Paul Grochowski writes:
>Are all of those holiday tournaments that someone listed four team, two day
>affairs?
 
Yes, they are (some may be spread over three days occasionally).
 
>So, for a couple of years, I've been wondering why the GLI doesn't expand to
>an eight team tournament.
 
A number of tourneys in the past have been 6 or 8 teams, like the early days
of the Nissan/Jeep Classic in Anchorage and the old ECAC Holiday tourney.
A big problem with putting together a tourney, let alone a 6 or 8 team tourney,
is getting enough teams.  There are so few nonleague games available now as
it is.
 
You mentioned the GLI having space to only invite one team a year; the Beanpot,
of course, isn't even an invitational tourney, as BU, BC, Harvard, and
Northeastern have always and probably will always be the only four competitors,
although in the late 70s there had been talk of Northeastern pulling out of it.
The attraction of the Beanpot is that it is considered the Championship of
Boston.  Similarly, the attraction of the GLI seems to be that it has the same
three Michigan teams, and one other top team.  It helps as far as attendance
goes for fans to know some of the same teams will always be in a tourney, so
they can look forward to it annually and so it can build up tradition.  The
GLI is heavily based on tradition like a number of other tourneys, thus I
would be surprised to see them make such a drastic change in format.
 
Also, the Auld Lang Syne Classic, somewhat of the Northern New England Beanpot,
annually has Dartmouth, UNH, Vermont, and one other team (this year, BU; in
past years it has invited Providence, Maine, and Northeastern).
 
Another problem is that in an eight-team tourney, teams would have to play
three games in a short period of time since the normal format is not to send
teams home after they lose but to have winners and losers brackets.  Teams
are not going to agree to join a tourney if they don't know if they'd be
playing one or three games.  They might miss out on two games that they could
have scheduled elsewhere.  And since the organizers pay most of the costs,
they won't be paying to truck eight teams to Detroit if four of them will
only be playing once.  So an eight-team tourney would likely see two brackets,
just as in four-team tourneys.
 
But consolation games aren't very popular with many teams.  Every team goes
to a tourney with the hope of winning, and a consolation game is often a
letdown for both teams although there have been the occasional exciting
consolation games.  In an eight-team, double bracket tourney, four teams
would be playing what amounts to *two* consolation games.
 
The Ivies would likely say no to such a tourney as well, unless it took place
in Alaska, for instance.  Harvard would never be able to play in an 8-team
GLI because it is committed to the Beanpot each year, leaving it only two
available nonleague games - it would have to play three here.  Harvard's only
NLG this season are the GLI and the Beanpot.
 
I see even two more problems: will Detroit-area fans pay to see teams not from
their area (an 8-team tourney would mean many more than 4 games), and you're
not guaranteed to get eight top teams because the logistics of getting all
those teams there, and correctly predicting who will be good, are just too
difficult.  The GLI has been so successful in its current format, I doubt the
organizers would want to tinker with it.
 
So it's an interesting idea to be sure, but I think the problems are too big
to overcome...
 
 
- mike