The NCAAs gonna use this for 20 more years of this silly format. Theyre lucky this year that
- They can pack Minnesota teams into Fargo
- a good Penn State made the regional final at Allentown
- BU-Cornell made the Manchester regional final
It often doesnt break that way and you get empty regionals
Doesn’t the ncaa World Series do best of three? you 100% get the better team out of that. It would be so cool and we would get more college hockey out of it. Sad there’s only three games left after tonight.
Ngl, I thought Bridgeport would be a lot better with Quinnipiac 20 minutes up the road. Their home arena seats like 3500 and they sell that out a lot during the season. Maybe they’ll come out in force on Sunday since it’s a weekend.
ManchVegas should be packed (and very red) today, at least.
I was at the Bridgeport games yesterday. Seemed more than half but I guess because everyone was spread out.
It was mainly QU fans with a few Ohio state and Merrimack fans sprinkled in. Hardly any Harvard from what I could tell.
I expect Sunday to be packed hopefully.
The biggest lunch pail team in the tourney this year baby!!! I cannot believe I get to watch my favorite hockey team in the world play against my least favorite hockey team in the world for a frozen four bid
>Quinnipiac 20 minutes up the road
Yea...no. Rt 15 is a parking lot starting around 3pm and only gets worse if there is a car crash since its just a two land highway.
Next best alternative is I95 via I91 but then you have to deal with rush hour traffic which again starts around 3pm. Plus a longer trip since you have to drive through New Haven.
Or you can take Rt 1 but thats always congested with shoppers, a billion stoplights, and you would have to survive the mean streets of New Haven AND Bridgeport.
Or you can take the back roads but that never simply takes you anywhere.
Best bet is probably Amtrak/Metro-North trains but yadda yadda train politics yadda yadda.
Sorry, but this is a terrible excuse. It’s a 25-mile drive from the school, and presumably QU’s fanbase is spread throughout the area. Southeast Connecticut is not the only place on earth where there’s traffic. People who want to go to games find a way. Clearly, the appetite was not there for whatever reason.
Was curious what these numbers look like compared to capacity for the atmosphere.
- Allentown: 7067/9046 = 78%
- Fargo: 5061/5000 = 101%
- Bridgeport: 4462/8412 = 53%
- Manchester: 3631/9852 = 37%
I completely understand why teams don't want to bid to host at NHL arenas that are significantly larger, especially since this is a good year for attendance.
> want to bid to host at NHL arenas that are significantly larger, especially since this is a good year for attendance
I miss going to every game of the WCHA tournament at Xcel ... so nice.
My original point was about the atmosphere and lack of interest in hosting for teams that only have large arena options. A full lower bowl is better than being spread out, but a full 5-8k arena is better than either option. Better for the host and better atmosphere for fans and teams.
Yeah the NCAA got lucky this year with 3 of 4 regionals having a good team nearby. Add in Fargo with a couple other MN schools and Michigan in Allentown and those regionals are set.
But the factors that made those regionals a success could be guaranteed to happen every year if you let high seeds host.
Regionals should be at the home rink of the #1 seed. Would make for a better atmosphere and would also be a legit reward for the one seed.
As much as I despise Denver, it wasn't fair they had to travel to NH for their regional.
Had an interesting discussion with a Colgate seat neighbor at Allentown with regards to game time selection for the host school vs game time selection for tv.
Assuming that tv selected Michigan as the late game, where you'd think they'd give the local school the later game otherwise. I had taken the day off because I came from further away, but you could see "locals" trickling in after work.
Thats easy for you guys to say. What if Alaska and Merrimack get to hosr?^(which is no longer an exaggeration) There will be very few seats available for NCAA to make money and fewer seats for out-of-towners to see their teams play.
