Attendance at Regionals

[Rover]

Re: Attendance at Regionals

I'm not sure what you mean when you state that for Maine, Yale, or QU it would essentially be an away game. Do you mean it would be an away game for yourself as a BU fan? Because that's exactly the point of putting it at the #1 seed's school. They earned the #1 seed which means they have the benefit of the regionals having that "home atmosphere" and all other seeds would have to travel since their team did not earn that top seed. Why would BU fans having to travel have to be equated into that as they did not earn the #1 seed in that scenario?

I'm sure the Regionals are working great for Eastern schools where population is compressed in comparison and you have a good amount of hockey schools in close proximity to each other. However, it is not working for the Western schools which is why the converstion is happening.

Again, not sure if I'm misunderstanding your post but that's what I got out of it.

I don't like the idea of switching to playing a one and done playoff game in an opposing team's home arena. The #1 team already has the advantage of being seeded in the regional closest to them (presumably) against the lowest seed. How much more of an advantage should we give them? For me, not another home game. Also I like giving all fans the opportunity to attend instead of getting shut out especially if the home team played in a small arena. Maybe that's not as much of a problem out west but in the east I can tell you from experience we had some great times all traveling on the bus out to the regionals. Travelling up to Orono to be surrounded by obnoxious Maine hicks with no teeth just isn't the same thing.

[MplsSioux]

Re: Attendance at Regionals

I don't like the idea of switching to playing a one and done playoff game in an opposing team's home arena. The #1 team already has the advantage of being seeded in the regional closest to them (presumably) against the lowest seed. How much more of an advantage should we give them? For me, not another home game. Also I like giving all fans the opportunity to attend instead of getting shut out especially if the home team played in a small arena. Maybe that's not as much of a problem out west but in the east I can tell you from experience we had some great times all traveling on the bus out to the regionals. Travelling up to Orono to be surrounded by obnoxious Maine hicks with no teeth just isn't the same thing.

Getting seeded in the regional closest to you is hardly an advantage out west when you have North Dakota earning a #1 seed and getting placed in Minneapolis at the Xcel Energy Center in the same region as the Gophers. This is the scenario that played out in 2012. The only reason the crowd was approximately 50/50 was because Sioux fans travel about as well as any fans in the nation. How is that an advantage for UND after earning the #1 seed throughout the course of the year? When you have a "host" school with an arena in close proximity it creates an unfair advantage when they make the tournament as anything but a #1 seed and the #1 school that gets shipped there is penalized. I believe there are examples of a #1 seed out west getting shipped East to New Hampshire for example too but would have to look back to confirm. So to answer your question, in some cases there is no advantage whatsoever for earning the #1 seed.

[Patman]

Re: Attendance at Regionals

Total goals was a disaster. One team would go out the first night and win by a decisive margin -- that would immediately reduce the interest in the second game. It also confused fans going in who missed the first game...definitely don't see that ever coming back. Like disco, it was a fad of its era but it went away for a reason.

honestly, if we do campus sites for any part of the first round... hey, its modern times... Away-Home-Home format. So you might have to go to Alaska, deal

[Patman]

Re: Attendance at Regionals

You know, if we're going to get really out there at this point... why not have 9-16 do a play-in round at home rinks which then seeds into a 6 team format... top seeds would get essentially a double bye.

edit:

Saturday: league finals.

Tuesday: play-ins...

Friday/Saturday/Sunday: Previous format.

Hypothetical 2013 -- East

G1: Wisconsin @ Union
G2: SCSU @ Niagara

G3: UNH vs. G1W in Manchester
G4: BC vs. G2W in Manchester

G5: UML vs. G3W in Manchester
G6: Quinnipiac vs. G4W in Manchester

West

G7: Canisius @ Mankato
G8: Yale @ Denver

G9: Miami vs. G7W in Lake Michigan
G10: NoDak vs. G8W in Lake Michigan

G11: Notre Dame vs. G9W in Lake Michigan
G12: Minnesota vs. G10W in Lake Michigan

--- no way around conference issues in this situation, as far as I can tell

[FRICKER]

Re: Attendance at Regionals

Talk about beating a dead horse......................

[Numbers]

Re: Attendance at Regionals

You know, if we're going to get really out there at this point... why not have 9-16 do a play-in round at home rinks which then seeds into a 6 team format... top seeds would get essentially a double bye.

edit:

Saturday: league finals.

Tuesday: play-ins...

Friday/Saturday/Sunday: Previous format.

