BIg Sky Tourney to Vegas?

[Kiltman]

Wow did I miss a lot since the AZ game. I finally logged on and caught up. unch: So it's time for me to chime in. :twocents:

Moving to Vegas is a dumbass idea. hno:

I'm pretty much in agreement with all the cons that have already been expressed. But a neutral site is not the worst idea. It would have to be centrally located and accessible. SLC? I like the idea for more than the home town feel WSU would get. It is close to the conference HQ, an NBA arena, accessible by multiple means of travel, hospitable, and has the accommodations for visitors, lodging, food, alcohol arty: , entertainment, and sightseeing. It puts the revenue in a state that hosts 2 of the conference teams while NV has zero ties to our athletics. The tournament would force the regional media to pay attention (Root, Altitude, KSL), rather than let us get overlooked in a town of dreamers and tweekers (Vegas, aka Far East Los Angeles :finger: ).

Why not bring another location into this conversation, Boise. It has accessibility, a central location, hotel(s?), and an out-of-conference university that will let us pay to use their arena. Surely there's someone that would pay a sponsorship fee. And the state of Idaho also has 2 teams in the conference that could benefit from the tax revenue. There's no real home advantage there. And everyone could drive it in half-a-day or less in the worst case scenario. (Sorry UND, you don't matter because we all had to travel to your sh*#hole :butt: all season and you joined a conference that was distant.)

Driving distance to Boise:

UND - 18 hrs 56 min
NAU - 12 hrs 45 min
UNC - 11 hrs 38 min
Sac - 9 hrs 5 min
SUU - 8 hrs 15 min
MSU - 7 hrs 21 min
MT - 7 hrs 15 min
PSU - 6 hrs 43 min
EWU - 6 hrs 25 min
ID - 5 hrs 25 min
WSU - 4 hrs 30 min
ISU - 3 hrs 28 min

No, I don't really want to go to Boise, but it would sure be more beneficial to the conference than the middle of a desert. But, again, SLC has ALL the benefits. :stir:

P.S. Happy Fathers' Day :dance: :dance:

 

[SWWeatherCat]

So, did your catching up take all night? :lol: Your post log time on my screen says 5:30 am! What in the world are you dong up at that hour on a Father's Day, Sunday morning :yikes: ?

Anyway, neutral site attendance will not compare to attendance with the tourney held at a conference school, especially at Weber or the Montanas. I get that's not what this is about but I think it's a tragedy to remove the most exciting time of the season from the fan base. Not to mention, the regular season champ deserves some advantages in a one-seed conference.

The conference will still not travel well even if it's at SLC or Boise. Where are the travel numbers for SLC. All other things being equal, that's a helpful item to compare by (I'm too busy-- 'er, lazy-- to look 'em up myself). My complete guess at WSU attendance at a 30 minutes away ESA is 2K maybe 3K, whereas, at the DEC we're looking at 8K plus.

 

[hdqweber]

From the Las Cruces Sun article linked above:

The conference has reserved dates in March at the Orleans Arena in Las Vegas as well, Hurd said. The Orleans has hosted the tournament since 2010, but attendance has lacked as the WAC has deteriorated as a basketball conference.

"If we do leave Las Vegas, it's likely we would lose those dates we do have locked in the future," Hurd said. "We have a good relationship with the facility in Las Vegas. They know us and we know them, so that has been a positive.

"On the negative side, we haven't attracted fans in the number that we would like but there is no guarantee we would do that in any other location either."

Seems like the BSC decision makers just need to look at the recent WAC Vegas tourney to get an idea of what there is to gain/lose. If Vegas is working so well for them, why is the WAC considering moving it to PHX?

The WAC had crappy attendance because look at the schools in that conference now! It's a joke outside of NMSU and somewhat now UVU. It's become the throw-out-the-trash league. hno:

It's worth noting that the Big Sky went 4-8 against the WAC this past season, and both the WAC and Big West had higher conference RPI this past season. That goes to the point made in this thread that the broader answer here is the need to make the league stronger.

 

[Kiltman]

@SWWeatherCat I was trying to be productive between World Cup games. So I finally made the switch to Google Chrome last night and I was trying to do all my settings and customization and get all the right cookies to save. I figured I should also include this site... Who needs sleep? Not Charlie Sheen. And who needs to travel for a Big Sky Tourney? Not Weber. #winning