Now that the Ivy League has a post season tournament, the last throwback to yesteryear is gone. And I have to wonder why all the one bid leagues have a tournament. For some, maybe it makes economic sense as a stand alone event. For a small handful, it offers a chance to get a second bid to the Big Dance if the regular season winner loses in the tourney.

But for most, the best outcome is that the regular season champion also wins the tourney. Otherwise, they still get only one bid but their champ gets a lower seed (and thus a poorer chance of winning its first round game).

I get the argument that the tournament keeps more teams' fans interested deeper into the season. But if that argument has merit, it would translate into better regular season attendance numbers. For most of the one bid leagues, it's hard to see how their attendance could get much worse. Twenty conferences average fewer than 3,000 fans per game, and 9 average fewer than 2,000 in the regular season. In 2017, the Northeast Conference only averaged 1,100 per game. That's high school attendance!

But then there's the Summit Conference. In 2017, they averaged 2,310 in the regular season, but 9,978 per session in their tournament. In Sioux Falls, South Dakota! That's 1,109 per member school per session - which ranked #4 out of 32 DI conferences. Better than the ACC, SEC and B1G and all of the FBS G5 conferences.

The G5 didn't fare well at all:

Conf...Rank...Avg/member

AAC.....13.......528
MWC....14.......504
MAC.....22.......317
CUSA...24.......287
SBC.....32........96

If you are a conference looking for better exposure from your conference tournament, is an average attendance of 1,151 per session the kind of exposure you really want?

ESPN, the arena, sponsors could be offering money to these schools. I like neutral site tournaments.

(03-27-2018 01:17 PM)AuzGrams Wrote:  ESPN, the arena, sponsors could be offering money to these schools. I like neutral site tournaments.

A number of these tournaments aren't played at neutral sites at all, and some only for the finals or semis. All Patriot League tourney games were played on the home court of the higher seeded team. They averaged less than 200 fans more than for regular season games. That can't bring in more revenue than the visiting team's travel expenses.

By having a conference tournament, you maintain the interest of your fans throughout the season. For example, if school clinches the NEC in early February, the interest in attending games at the other conference schools will drop significantly. By having a tournament at the end of the year, you still give a school's fans hope that their school can make the tourney, thereby keeping interest in the program. Wisconsin AD was asked why does college football have all these crappy bowl games? In short, his answer was that most schools still earn most of their money from attendance at football games (plus concessions, merchandise, etc.). If Indiana still has a chance at the Astro-Bluebonnet Bowl in mid-November, fans still show up to their home games. If they were eliminated from bowl and playoff contention in week 4, the stands would be empty.

(03-27-2018 02:09 PM)MU88 Wrote:  By having a conference tournament, you maintain the interest of your fans throughout the season. For example, if school clinches the NEC in early February, the interest in attending games at the other conference schools will drop significantly. By having a tournament at the end of the year, you still give a school's fans hope that their school can make the tourney, thereby keeping interest in the program. Wisconsin AD was asked why does college football have all these crappy bowl games? In short, his answer was that most schools still earn most of their money from attendance at football games (plus concessions, merchandise, etc.). If Indiana still has a chance at the Astro-Bluebonnet Bowl in mid-November, fans still show up to their home games. If they were eliminated from bowl and playoff contention in week 4, the stands would be empty.

Before the explosion in the number of bowl games in recent years, is there any evidence to suggest that stands were empty after the Indianas of the Big Ten were eliminated from the Rose Bowl chase? I think this reason is a little overblown.

Gives them a national TV slot in March

(03-27-2018 11:41 AM)ken d Wrote:  Now that the Ivy League has a post season tournament, the last throwback to yesteryear is gone. And I have to wonder why all the one bid leagues have a tournament. For some, maybe it makes economic sense as a stand alone event. For a small handful, it offers a chance to get a second bid to the Big Dance if the regular season winner loses in the tourney.

But for most, the best outcome is that the regular season champion also wins the tourney. Otherwise, they still get only one bid but their champ gets a lower seed (and thus a poorer chance of winning its first round game).

I get the argument that the tournament keeps more teams' fans interested deeper into the season. But if that argument has merit, it would translate into better regular season attendance numbers. For most of the one bid leagues, it's hard to see how their attendance could get much worse. Twenty conferences average fewer than 3,000 fans per game, and 9 average fewer than 2,000 in the regular season. In 2017, the Northeast Conference only averaged 1,100 per game. That's high school attendance!

But then there's the Summit Conference. In 2017, they averaged 2,310 in the regular season, but 9,978 per session in their tournament. In Sioux Falls, South Dakota! That's 1,109 per member school per session - which ranked #4 out of 32 DI conferences. Better than the ACC, SEC and B1G and all of the FBS G5 conferences.

The G5 didn't fare well at all:

Conf...Rank...Avg/member

AAC.....13.......528
MWC....14.......504
MAC.....22.......317
CUSA...24.......287
SBC.....32........96

If you are a conference looking for better exposure from your conference tournament, is an average attendance of 1,151 per session the kind of exposure you really want?

The Summit isn'the as spread out and besides, what exactly is there to do in Sioux Falls?

That said, that's impressive and may serve for some lessons for others.

The conference tournaments also make the NIT a bit more relevant since regular season champions not going to the Big Dance get automatic bids.

