Rival Week : UB Mens Basketball has options, who should we hate the most?

The MAC East has dominated the conference for well over a decade and in that time there have been four very consistent powers. Really nobody else in the conference has had any kind of established relevance.

Take the MAC tournament seeding...

When we ignore the old rule which gave the MAC West winner the number two seed here are how the four have fared for the past decade.

• Buffalo is on average a three seed and has been a top 4 seed eight times.
• Ohio is on average a five seed and has been a top 4 seed four times
• Akron is on Average a four seed and has been a top 4 seed five times
• Kent is on average a four seed and has been a top 4 seed six times

But enough about the regular season, what about winning in Cleveland... In the past ten years here is how many times each has won it all

• Buffalo 4
• Kent 1
• Ohio 2
• Akron 2

One time in the last decade someone other than these four teams has won the MAC tournament.

We have a lot of reasons to hate on each of these teams the two runners up are:

Ohio : DJ Cooper the bikini wearing, sign steeling cry baby.

Cooper was a solid player for the Bobcats who had a particular penchant for driving a dagger through the hearts of Buffalo fans. Give the guy his due, he was an assassin who excelled at killing us in the last few minutes of the game.

So UB fans did what basketball fans do, latched onto something embarrassing to taunt him. Namely make a huge poster from a picture he posted of himself in a Bikini that he posted on social media after losing a bet.

It was used for a couple of seasons and then, after his last game at Buffalo, he ran into the true blue student section, and stole the sign.

Akron: Jon Groce

So remember that Ohio team who had a knack of putting us away late in games? Well after a great run at Ohio he had a not so great run at Illinois and then landed in Akron. I can’t tell if Ohio -> Akron is failing up or down?

Anyway, geographically they are the closest school to us, they are a solid program, and have more than a few time handed us painful losses.

The Winner? Loser?

Kent: Just generally bad people

Of the three other “Eastern Powers” Kent has been the least annoying on the court. They’ve won fewer titles and overall have been a less scary team. They are consistently good but never really dominated the conference over the past decade.

But one year, when it looked like they might, the players made absolute fools out of themselves when they started to chant “where are your cheerleaders at” before a nationally televised game.

Warning Language

Never taunt before the game, because when you get blown out of the Arena it’s even more amusing.

I’m going with Kent. They have not been as good as the others on the list but they are consistent and they are also consistently low class. When Akron or Ohio have a couple of bad years beating them starts to take on a little less meaning.

But beating Kent always feels good.