Notwithstanding the protests of Digger Phelps, the Irish's loss at UConn finishes their chances at going to the NCAA Tournament without a miracle run in the Big East Tournament. Forget the non-conference strength of schedule, which ranks at 257th. Forget an overall RPI of 72. Ignore the 3-10 record against the RPI top-50.The reason that the Irish are done is that they finished 2-7 in the Big East in road games. Simply put, they could not win a single quality road game in conference. When you can't do that, regardless of how tough the conference schedule is, you are not an NCAA Tournament team.