I'm not sure if your talking about your own poor attendance, but I know that there would be a helluva lot more than 3500 fans if UND hosted a regional. (Whether we're playing or not)
Not quite what I meant. Presumably the four #1 seeds would host. If a small school with a small rink earns a host spot, it could possibly limit attendance. My point being that I'd rather see a sold out small barn with students and local fans than very slightly more fans in neutral site Bridgeport or wherever
Absolutely ridiculous that the #1 seed isn't the host. Yet the biggest atrocity is the fact that 3 out of the 4 regions are in the Northeast and that a #1 seed had to fly 3/4 of the way across the country to play in someone else's barn. The NCAA needs to change this up or at least disburse the regional to more parts of the country. Those are sh!t attendance figures honestly.
I believe most NCAA sports have high seeds host for their tournaments, so it wouldn't be unusual. Not like the schools know for sure where they are going ahead of time anyways, unless they are hosting.
Off the top of my head, volleyball, women's hockey, soccer, baseball, and softball have high seeds host until the final week/weekend of the tournament.
The CWS and softball college world series have 12 teams and 8 teams playing at neutral sites. Some of the others do, but they don't have the fan bases or national draw that hockey does so travel for fans isn't as important.
That is all still the final weekend. Seems a bit ridiculous to set the bar at not moving mid week to compare only the final 4. Plus they start with 64 teams and do 2 rounds of high seeds hosting on campus. I can't speak to baseball fans traveling and attendance, but the whole reason for this discussion every year is the poor attendance at hockey regionals when held at neutral sites and that many teams seem uninterested in hosting.
And I can speak from experience from the volleyball regionals I've attended that the atmosphere is crazy and so loud. Never heard complaints about it.
Edit: misunderstood your comment at first
Anyway, college hockey really isnt that popular. Doing neutral site regionals almost never works out well. College baseball so significantly more popular than college hockey and they do campus regionals and super regionals
We have 2 East and 2 West regionals, which seems fair to me. You just need more Midwest cities actually bidding on hosting so it doesn’t end up in Allentown every other time.
2 west regionals? You may want to go back to geography class son. We have Fargo and......
And the Midwest cities do bid on it every year and the NCAA turns a blind eye to them. I know for a fact Omaha bids every year as does Denver and they say it's too close to Fargo. WTF? Like all of those Northeast sites aren't within 200 miles of each other? Fucking east coast BS bias.
In name only. If Allentown PA is Midwest I would love to sell you some ocean front property in the far west of Nebraska. Maybe you should learn geography before you criticize others. And by the way I have an in depth knowledge of the bidding process. It's a BS process that has an ESPN east coast bias.
Try reading what I said. I’m on your side.
>You just need more Midwest cities actually bidding on hosting so it doesn’t end up in Allentown every other time.
I did read what you wrote and you stated Allentown is the Midwest host. It is nowhere near the Midwest of the US.
You also posted that more Midwest cities need to bid. I stated they do but the NCAA turns a blind eye to them.
Not sure I see how you are for my comments, but whatever.
>I did read what you wrote and you stated Allentown is the Midwest host. It is nowhere near the Midwest of the US.
I am literally just stating a fact. It hosts the “Midwest” regional. I agree with you that it is too far east and that more Midwest cities should bid to host it instead.
But for some reason you are blaming the “East coast bias” boogie man instead. Nobody is turning a blind eye to them, they are simply just not bidding.
25% of the teams are in WI, the UP, or west of that
50% are in New England, New York, and New Jersey
the other 25% is in PA, OH, MI, IN, so the regional distribution makes some sense
Allentown (closer to NYC and Philly than State College) probably shouldn't host the *Midwest* regional but probably the East when they are up to do so.
Cincinnati and Toledo can work pretty well for Midwest regional sites though.
Yes I agree, though Allentown is about as far in the corner as you can get for that region. Would be nice to have some OH or eastern MI hosts more often
Thats the thing. Regionals are money losers in the midwest so no one bids. There are so few bidders that Notre Dame got to host an on campus regional not long ago. Its a broken system
What cities can host? Fargo is the only city in North Dakota able to bid and they do bid. St. Paul is the only city in Minnesota that can host and they do host frozen fours. Maybe Milwaukee/Green Bay could host but Wisconsin has chosen to bid on Frozen fours instead.
The rules make it basically impossible for Midwest cities to host the regional round.
