I love upsets too, and I am in favor of expanding to 16 (for other reasons), but it is a
problem that the "better team" tends to win any given game more in basketball than in
any other sport. By its nature, a sport in which you score 4 or 5 times is more beholden
to luck than one in which you score 40 or 50 times. There's more room within the
standard deviation for plans to go awry (this fact makes Maine's success this year
almost beyond comprehension).
 
The solution is to expand to 16 and play the first two rounds best of three at the better
seed's home ice. It gets rid of these ghastly regionals, allows more teams a taste of the
Big Time, rewards the fans (and, for that matter, the coffers) of the premier teams by
granting them additional home games, and adds just one week to the season.
 
I disagree that this would unduly dilute the field. If anything, it would protect strong
teams from missing the tournament because of space limitations caused by Cinderella
stories, while still allowing all conference tournament winners to participate. We're
not talking Coppin State and Wagner here, guys. As has been pointed out already, the
general rule in the BB tourny is that, if you have a winning record in one of the
premier conferences (ACC, Big Ten, the stronger of Big East/A-10), then you go. Fine,
do the same here, where all four conferences are within the same ballpark (er,
rink?).
 
I would KILL to see an NCAA game against a Minnesota or Wisconsin played at
Lynah Rink. The atmosphere of that kind of showdown, in an exceedingly partisan
environment, would leave the antisepticism of the regionals in the dust. I'm sure the
faithful of Madison, Potsdam, Sault Ste. Marie and Orono feel much the same.
 
Greg
Somerville
Let's Go Red!