Thoughts on New CBI Tourney for Basketball

All,

 

Looks like Utah will be playing UTEP in the CBI tournament, and while it is a far cry from the NCAA tournament, at least it gives our squad some more opportunities to mexh together before the offseason.

 

With there being 3 basketball tournaments now, (the NCAA, CBI, and NIT) I am wondering why there is still only one College Football championship series in the BCS?  Why has no one gone and made a secondary 12 or 16 team Non-BCS college football championship that works like a playoff?  I think the CBI has an interesting setup here:

 

Sixteen teams will compete in this new postseason event, hosted at on-campus arenas throughout the country. The CBI will provide a meaningful opportunity for teams that are deserving of a postseason experience.

The College Basketball Invitational will be a single-elimination tournament, up until the Championship Series, with all games being played at campus sites. The Championship Series will be a best of three series, home-away-home, in which the higher seed will get the first and last (if necessary) home games.

• The event will feature eight first-round games, four second-round games, a semifinal round and then a Championship Series
• The opening round of the event will take place March 18 and 19
• The winner of each opening round game will advance to the round of eight on March 24
• The semifinals will be held on March 26
• The Championship Series will take place on March 31, April 2 and April 4.

Bracketing will be done geographically into four regions of the country (East, West, South, Midwest) to minimize missed class time. Brackets will be balanced competitively within each region. The process will take place after the NCAA Tournament field is announced.

The 16-team field will consist of teams that are not selected for the NCAA Tournament. Teams will be invited based upon their performance during their conference and non-conference schedule, as well as how well the team is playing at the end of the regular season.

According to this, they are playing at campus sites, which if I understand it correctly means that the games will be held at the team's home court who has the higher seed, much like the NBA or NFL does for their playoffs.  If you did a playoff in football like this, it would be best to do it the same way which would minimize a lot of cost in holding games on neutral turf. 

I also looked up the company behind this new tournament.  Seems like an interesting group, as they say they help create these events through all of their business and client resources.  Sounds like they need to come up with a football tournament too.

 

Tijs
--
Tijs Limburg
Chairman and CTO of DMX - Digital Media eXceleron, Inc.
Get eXcited!
www.dmxed.com

Blogs:
http://phystrings.blogspot.com/
http://getoutofthedark.blogspot.com/

The "Don't Tread on Me" Flag: The First Navy Jack is enjoying renewed popularity these days thanks to an order from the Secretary of the Navy that directs all U.S. Navy ships to fly the First Navy Jack for the duration of the War on Terrorism.