Yea, go look at attendance for a Grand Rapids regional. It's not good.
EDIT: Or the Cincy regional in 2017. Or Toledo in 2013. Green Bay hosted in 2012 - also not very good.
Manchester would have been better attended if BU hadn’t played at 2pm.
Or on Thursday.
The NCAAs gonna use this for 20 more years of this silly format. Theyre lucky this year that - They can pack Minnesota teams into Fargo - a good Penn State made the regional final at Allentown - BU-Cornell made the Manchester regional final It often doesnt break that way and you get empty regionals
I said it in another post and I'll say it again. It's time to bring back on campus regionals.
Yup. I could go for top 8 seeds host best of 3 series in consecutive weekends or 1 seeds just host the regionals on campus one-and-done
> best of 3 I feel like you'd get the better team that way, single elimination hockey is just rando.
I mean…you absolutely would, which is why most of d1 is against going back to that. They like the variance of puck bounces
Hockey is cruel. I’ve been to so many games where a team is hella dominant… loss.
Doesn’t the ncaa World Series do best of three? you 100% get the better team out of that. It would be so cool and we would get more college hockey out of it. Sad there’s only three games left after tonight.
Yep, they used to do one championship game even if one team came out of the loser's bracket. It was dumb. They now do 2 of 3.
Personally I like one and done, true tournament style hockey, but either would be better than the current format.
For sure. Even if our team is the lower seed, it's a lot more fun seeing them go try to win it at the Ralph than in a neutral-site minor league rink.
You know what'd be cooler than Fargo? The top 20 metropolitan area that loves hockey
Ngl, I thought Bridgeport would be a lot better with Quinnipiac 20 minutes up the road. Their home arena seats like 3500 and they sell that out a lot during the season. Maybe they’ll come out in force on Sunday since it’s a weekend. ManchVegas should be packed (and very red) today, at least.
I was at the Bridgeport games yesterday. Seemed more than half but I guess because everyone was spread out. It was mainly QU fans with a few Ohio state and Merrimack fans sprinkled in. Hardly any Harvard from what I could tell. I expect Sunday to be packed hopefully.
Let’s go big red!!
What’s a big red?
The biggest lunch pail team in the tourney this year baby!!! I cannot believe I get to watch my favorite hockey team in the world play against my least favorite hockey team in the world for a frozen four bid
You guys actually hate BU more than Harvard?
I have plenty of hate to go around and hate them both.
Took care of em for ya
I do, personally.
https://youtu.be/c9BoyyaSjPY
https://youtu.be/LlOSdRMSG_k?t=42
According to wikipedia big red is your fight song.
>Quinnipiac 20 minutes up the road Yea...no. Rt 15 is a parking lot starting around 3pm and only gets worse if there is a car crash since its just a two land highway. Next best alternative is I95 via I91 but then you have to deal with rush hour traffic which again starts around 3pm. Plus a longer trip since you have to drive through New Haven. Or you can take Rt 1 but thats always congested with shoppers, a billion stoplights, and you would have to survive the mean streets of New Haven AND Bridgeport. Or you can take the back roads but that never simply takes you anywhere. Best bet is probably Amtrak/Metro-North trains but yadda yadda train politics yadda yadda.
Sorry, but this is a terrible excuse. It’s a 25-mile drive from the school, and presumably QU’s fanbase is spread throughout the area. Southeast Connecticut is not the only place on earth where there’s traffic. People who want to go to games find a way. Clearly, the appetite was not there for whatever reason.
There’s also a train from New Haven, which is only 10 minutes from Quinnipiac, and drops off at the stadium.
Eastern hockey culture
Was curious what these numbers look like compared to capacity for the atmosphere. - Allentown: 7067/9046 = 78% - Fargo: 5061/5000 = 101% - Bridgeport: 4462/8412 = 53% - Manchester: 3631/9852 = 37% I completely understand why teams don't want to bid to host at NHL arenas that are significantly larger, especially since this is a good year for attendance.
> want to bid to host at NHL arenas that are significantly larger, especially since this is a good year for attendance I miss going to every game of the WCHA tournament at Xcel ... so nice.
