyone has gone?

Good question!

Here's what the Heritage Conference has done in the NCAAs through the 1999 season.


In the NIT, Heritage Conference teams have been finalists three times, three straight years (1995-97)

We're going to rename NW Indiana State. The problem with the name is that it's not IU, it's not Indiana State and it's not Northwestern, but it's adjacent to all of them. So we're going to rename them East Chicago University.


Given they've never made any post-season ever, I'm intrigued to see what we can do with that program with new AD leadership, but no editing recruits. Just better coaching. So with the name change will come some regime change in the coaching ranks and we'll just follow their progress to see how they make out.

Here's their new men's head basketball coach.


East Chicago will host a pre-season tournament called "The Midwest Tipoff Classic" and it'll attract Level 1 programs for now. It'll be a solid schedule filler though, if nothing else.

2000-01 EAST CHICAGO PILOTS ROSTER

The star of this team is senior forward Rahsaan Robinson. He's helped out by the guard combo of Houston Calvert and Miguel Broomfield.

The Heritage is a tough league, so no real idea what to expect from them this year. I think my gameplan won't be to do anything with East Chicago themselves. I will insert some "home grown" talent into the recruiting pool though in the hopes the coaches there can recruit some of them in the coming years and if they do end up becoming good, that it'll be on the backs of some local guys.

Hopefully, the new staff can tap Chicago too for some 1/2 star dudes who can contribute in future years, I feel like they're relying too heavily on out-of-state kids right now in a talent rich area, so I'll try to generate enough recruits that might fall to this level, especially since prestige wise, it might be a decent place for kids to go despite their lack of success.

Last year's recruiting situation:


Here's the overall Top 25 classes:

2000-01 EAST CHICAGO PILOTS
A winning season, but unfortunately were not picked up for any post-season tournament even with the addition of the CBI this season. RPI was too low, ultimately.



Rahsaan Robinson ends his career as the 2nd all-time leading scorer (1355) in East Chicago/NWI university history. He's the all-time leading rebounder (823) in school history.

2000-01 POST-SEASON/TOURNAMENT PREVIEW
 

Here's the last Top 25 poll before the tournament:



The top seeds in this year's tournament are:

Baylor, Kansas, UConn and Georgia Tech.

2000-01 TOURNAMENT IN REVIEW
 

HERITAGE ADVANCES TWO TEAMS BEYOND THE FIRST ROUND
The Heritage Conference had 5 teams make the tournament this year. Iowa Poly reached the furthest -- losing in the Sweet 16 to eventual Final Four team City College of New York.

SUNY-Harlem lost in the 2nd round to Stanford.

LOWEST SEEDS TO ADVANCE PAST FIRST ROUND
The Midwest region had three double-digit seeds in the Round of 32 as 13-seed Charlotte, 14-seed Wright State and 15-seed South Dakota State all advanced before losing their next games.

In general, this year was very chalky as the Final Four has all low seeds.

CCNY last won a title in 1978, but last made the Final Four in 1996 when they lost in the title game. Program has 5 NCAA titles to its credit. This is their 9th Final Four appearance in school history.

Kansas won their first title in program history in 1996 when they beat CCNY. This is their 4th Final Four appearance.

Creighton has never won a national title, but this is their 5th time in the Final Four, the last time was in 1995.

Florida has one national title (1961) to their credit and this is the program's 7th time reaching the Final Four, the last time was in 1986.

ROAD TO THE FINAL 4

WEST REGION CHAMPION: Creighton (27-8)
64: def. 14-seed Portland 54-46
32: def. 6-seed West Virginia 76-60
16: def. 2-seed NC State 62-54
8: def. 1-seed Baylor 72-68


MIDWEST REGION CHAMPION: Kansas (32-5)
64: def. 16-seed Stony Brook 103-77
32: def. 8-seed Tulane 79-65
16: def. 5-seed Texas A&M 52-50
8: def. 7-seed UCLA 81-79

SOUTH REGION CHAMPION: CCNY (30-8)
64: def. 15-seed Sewanee 92-68
32: def. 7-seed Cincinnati 70-69
16: def. 3-seed Iowa Poly 66-58
8: def. 1-seed Georgia Tech 65-62

EAST REGION CHAMPION: Florida (28-9)
64: def. 14-seed Yale 71-68
32: def. 6-seed Memphis 67-56
16: def. 7-seed Purdue 76-68
8: def. 1-seed UConn 74-50

OTHER TOURNAMENTS
NIT: Bethune-Cookman (23-11) def. Albany 64-63
CIT: Hawaii (20-14) def. Canisius 69-64
CBI: Nebraska (23-15) def. South Carolina (2-1) (83-94, 89-86, 81-73)

2000-01 FINAL FOUR
 

2000-01 AWARD WINNERS

CONFERENCE AWARD WINNERS

2000 RECRUITING
East Chicago had the 53rd best recruiting class in the nation this past year.

Here's a way to participate. Each season, you can be a "booster" to a program. Doesn't have to be in the Heritage Conference. You get up to $5m to donate to a program. If you donate to the same program for 3 years in a row, you get "superbooster" status and can increase the amount you can donate.

The idea? That your contributions might help a program advance. No guarantees it'll work and I won't outright edit any players for a program based on a contribution, it'll just be a facilities thing and perhaps more money for coaching deal or something else.

But it could be an interesting way to follow other programs or to boost a mid-major, all the while the Heritage Conference thing is happening.

So that's a standing offer.

2001-02 CONFERENCE CHANGES
Denver State is leaving the Heritage Conference to join the WAC this season.
Mississippi River State is leaving the Heritage Conference to join the Missouri Valley Conference.

New Jersey A&M is heading to the Northeast Conference.
SUNY-Harlem are also leaving the league to join the more regionally appropriate Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference.

I imagine this will hurt the leagues prestige in the future, but those teams were wanting to get closer to teams in their own region, despite the blow it might have to their tournament prospects in the longer term if they don't stay good.

To keep the Heritage Conference at 8 teams, Chicago State will leave the Horizon league to rejoin the conference.

2001-02 FINAL REGULAR SEASON POLL

TOP SEEDS

2001-02 FINAL FOUR
-----

TCU is in the Final Four for the 7th time in program history. Iowa State, Nebraska A&T and Albany are all making their first appearances.

OTHER TOURNAMENTS
NIT: Nebraska def. Austin Peay 66-57
CBI: Air Force def. Duke 73-66, 62-51
CIT: Boston University def. Alabama A&M 67-66

Easily the greatest season in Albany basketball history gets punctuated with a national championship, becoming the first mid-major program since SIU in 1982 to claim the biggest prize.

HERITAGE CONFERENCE TO DISBAND


Four Heritage Conference programs have cited "the costs of competition" with a desire to drop to Division II, meaning the league will have to disband effective the 2001-02 season.


Will move to D2 next year. Nebraska A&T, Chicago State, Iowa Poly and SE Michigan will find new conferences to join for next year.

2001-02 AWARD WINNERS
 

Final Conference award winners from the Heritage Conference


FINAL TOURNAMENT CHAMPS FROM HERITAGE CONFERENCE

HERITAGE CONFERENCE CASTOFFS


Chicago State (to the Horizon League)
Iowa Poly (to Atlantic 10)
SE Michigan A&M (to Summit League)
Nebraska A&T (to Missouri Valley)

In some ways, spinning this dynasty off into just my regular college league will give me more latitude to do what I want, but it'll also be interesting to see if the former Heritage Conference programs can maintain a kind of success post-Heritage Conference than during especially as some of them have peaked in recent years or whatever.