On Tue, 31 Mar 1998, Zac Halter wrote:
 
> I believe that the concept of "regional" venues is for the semi's is a
> failure and should be scrapped.  The higher seeds should retain home ice.
 
That would be fine, and easily workable, if the tournament were still at
8 teams.
 
But how do you propose getting down from 12 teams to the Phinal Phour,
while playing series on campus sites (as the old system went)?
 
It seems to me that the only way to do is to add another week to the
season, and I doubt the NC$$ would look very favourably upon that.
 
Abandoning the regionals would also make tournament revenue extremely
unpredictable. And if we thought attendance (and money) was a factor
before, just wait. If it comes down to Minnesota (capacity 10,000,
$19/ticket) vs. St. Lawrence (capacity 2,200, $7 or $8/ticket) for the
last home-ice berth.... well, I think we'd see if the term NC$$ held any
meaning.
 
I don't know that one can judge Regionals to be failure. There is a certain
building size (between 7,000-12,000 seats, it seems) in which they are a
good fit. It is too early to expect Regionals to be able to fill up the
Joe, or the Target Center. This is especially true, given that Regionals
fall between two big-hype events: conference tournaments and the Phinal
Phour.
 
At this point, one should perhaps reflect on how College Hockey has
progressed. I don't think that it was all that long ago (10 years, I
think) that the Phinal Phour was held in Grand Forks, in a 6,000 seat arena.
 
See you later,
John
 
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John Edwards - Carleton (ON) '96, Manitoba '00 - [log in to unmask]
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