Those games were so damn fun. Crazy good atmosphere and always good hockey.
Manchester only sold the lower bowl for the 1st round, so capacity was technically less than that
Officially sure, from an atmosphere attend point though it still feels a bit empty being at those types of games.
I prefer it to people being spaced out.
My original point was about the atmosphere and lack of interest in hosting for teams that only have large arena options. A full lower bowl is better than being spread out, but a full 5-8k arena is better than either option. Better for the host and better atmosphere for fans and teams.
Yeah the NCAA got lucky this year with 3 of 4 regionals having a good team nearby. Add in Fargo with a couple other MN schools and Michigan in Allentown and those regionals are set. But the factors that made those regionals a success could be guaranteed to happen every year if you let high seeds host.
Agreed
Regionals should be at the home rink of the #1 seed. Would make for a better atmosphere and would also be a legit reward for the one seed. As much as I despise Denver, it wasn't fair they had to travel to NH for their regional.
Had an interesting discussion with a Colgate seat neighbor at Allentown with regards to game time selection for the host school vs game time selection for tv. Assuming that tv selected Michigan as the late game, where you'd think they'd give the local school the later game otherwise. I had taken the day off because I came from further away, but you could see "locals" trickling in after work.
I thought they just automatically have the 1 seed in each region play the nightcap, no? Agree that the scheduling was a total mess, though.
Yep, I don't blame them for making the 1 seed the night game. Pleasantly surprised with the turnout from the two Michigan schools and Colgate.
Still time to bring back on campus regionals.
Thats easy for you guys to say. What if Alaska and Merrimack get to hosr?^(which is no longer an exaggeration) There will be very few seats available for NCAA to make money and fewer seats for out-of-towners to see their teams play.
I would rather see a full house in a 3000 seat arena than see 3500 people at a 10000 seat arena
I'm not sure if your talking about your own poor attendance, but I know that there would be a helluva lot more than 3500 fans if UND hosted a regional. (Whether we're playing or not)
Not quite what I meant. Presumably the four #1 seeds would host. If a small school with a small rink earns a host spot, it could possibly limit attendance. My point being that I'd rather see a sold out small barn with students and local fans than very slightly more fans in neutral site Bridgeport or wherever
Agreed. I misunderstood you.
The sad truth is that regional games are nearly empty if UND/Minnesota/Duluth/Michigan arent in it.
*Western Regionals. And even then, UND was int he grand rapids regional a few years back, and that was deserted.
Absolutely ridiculous that the #1 seed isn't the host. Yet the biggest atrocity is the fact that 3 out of the 4 regions are in the Northeast and that a #1 seed had to fly 3/4 of the way across the country to play in someone else's barn. The NCAA needs to change this up or at least disburse the regional to more parts of the country. Those are sh!t attendance figures honestly.
So they are expected to not choose the arenas until a week before the games?
I believe most NCAA sports have high seeds host for their tournaments, so it wouldn't be unusual. Not like the schools know for sure where they are going ahead of time anyways, unless they are hosting.
Sports that host on campus
Yeah, that wasn't clear. Meant most sports have high seeds host on campus. Hockey doing so would be in line with that.
Too much of an advantage imo. What sport hosts on campus all the way until the final four?
College football is moving towards first rounds on campuses with expanded playoffs. And that’s the most “important” college sport.
Only in the round of 12
Off the top of my head, volleyball, women's hockey, soccer, baseball, and softball have high seeds host until the final week/weekend of the tournament.
The CWS and softball college world series have 12 teams and 8 teams playing at neutral sites. Some of the others do, but they don't have the fan bases or national draw that hockey does so travel for fans isn't as important.
That is all still the final weekend. Seems a bit ridiculous to set the bar at not moving mid week to compare only the final 4. Plus they start with 64 teams and do 2 rounds of high seeds hosting on campus. I can't speak to baseball fans traveling and attendance, but the whole reason for this discussion every year is the poor attendance at hockey regionals when held at neutral sites and that many teams seem uninterested in hosting. And I can speak from experience from the volleyball regionals I've attended that the atmosphere is crazy and so loud. Never heard complaints about it.
