Hello All,
Welcome to the Big Sky.
I haven't heard if the Big Sky format will change. I hope it remains the same. Making it hard to get in makes it more interesting. 6 of 9 get in now which I like more than when we had 6 of 8 getting in.
Do you guys liek 6-11 or think a change is in order?
A neutral site doesn't work in the Big Sky as we don't have large fan bases that would travel. Vegas is the obvious site to choose. Everyone likes Vegas, not expensive to get there and its not cold. Salt Lake doesnt work. If your gonna go to SLC you might as well just have it at Weber State 40 miles away. Our arena capacity is 12,000 and has hosted the NCAA tournament 2-3 times but not since 1994.
In the Big Sky playing the tourney at the regular season champ's house still is the most feasilble option. Big Sky usually is 18-24th in confernece rank so we would like to send our best team. letting them host the tourney increases that chance and is about all the Big Sky can do to help the champion make it.
The hosting team usually can manage to get a 12-14 seed, if we have another team get in its even lower seed. Though there is no guarantees with seeding and we have seen regular season champs get in as a 15 or 16.
Another issue is venue size of hosting school. The Big Sky requires I believe 4-5,000 but maybe its 3,000 since UNC hosted last yr on their home court and their place holds 3,000. So this must mean only PSU and Sac can't host at home.
One change the Sky made I really like is the quarterfinal/first rd being held at campus sites and not at the hosting schools. This gives the higher seeds soemthing to look forward to as well attendance is never any good when the quarters are at the hosting school. This change took place in 2003 I believe.
6 @ 3
5 @ 4
1 and 2 sit out
then low vs 1
and high vs 2
semis are on altitude which i dont think is available in north dakota, hopefully that can change.
championship on espn2