INCH dropped a pretty big bombshell today when they announced that aside from the top four seeds, NCAA is considering seeding based on geography, rather than ranking and maintaining bracket integrity, as a way to decrease costs.
It's not surprising to see this come from the NCAA. They've never really cared about the integrity of their events, so long as they can maximize their profit. Of course, other ways to cut costs would be not adhering to the stupid "No home venues, unless it's a WCHA team, in which case it's totally cool" policy, and not scheduling a regional in freaking St. Louis. And if the number one concern is keeping teams from the same conference together in the NCAA tournament, it makes it look even more ridiculous that the WCHA gets to host the Midwest regional in Wisconsin 50% of the time.
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I don't think this is as much about travel costs as it it with the 3/4 empty arenas they have had. This is about forgetting the current criteria and maximizing the closer fan bases into tickets. Some of these regional sites have been morgues for the "non prime" games. Not sure if i hate what the NCAA is doing or the lame atmosphere in some NCAA regional games.
I think it's about money, pure and simple.
Does anybody happen to know if this will apply to bouncyball or is it just Hockey?
One obvious way to save on travel costs would be to say "thanks, but no thanks" to the Alaskan teams.
The way I read it (and it was early this morning, so I could be wrong) sounds like it applies to ALL tournaments which would include basketball. But with 65 teams in that tournament instead of 16 it would be easier to finagle the brackets to meet the guidelines. After all, if you're the 63rd overall seed in the tournament does it really matter where you go to lose in the first weekend?
I would also rather see good crowds than strict adherence to 1-16 seeding matchups. It's embarrassing for the sport to see empty arenas at the tournament on tv.
NCAA Hockey is a regional sport...therefore it makes sense to regionalize the NCAA tourney. Good crowds and fan passion are what makes NCAA tourney hockey (see WCHA Final Five), so this should be implemented. It's a no-brainer to me.
would it save everybody money if we just gave north dakota their fourth place trophy at the beginning of the year, instead of all that traveling around, playing games, and such.
What is the problem with having regionals in Wisconsin? By all accounts the last 2 in Green Bay and the Kohl Center were well attended relatively speaking. I think the Kohl was one of the better attended regionals in recent years, despite the fact that UW had a NCAA tourney appearance simulataneously in Detroit. Is it just Michigan that is allowed essentially a home regional in Grand Rapids seemingly every other year? I really don't get the beef with Wisconsin. Wisconsin, Minnesota, Michigan, & Mass should get the bulk of regionals as those are the prime base of hockey in the US. I also think major cities like Chicago, Milwaukee, Minneapolis, Detroit, Boston, ect should also get more emphasis as the alumni base and general hockey fan base to draw from is higher (also convience of air travel options make it more condusive for a quick weekend getaway).
One of the real problems with regionals is cost of the ticket. I attended the Madison one last year, and taking my family of four is a considerable investment realative to a regular season game. I agree, nonsense like a regional in St Louis or a F4 in freaking Florida is a big issue as well. An F4 even in Florida will likely sell out, but the less obviously negative consequence is that fans otherwise inclined to perhaps follow their team to a regional may very well pass because of the significant expense already committed to attending a f4 in Florida. Put the F4's w/in driving distance of the upper midwest and northeast, and fans are likely more apt to attend both regionals and F4's (again the f4's will get theirs in the end, they always do).
Sounds good to me......I got tired of seeing Maine sent out West!
Of course, it won't make much of a difference right now. :(
The fact that the NCAA holds a "east" regional in Worcester/Albany and a "northeast" regional in Manchester is a joke. Those are BOTH "northeast" cities. How about moving a regional to Chicago, Columbus, Dayton, South Bend, even Cleveland? There's no reason why an "east" regional can't be in Ohio. God forbid a HE team (see: BC, BU) has to make more than a 90 minute drive to play in a Regional. Aside from the every-4-years Grand Rapids regional, no matter where a CCHA team goes, even as a 1 seed, it's a hostile environment.
Teams work hard to gain a 1 seed in the NCAA's. They shouldn't be rewarded with having to fly 750 miles and play in what amounts to be a 2 or 3 seed's home building.
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