Hypothetical 2013 -- East

G1: Wisconsin @ Union
G2: SCSU @ Niagara

G3: UNH vs. G1W in Manchester
G4: BC vs. G2W in Manchester

G5: UML vs. G3W in Manchester
G6: Quinnipiac vs. G4W in Manchester

West

G7: Canisius @ Mankato
G8: Yale @ Denver

G9: Miami vs. G7W in Lake Michigan
G10: NoDak vs. G8W in Lake Michigan

G11: Notre Dame vs. G9W in Lake Michigan
G12: Minnesota vs. G10W in Lake Michigan

--- no way around conference issues in this situation, as far as I can tell

Patman, that is almost as crazy as my double elimination idea:

Break the 16 teams into EAST and WEST. One side has seeds 1,4,5,8,9,12,13,16 the other 2,3,6,7,10,11,14,15. Seed both Regions 1-8.

First weekend:
FRI - Game 1: 1v8; Game 2: 4v5
SAT - Game 3: Game 3: 2v7; Game 4: 3v6; G5: L1 v L2 (Elimination game) (Times: 12, 4, 7:30)
SUN - G6: W1 v W2; G7: L3 v L4 (Elimination game); G8: W3 v W4 (Times: 12, 4, 7:30)

Second weekend (Change sites if you want):
FRI - Game 9: W5 v W7 (Elimination game); G10: L6 v L8 (Elimination Game) (Times - 5:00, 8:00)
SAT - G11: W6 v W8 (Note that these 2 teams have not lost yet. Winner here advances to F4); G12: W9 v W10 (Elimination game)
SUN - G13 - L11 v W12 (Winner advances to F4).

Winner of Game 11, being undefeated, is seeded 1st or 2nd at F4 and plays as Home in the National Semi-Final.

Advantages: 1)For Hockey, Double Elimination is more fair. 2)First weekend every one plays twice, so no fans leaving the area after one game

Disadvantages: 1) First weekend host needs room for 8 teams in the facility and hotels. 2) Double elimination is harder to follow for casual fans than single. 3) Forces fans to travel 2 weeks in a row for regions (3 counting conference tourneys)

[Hux]

The arguments you usually hear against that idea are usually along the lines of any given school being hard-pressed to get their venue ready to meet the NCAA's lofty standards for same on short notice... Personally, I consider that to be a crock.

I'm confident that any school that earns home-ice would be delighted to cover-up any forbidden ads along the boards, and to instruct their PA guy not to impart any inflection to his voice, just for the opportunity to have its rink on national TV.

A week is enough time to get that all arranged, FCS.

Except that it takes four days to take down the ice and repaint (assuming NCAA wants ads removed and NCAA logos put in) leaving the home team to scramble for practice ice.

[Ma#1ne Hky]

Re: Attendance at Regionals

I don't like the idea of switching to playing a one and done playoff game in an opposing team's home arena. The #1 team already has the advantage of being seeded in the regional closest to them (presumably) against the lowest seed. How much more of an advantage should we give them? For me, not another home game. Also I like giving all fans the opportunity to attend instead of getting shut out especially if the home team played in a small arena. Maybe that's not as much of a problem out west but in the east I can tell you from experience we had some great times all traveling on the bus out to the regionals. Travelling up to Orono to be surrounded by obnoxious Maine hicks with no teeth just isn't the same thing.

Its too bad there are people like you...but you have your right of speech...nothing better to do...done beating your dog & wife/girlfriend combo..?

[Fishman'81]

Re: Attendance at Regionals

Total goals was a disaster. One team would go out the first night and win by a decisive margin -- that would immediately reduce the interest in the second game. It also confused fans going in who missed the first game...definitely don't see that ever coming back. Like disco, it was a fad of its era but it went away for a reason.

I wouldn't call it a "disaster", nor would I necessarily endorse it... But it had it's moments.

(For instance, Team A could win 1-0 in Game One, then fight like Hell when down 3-1 on the next night, with no 3rd-game do-over available to them.)

It was an interesting format -at least for those of us who could perform elementary-school addition- and it rendered every minute of both games meaningful.

[Rover]

Re: Attendance at Regionals

Its too bad there are people like you...but you have your right of speech...nothing better to do...done beating your dog & wife/girlfriend combo..?

Oh settle down already. I vacation up in Maine all the time, and aside from using Monopoly money to pay some of the hayseeds up there instead of US currency, nobody is worse for the wear from me being there.