(03-27-2018 02:09 PM)MU88 Wrote:  By having a conference tournament, you maintain the interest of your fans throughout the season. For example, if school clinches the NEC in early February, the interest in attending games at the other conference schools will drop significantly. By having a tournament at the end of the year, you still give a school's fans hope that their school can make the tourney, thereby keeping interest in the program. Wisconsin AD was asked why does college football have all these crappy bowl games? In short, his answer was that most schools still earn most of their money from attendance at football games (plus concessions, merchandise, etc.). If Indiana still has a chance at the Astro-Bluebonnet Bowl in mid-November, fans still show up to their home games. If they were eliminated from bowl and playoff contention in week 4, the stands would be empty.

But you hold it at the risk of having shoddy attendance and eliminating your best teams from NCAA Tournament contention.

(03-27-2018 04:49 PM)_C2_ Wrote:  

(03-27-2018 02:09 PM)MU88 Wrote:  By having a conference tournament, you maintain the interest of your fans throughout the season. For example, if school clinches the NEC in early February, the interest in attending games at the other conference schools will drop significantly. By having a tournament at the end of the year, you still give a school's fans hope that their school can make the tourney, thereby keeping interest in the program. Wisconsin AD was asked why does college football have all these crappy bowl games? In short, his answer was that most schools still earn most of their money from attendance at football games (plus concessions, merchandise, etc.). If Indiana still has a chance at the Astro-Bluebonnet Bowl in mid-November, fans still show up to their home games. If they were eliminated from bowl and playoff contention in week 4, the stands would be empty.

But you hold it at the risk of having shoddy attendance and eliminating your best teams from NCAA Tournament contention.

Let's face it: Nothing said in this thread is anything that the conferences don't already know. They've factored in these pluses and minuses, and probably some things us on this forum aren't aware of to boot.

When the minuses outweigh the pluses, they will end their conference tournaments.

As someone said earlier, these are games on national TV for the conferences. If you don't have one, then you are missing that while your competitors enjoy it.

I don't like that the fact that most regular season games are unimportant. If #1 and #5 play the outcome doesn't really matter. Both are going to the Dance. It doesn't matter if #24 and #25 are playing because it would be unlikely that the outcome knocks one out.

If a conference only takes part of the field, the games that matter are the ones impacting the red line of in or out, not the duel between the conference leaders.

The bulk of Division I schools know by game five if they have any realistic shot at an at-large and the answer for about 250 schools at that point is no.

What we see after that is some schools have a culture built around the conference tournament. I have a friend who has been to like 27 straight tournaments. Many (most?) schools don't have that culture.

If you are an empty nester with job flexibility or are retired, conference tournaments can be great events in a community with other things to do.

What I can't answer is how you build that culture to get where people make their plans for the conference tournament as soon as the date and site are announced.

Every conference wants to be the ACC.

(03-27-2018 06:56 PM)XLance Wrote:  Every conference wants to be the ACC.

When the Big East was founded in 1979, it certainly did. It built its basketball culture explicitly around the conference tournament at MSG, clearly emulating what the ACC had built with its tournament.

But more recently? The ACC wanted to be the Big East circa 2010, that's why the ACC raided the Big East and took away Pitt, Cuse, and Louisville. Today, the ACC is what the Big East was then.

(03-27-2018 06:53 PM)arkstfan Wrote:  What we see after that is some schools have a culture built around the conference tournament. I have a friend who has been to like 27 straight tournaments. Many (most?) schools don't have that culture.

If you are an empty nester with job flexibility or are retired, conference tournaments can be great events in a community with other things to do.

What I can't answer is how you build that culture to get where people make their plans for the conference tournament as soon as the date and site are announced.

Carving a niche. Summit tournament is biggest sporting event in Sioux Falls history (huge opportunity for corporations) and invaded yearly by USD and especially SDSU fans who are often more invested in their college teams than pro sports due to geography.

(03-27-2018 07:27 PM)IWokeUpLikeThis Wrote:  

(03-27-2018 06:53 PM)arkstfan Wrote:  What we see after that is some schools have a culture built around the conference tournament. I have a friend who has been to like 27 straight tournaments. Many (most?) schools don't have that culture.

If you are an empty nester with job flexibility or are retired, conference tournaments can be great events in a community with other things to do.

What I can't answer is how you build that culture to get where people make their plans for the conference tournament as soon as the date and site are announced.

Carving a niche. Summit tournament is biggest sporting event in Sioux Falls history (huge opportunity for corporations) and invaded yearly by USD and especially SDSU fans who are often more invested in their college teams than pro sports due to geography.

South Dakota State fans buy tickets 2 years out. Even if SDSU is not playing, you will see a lot of blue in the stands. Not a lot to do in South Dakota come March, plus, the state is a basketball state. Always has been. I recall, back in the old days when the state only had 2 classes in basketball, playing in front of over 9,000 in the old Sioux Falls arena, in the small school class.

The event has found its spot. And with SDSU and USD both fielding strong Men's and Women's teams, plus Sioux Falls filled with alumni from both schools, attendance will only grow. They had over 8,700 at the Women's championship game this year, on a Tuesday afternoon. Pretty crazy stuff, I've made it once, it is definitely an event worth checking out if you love basketball.

The Summit turning itself into Conference Dakotas with UND inbound is one of the smarter things they could have done and really gives them a center of gravity in a place where there's no other competition. I still think they should look at the relatively nearby Minnesota State as a move-up if they wind up in the new member hunt anytime soon. Not a lot of chances to have a geographically sensible conference in that part of the country and they managed it.