It appears that the NC$$ will not be rewarding long-time attendance in
their newly-announced ticket application process for next year's tourney
in St. Paul.

The way I read the procedure, purchase of tickets in *any one* of the
past five years will entitle the purchaser entry in the priority random
selection (read: lottery) process.

As a Phinal Phour attendee for 15 consecutive years (beginning in
Providence in 1986), not to mention the 1965 tourney at Meehan
Auditorium), I am disappointed that more weight has not been given to
those folks (like many on this list) whose support of this annual event
goes back to the days when a full house was 8,000-10,000 at best and the
NCAA treated the event as no more than an afterthought in comparison
with their hoops spectacular.

On the other hand, I am realistic enough to understand that perhaps
records of previous ticket buyers prior to the stated five-year interval
have long ago been trashed or lost by the local agencies that typically
handled ticket sales back in the years when the tournament support on a
year-to-year basis came largely from a small, dedicated and involved
core group.  Now, of course, we have witnessed an explosion of interest
in attending the tourney, particularly over the past 5-7 years, and even
the nation's largest arenas in hockey territories like Boston, Milwaukee
and Detroit are now hard-pressed to satisfy total ticket demand.

Anyway, I wish that 'core support group' could be favored a bit more,
but I guess we should be thankful for any small favors after the ticket
debacles in Providence and Albany whose 11,000+ seats were revealed as
woefully inadequate to satisfy demand.  From here on, it appears
15,000-20,000 seats will be the standard NCAA requirement for tournament
venues.

See you in Albany!

Bill Corrigan

LET'S GO BRUNO!