(05-24-2016 11:01 AM)monarx Wrote: Nothing against El Paso, but it sucks for the vast majority of the conference. There won't be 2,000 people there outside of UTEP fans. Hope they get a big corporate sponsor or something. Isn't a conference tournament supposed to generate enough revenue to pay the administration costs for the conference each year? Good luck. At least Birmingham is slightly more central, even if its not an exciting or welcoming locale.
I'm not sure that there have been 2,000 fans outside of the home team in the past 10 years.
Seriously, with 14 teams in this conference we can't get 2000 from 13 schools combined?!! If thats the case this conference is just sad. I'm being a bit hypocritical because I haven't been to one yet since they've been in El Paso and Birmingham, but I did go to about 15 in a row when it was within driving distance. Theres no excuse for a top half division 1 conference to only have a couple thousand fans in attendance. The CIAA draws 5X that and they're D2.
Here are some quick numbers from 2014 that show CUSA a little better off. Was it in El Paso that year?
I find it hard to believe that Birmingham tournaments don't draw 2,000 traveling fans, I'll grant I haven't made it to one personally, but MT/WKU conservatively brought nearly half that to Hot Springs Arkansas both times I went for SBC tournaments.
Hahahaha to everyone complaining about the distance. Welcome to a day in our shoes. Don't you guys have airports and planes? I'm going to take a wild guess and say no one would take longer than four hours to fly into El Paso.
I see no problem in giving UAB a first round evening session game.This alone would boost attendance.
Also,WKU,MT,and SOUTHERN MISS need to do more to promote their fans going(ticket specials,less expensive motel packages).Make it less costly.
Actually, I was VERY disappointed in the WKU and MT crowds the last two years.If you are a fan--PLAN.Get those one or two days off from work ahead of time and GO to Birmingham.Great town and lots to do.
MT to UAB--2.8 hrs drive 4 lane
WKU to UAB--3.25 hrs drive 4 lane
S. MISS to UAB--3.4 hrs drive 4 lane
No excuses for these three.NONE!
Hopefully, MT's NCAA win and WKU's new coach will bring excitement and more fans if Birmingham is chosen.
According to http://www.geomidpoint.com/ the exact geographic center of the conference is right about halfway between Hattiesburg and Birmingham. That's with all 14 teams included. It's about the same with ODU and El Paso removed. The tournament should be at either of those two, barring a better/different solution, IMO.
The 3-5 geographic outlier teams would be the only teams to suffer at that point, and it would also open up neutral cities in the region, like NO and Memphis, for discussion at a later date if we don't move to a higher seed hosts format.
(This post was last modified: 05-24-2016 08:28 PM by MUther.)
(05-24-2016 08:24 PM)MUther Wrote: According to http://www.geomidpoint.com/ the exact geographic center of the conference is right about halfway between Hattiesburg and Birmingham. That's with all 14 teams included. It's about the same with ODU and El Paso removed. The tournament should be at either of those two, barring a better/different solution, IMO.
The 3-5 geographic outlier teams would be the only teams to suffer at that point, and it would also open up neutral cities in the region, like NO and Memphis, for discussion at a later date if we don't move to a higher seed hosts format.
Weighted for fan-attendance, the center of the conference is much closer to Charlotte.
(05-24-2016 09:10 PM)jaminniner Wrote: Are there any venues available to host the tournament in Nashville? If you want folks to attend how about a location that is fun to visit.
Middle is right outside. Is there another arena besides bridgestone?
We should only allow 8 team in the tournament, and all game should be on campus sites. Neutral site is a disaster. C-USA is still in the mindset that Cincy, Memphis, Louisville, Marquette, and DePaul are in the league. We have a conference the runs from the Atlantic Ocean to the Rio Grande. We have schools that can't sell 1000 tix to a home game, much less get 50 people to go to Birmingham or El Paso. Sure playing on campus sites sounds bush league, but we need to stop worrying about what others might think and do what is right for the conference. Imagine the fun on campus hosting quarterfinal, semifinal, and championship games. There will actually be people there to watch and good money will be made by those host schools by getting up to 3 more home games that matter.
CUSA fans are not buying into this conference. It's time to stop trying to force feed the fans and start securing feedback from the students and fans. Until the fans buy into a conference it remains a one team conference with no at large invites. The feedback could be collected during games and in one season the conference would know the heart beat of its fan base.
The heartbeat of the fans is going to say "play teams we care about". and that will be different for every team because geography plays such a huge role.
ODU fans truly couldn't care less about playing North Texas or UTSA and I'm sure theirs feel the same way about the Monarchs. ODU fans care about Charlotte and UAB because there is a long history there. WKU because they're good and there is some history there. Marshall a little bit because they're one of the closer teams now, but thats in its infancy. What we really care about is playing VCU, GMU, JMU and ECU, though admittedly its not as heated now that we aren't conference rivals with those four any more. Oh, and any P5 team we can get to stop by. Especially Va Tech since we own them in hoops too. I would imagine a team like So. Miss would care about playing So. Alabama, Ark. St, La Tech, UAB, Tulane and any P5 school, especially an SEC one. So I figure the problem is we're all stuck here together for whatever reason, and not in a conference that makes sense historically or geographically. The AAC and SB are in the same boat. The only difference is the AAC has a couple names that can still peak the interest of a casual fan like UConn, Memphis or Cincy. When they leave, the American will be in the same boat too. Hopefully thats when sensible realignment can begin. The MW & MAC are what they are and are probably fine with that.
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TOurnament is in either El Paso or Brimingham
![[Image: feature-bk-2017-tourni.jpg?ssl=1]](https://i1.wp.com/thedailydragonblog.files.wordpress.com/2016/05/feature-bk-2017-tourni.jpg?ssl=1)
to everyone complaining about the distance. Welcome to a day in our shoes. Don't you guys have airports and planes? I'm going to take a wild guess and say no one would take longer than four hours to fly into El Paso.
