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Post by bonawolf02 on Nov 24, 2015 12:31:48 GMT -5
This is a point no one wants to recognize. Most of these are not attendance driven tournaments. Hell, some of them are held in hotel ball rooms with temporary stands. It's all about the TV draw and contracts that none of us are privy to. I don't know what expense, if any, the school has to pick up to participate, but that certainly could be a factor. I would further contend that college sports aren't attendance driven any more. That's as true for these tournaments as it is for Michigan putting 100,000+ in the big house for football. Regardless of the viewership vs. attendance component....which agreed, attendance doesn't really mean crap for these early season tourney....I haven't heard an argument on why the Bonnies can't get in one of these after 13 years. There's a list of 20+ teams that the Bonnies would make for a more compelling match up coinciding with better viewership. There's upsets all the time in these tourney's - with the parity in the game today, trying to match up the "best" championship final no longer exists. Tournament organizers just cannot bet on that any longer.
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Post by sony on Nov 24, 2015 12:51:03 GMT -5
see my earlier post!
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Post by class70 on Nov 24, 2015 13:02:33 GMT -5
I am going to guess most likely #3 too. We have to somehow market how well our fan base travels and buys merchandise. I would think that would be a huge factor in getting invited to one of these tournaments. All I can remember at Nashville was how the t-shirts with St.Bonaventure on them sold out way before the 1st game, which wasn't even our game, and how our t-shirts were the only ones sold out. I took the shuttle bus from the parking lot at Titan (now Nissan) Stadium to the Bridgestone Arena. No other Bonnies on the bus, so I made an announcement: "Ladies and Gentlemen, after today you will all be St. Bonaventure fans." Many nodded in agreement and nobody dissented. Some remembered the vintage Bonnies of my youth. As to holiday tourneys, I suspect this is entirely a coaching decision and it may be something as mundane as wanting to spend Thanksgiving in Olean and have some quiet time to work on weaknesses spotted in the first few OOC games.
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Post by agoo on Nov 24, 2015 14:24:10 GMT -5
Regardless of the viewership vs. attendance component....which agreed, attendance doesn't really mean crap for these early season tourney....I haven't heard an argument on why the Bonnies can't get in one of these after 13 years. There's a list of 20+ teams that the Bonnies would make for a more compelling match up coinciding with better viewership. There's upsets all the time in these tourney's - with the parity in the game today, trying to match up the "best" championship final no longer exists. Tournament organizers just cannot bet on that any longer. ...except I just made the argument a few posts earlier. A school with 30,000 students and 300,000 living alumni is going to move ratings in a way that we can't. Those teams are attractive for TV dollars and advertising and the tournaments are set up for those schools to make runs to the finals. We're good enough to beat many of those teams on any given night, so its not worth the risk to have us take out one of those schools and their viewers. Now that we're clear of the scandal, we'd be a prospect for those tournaments if we were bad. We were probably off the list for a while because no one wanted to be associated with the scandal. Now its because we're too good for what they want small schools to do, i.e. lose by double digits to a second rate program with a huge alumni/student base.
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Post by libonnie91 on Nov 24, 2015 14:35:56 GMT -5
i rather keep a normal schedule with ample time in between games to get practices in.... i dont think schools like us get much out of these tournaments. The P5 teams that play essentially use these as scrimmages and beat up on the teams that buy their way into these tournaments.
its just like when college teams play an MLB team during spring training. its cool and a great experience for your athletes but in reality you are not getting many "teaching/Learning" moments and youre using up your bullpen on meaningless games.
these games obviously are not meaningless but i think not even having to travel outside of New York State during our OOC is much more beneficial. the athletes get to stay up to date in classes before the grind of the conference schedule and we have a better chance of developing younger players and allowing them to gain some confidence
i believe these foreign trips that teams take during the summer are more beneficial. gets the team to gel, younger guys get a chance to play before it matters, and you are playing real games months before the season starts.
i for one enjoy our 1-2 big OOC games. the rest are great tuneups for the conference schedule
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Post by bonawolf02 on Nov 24, 2015 14:44:17 GMT -5
Regardless of the viewership vs. attendance component....which agreed, attendance doesn't really mean crap for these early season tourney....I haven't heard an argument on why the Bonnies can't get in one of these after 13 years. There's a list of 20+ teams that the Bonnies would make for a more compelling match up coinciding with better viewership. There's upsets all the time in these tourney's - with the parity in the game today, trying to match up the "best" championship final no longer exists. Tournament organizers just cannot bet on that any longer. ...except I just made the argument a few posts earlier. A school with 30,000 students and 300,000 living alumni is going to move ratings in a way that we can't. Those teams are attractive for TV dollars and advertising and the tournaments are set up for those schools to make runs to the finals. We're good enough to beat some of those teams, so its not worth the risk to have us take out one of those schools and their viewers. except....I just made the argument that tournament organizers cannot bank on "chalk" for these tournaments anymore. Any one of those smaller teams have the capability of beating the "higher seed" and we've already seen in a number of times this year - so the argument that SBU has a better shot at beating one of the big teams vs. the others, is not a valid argument. And you're telling me Towson, Norfolk St., Monmouth, Bradley, Hofstra, Illinois St., Missouri St. among others would muster up more interested viewers than SBU? I don't see that....
I think it really comes down how aggressive a school and athletics program is in getting into these types of tournaments.....which I would say, SBU hasn't exactly been real bullish over the past 10+ years.
Would be interesting to hear Coach Schmidt's take on this as mentioned in a previous post.
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Post by agoo on Nov 24, 2015 15:53:40 GMT -5
For the small hit you take on viewership in the first round with Towson, Norfolk St., Monmouth, Bradley, Hofstra, Illinois St., or Missouri St., you get a safer match up for Florida State, UNC, Maryland, Duke, Arizona, NC State, and others. Yes, I know Hofstra beat FSU and there was another upset somewhere. But there are many, many more cases of the big school beating up little guys on their way to the finals.
As you also note, it takes two to make a tournament happen. I think there's a strong reason for networks to not want us. There may also be a strong reason for Schmidt to not want a tournament.
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Post by gdub2009 on Nov 24, 2015 16:39:15 GMT -5
You have to be in the right tournament though. Some of the tournaments I would be interested would be: Maui (That will never happen), Charleston Classic, Puerto Rico Tip-Off, Battle 4 Atlantis, or the AdovoCare Invitational. These tournaments have quality teams, but most of them are also shown on ESPN. I doubt ESPN is clamoring to have St.Bonaventure in a tourney. Now if we can get into one of these tournaments that is awesome, but I really have no idea how can do that or if we can afford it. It makes me wonder if a team like Towson is paying their way because they do have a larger athletic budget than we do.
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