BCPanther wrote:siudawgs wrote:Posted this on the Saluki board but will copy-paste in case anyone here knows:
I haven't heard this discussed, but I'm guessing they went to Sunday finales across the league the last couple years due to TV slot availability? It probably would be better for the teams to finish on Saturday like they used to, in order to allow for more rest/prep time leading up to Arch Madness, especially with most teams now having to start on Thursday. It's a pretty quick turnaround now with finishing on Sunday and then having to head to St. Louis rather quickly.
Also would be better for the fans to have more time to know when their team is playing.
They went to Sunday for TV and officials. If you've got a winner take all game or something really important for seeding, you'd much rather have the officials we have mid-week and on Sunday than relying on the 'Saturday Night in the Valley' boys.
I think the UNI-Loyola game a couple years ago was the tipping point. I'm thrilled UNI won but, hoo boy, did Loyola get a terrible whistle all night.
As to knowing when your team is playing. That's a uniquely SIU phenomenon. None of the rest of us are really close enough to not just plan on making a weekend of it anyway regardless of when we play.
The final has been on Sunday ever since (network) CBS picked it up in 2006. And it moved, because, well we wanted to be on CBS and that's when they wanted us. Prior to that, it was on Monday night, because that's when ESPN slotted us during Championship week.
Now to the question of general schedule, there are some leagues that do break up the consecutive days, but usually those are leagues that play on home floors and teams have to travel between rounds. There may be one league that staggers a round to give an extra day rest to their lower seeds, but most of the leagues that would see the need to do that, already protect them to the semifinals. The Big West re-seeds every round.
The league probably doesn't see much value in having the opening round on Wednesday and then having 4 teams with nothing to do for a day, while also potentially disadvantaging the top 4 teams that earned a bye to the quarterfinal. St. Louis would love that idea, though.