Does the success of VCU, George Mason, ODU, and Richmond hurt UVA and Virginia Tech, the state's automatic BCS schools?

As a Virginian, I love seeing schools in my state making a Final Four run. The amazing thing here is that the schools making a Final Four run in the last 10 years in Virginia have been VCU and Mason, both in the CAA. Richmond, an A-10 school (also a former CAA team) was in the Sweet 16 this year and was nationally ranked last year. ODU made two straight NCAA appearances.

This is good by itself, but at the same time, Virginia has two schools in the ACC, Virginia Tech and the University of Virginia. Virginia Tech since getting into the ACC (thanks to politics) has gotten into an NCAA berth in 2007 but ever since they've been NIT bound. Virginia got an NCAA run in 2007, but has been more or less a .500 overall team, all of this happening since the school built a new arena in 2006.

School	League	School Type	US News Ranking	Acceptance Rate	Average SAT*	Undergrad Stduents	Location
George Mason Patriots	CAA	Public	#143, National U.	63.3%	1150	19,702	Fairfax, VA
Hampton Pirates	MEAC	Private, Nondenom., HBCU	#32 Southern Regional U.	46.7%	1060	4,565	Hampton, VA
James Madison Dukes	CAA	Public	#3, Southern Regional U.	61.4%	1150	17,281	Harrisonburg, VA
Liberty Flames	Big South	Southern Baptist	3rd Tier Southern Regional U.	19.9%	980	28,986	Lynchburg, VA
Longwood Lancers	Indep.	Public	#27 Southern Regional U.	69.6%	1080	4,086	Farmville, VA
Norfolk State Spartans	MEAC	Public, HBCU	3rd Tier Southern Regional U.	n/a	n/a	5,400	Norfolk, VA
Old Dominion Monarchs	CAA	Public	4th Tier National U.	72.1%	1070	18,253	Norfolk, VA
Radford Highlanders	Big South	Public	#38, Southern Regional U.	71.1%	1020	7,773	Radford, VA
Richmond Spiders	A-10	Private, Nondenom.	#32, Liberal Arts Colleges	39.2%	1260	2,925	Richmond, VA
VCU Rams	CAA	Public	#167, National U.	59.4%	1090	23,149	Richmond, VA
Virginia Cavaliers	ACC	Public	#25, National U.	32.1%	1330	15,476	Charlottesville, VA
Virginia Tech Hokies	ACC	Public	#69, National U.	66.7%	1210	23,558	Blacksburg, VA
VMI Keydets	Big South	Public, Military Style	#62, Liberal Arts Colleges	55.6%	1140	1,500	Lexington, VA
William and Mary Tribe	CAA	Public	#31, National U.	33.5%	1350	5,836	Williamsburg, VA

I am not too worried about Virginia Tech, aside from the fact that they are scheduling prissy opponents, often at home, and they're paying the price for it with NIT berths and maybe they could get some better recruits because a program in a power conference can't improve long term with constant NIT berths. Virginia is more of a concern. For some reason, UVA hasn't been a popular destination for athletes, even though they have good facilities and the new basketball arena was supposed to get them back to their consistency in the '80's and '90's. In the DC area, they're an afterthought now, with Maryland and VT taking the sports headlines, and recruiting in football and men's ball consistently is better. Even other area schools like Mason and VCU are more desirable destinations than UVA.

With good Virginian recruits now heading to Virginia schools besides Virginia. Liberty got a recent 20 win season and is still doing well in the Big South despite restrictive moral rules on the students. JMU has made the CBI or College Insider Tourney twice in the last three years and has gotten 20 win seasons. Hampton often gets into the NCAA's, but HBCU's aren't particularly popular destinations for recruits. If some of these Virginian recruits went to UVA or VT, it's much more likely that they'd be making the dance. You could also argue that Maryland also takes a hit because of the success of Virginia non-BCS conference teams.

One argument UVA likes to throw out there as a reason why their men's basketball team isn't good is because of their high academic standards for admission. UVA is a great insititution, one of the best public universities. VCU and Mason as you can see by their admittance rates and average SAT scores, they're not as good as UVA is academically.

However schools like Berkeley (Cal), Michigan, UCLA and fellow conference team UNC are all among the best public universities in the US and have had more NCAA and post season success in recent years than the Cavs. In addition, Duke is in the conference and is one of the top universities in the country which is better than most of the Ivy League schools. Admissions guidelines for all ACC schools from FSU to Duke are all also the same, so maybe UVA just wants to make sure their athletes are at a higher academic level than the minimal standard.

If UVA were clearly the best school academically in the ACC and couldn't compete, then that could be a decent rationale. Like if Duke were the worst team in the ACC every year in basketball with not much good history, they could have a legit claim as to why it's so hard to win. Northwestern of the Big Ten is an example of such a school which is head and shoulders above Michigan, the next best school in the league, and they are one of five original D-I schools that have never made one NCAA appearance. The Wildcats also haven't won a Big Ten title since 1933, with not too many winning seasons since then. While UVA hasn't won many ACC conference titles, they have made two final fours in 1981 and 1984, were a consistent NCAA tourney team in the '80's and '90's, and they have a new arena that is state of the art, which is more than enough to get them some NCAA runs and to get some of the recruits that are going to Mason, VCU over UVA and Virginia Tech.

Another school in Virginia, William and Mary also encounters the "UVA problem" and like Northwestern, the Tribe has no NCAA appearances ever as an original D-I school. But unlike UVA where there are several schools that are as good or better than UVA academically in the ACC, W&M is the best school in the CAA academically and this is used against them in recruiting battles for local athletes. But even W&M made an NIT last year and has made some consistent improvement over the last few years, which include two finals appearances in the CAA tourney over the last four years, and their last recruiting class was the best in the CAA, so maybe they will make the dance.

So the question I have is this. Does Virginia's non-BCS programs hurt UVA and Virginia Tech in basketball? I say yes, it is hurting them. I don't know if the success of VCU, Mason and other programs I mentioned are the result of them being so good, or the fact that the Virginia ACC schools are just not being so good in protecting their turf.