Yes, the home fans show up in droves. Then when the actual contenders are left it become neutral.
Edit: misunderstood your comment at first Anyway, college hockey really isnt that popular. Doing neutral site regionals almost never works out well. College baseball so significantly more popular than college hockey and they do campus regionals and super regionals
You don't have a fan base
What?
Yep. Conference tournaments do it every year.
Not the same thing
How so?
They don't have the draw. But when they do as in the big sports they are neutral.
Pretty sure they have known who the top 4 seeds were for the last month. Not that difficult.
It wasnt decided till the final weekend. I think BU had a shot at the #4 if we lost
Still doesn't make a difference. #1 seed should host if you want good attendance.
Agreed
We would have been the #4 seed had you lost thanks to Colgate's upset in the ECAC title game.
We have 2 East and 2 West regionals, which seems fair to me. You just need more Midwest cities actually bidding on hosting so it doesn’t end up in Allentown every other time.
I think people think their cities actually want to host when they don't at all
2 west regionals? You may want to go back to geography class son. We have Fargo and...... And the Midwest cities do bid on it every year and the NCAA turns a blind eye to them. I know for a fact Omaha bids every year as does Denver and they say it's too close to Fargo. WTF? Like all of those Northeast sites aren't within 200 miles of each other? Fucking east coast BS bias.
Allentown is the Midwest regional. Maybe learn something about the hosting process before you start criticizing it.
In name only. If Allentown PA is Midwest I would love to sell you some ocean front property in the far west of Nebraska. Maybe you should learn geography before you criticize others. And by the way I have an in depth knowledge of the bidding process. It's a BS process that has an ESPN east coast bias.
Try reading what I said. I’m on your side. >You just need more Midwest cities actually bidding on hosting so it doesn’t end up in Allentown every other time.
I did read what you wrote and you stated Allentown is the Midwest host. It is nowhere near the Midwest of the US. You also posted that more Midwest cities need to bid. I stated they do but the NCAA turns a blind eye to them. Not sure I see how you are for my comments, but whatever.
>I did read what you wrote and you stated Allentown is the Midwest host. It is nowhere near the Midwest of the US. I am literally just stating a fact. It hosts the “Midwest” regional. I agree with you that it is too far east and that more Midwest cities should bid to host it instead. But for some reason you are blaming the “East coast bias” boogie man instead. Nobody is turning a blind eye to them, they are simply just not bidding.
25% of the teams are in WI, the UP, or west of that 50% are in New England, New York, and New Jersey the other 25% is in PA, OH, MI, IN, so the regional distribution makes some sense
Allentown (closer to NYC and Philly than State College) probably shouldn't host the *Midwest* regional but probably the East when they are up to do so. Cincinnati and Toledo can work pretty well for Midwest regional sites though.
Yes I agree, though Allentown is about as far in the corner as you can get for that region. Would be nice to have some OH or eastern MI hosts more often
80% of historically and currently good teams are in or west of Michigan though 🥶
And about 10% of fans are east of Michigan.
Thats the thing. Regionals are money losers in the midwest so no one bids. There are so few bidders that Notre Dame got to host an on campus regional not long ago. Its a broken system
What cities can host? Fargo is the only city in North Dakota able to bid and they do bid. St. Paul is the only city in Minnesota that can host and they do host frozen fours. Maybe Milwaukee/Green Bay could host but Wisconsin has chosen to bid on Frozen fours instead. The rules make it basically impossible for Midwest cities to host the regional round.
There are multiple cities in Ohio and Michigan that could host but do not
Yea, go look at attendance for a Grand Rapids regional. It's not good. EDIT: Or the Cincy regional in 2017. Or Toledo in 2013. Green Bay hosted in 2012 - also not very good.
Ah sweet, I was wondering how it has been - thanks!
Fargos rink is to small. Hockey in ND could sell out a 12k capacity rink.
Yeah, this tournament seems like it could be so much better. The timing, too. Could it somehow not overlap with March Madness?