UVM Hoop Cat

Per Chris Villani According to this article on tonight's matchup in Newsday, SBU has been given a waiver to host the championship game at Pritchard Gym, contingent upon it getting there, obviously.

http://www.newsday.com/sports/colleg...ight-1.4650754


I have a hard time believing this is true, if so it's pretty shocking. That's pretty awful going against league bylaws like that. I think it's especially bush league given the league is not letting BU participate in the conference tournament this season per league bylaws.

But let's talk about this for a second- wasn't attendance 4500-5000 fans last year? Wasn't there like 1500 students alone last year? How do SBU fans feel about not being allowed to watch the game, because 600 tickets will still need to go to the opponent. So there will be what 1,000 home fans and 600 opposing fans? Doesn't make any sense how that's beneficial.

Seems like an incredibly stupid decision for all parties to forego that additional ticket revenue and alienate your fanbase, not to mention making the league look even more small/time & ridiculous on ESPN.


Discuss.

__________________
"Let's win this game for all the small schools that never had a chance to get here"
- Hoosiers,
& UVM mens basketball NCAA's 2005

uvm4life20

Agreed. If 600 tickets go to the home team the gym becomes less effective. Barely home court advantage. Talk about bowing to SB wishes to try to keep them. This is crazy. I think SB wants to stay away from the bad karma from last year's loss.

I wouldn't be suprised if SB got a waiver on 600 tickets going to the away team's fans as well.

farfromtheshow

They have - I tweeted it two days ago.

oceandogs

They started construction on the arena last June, so that's completely out of order. Pritchard is the only option.

http://www.goseawolves.org/facilitie...10-arena.html#

farfromtheshow

The league has done its best to build a yellow brick road to the NCAA's for stony brook... Seems like they haven't learned from their mistakes with bu: they let bu dictate the direction of the AE for more than a decade and still got dumped at the alter when something better came along. Bowing to sbu isn't going to keep them in the league.

farfromtheshow

No, it's not: in 2010 the league was going to make sbu host in a bigger venue: had stony brook hosted the championship it would have been held at UHart... The league has changed course, and if sbu hosts this year the opposing fans are going to get hosed.

UVM Hoop Cat

Minimum 3,000 seat facility to host the championship game, so that's thrown out the window, has the minimum 600 ticket rule been thrown out the window as well?

__________________
"Let's win this game for all the small schools that never had a chance to get here"
- Hoosiers,
& UVM mens basketball NCAA's 2005

UVM Hoop Cat

It certainly appears to be that way. Hosting any conference championship in that gym certainly isn't in the best interests of the conference and only benefits one member.

__________________
"Let's win this game for all the small schools that never had a chance to get here"
- Hoosiers,
& UVM mens basketball NCAA's 2005

oceandogs

Nope, in 2010 the conference was going to make Stony Brook host the game in the Stony Brook Arena. That's why Stony Brook fixed the court up and had it ready to host Illinois in the NIT. This is the first time that the Arena has been truly unavailable, and that's why this is the first time the waiver to host in Pritchard was accepted.

PatrickGymRat

Whats next commish? You ban BU and scream bylaws and you bypass bylaws to let Stony Brook play in their high school gym? Next move is to have UVM spot Phony Brook 10 points because they lose every year they compete for the AE championship? Now SBU is most likely holding the league hostage at the heels of BU moving to the Patriot League. I hope we are pursuing the Patriot League cause the America East doesn't deserve a clean, honest program and perennial winner who plays by the rules like UVM.

UVM Hoop Cat

To be clear though on the BU AE tourney ban vs Pritchard potentially Hosting AE Chmp game thing, all the schools in the conference had to vote to enforce bylaws that keep BU out of the tournament; this is simply a unilateral decision by the commish to grant a waiver and go against bylaws...which of course, is bull$hit.

__________________
"Let's win this game for all the small schools that never had a chance to get here"
- Hoosiers,
& UVM mens basketball NCAA's 2005

farfromtheshow

No, you're wrong - while it's popular belief on here that sbu was going to host in the arena, like they did after a crazy series of events gave them the NIT game (which I covered), it's note true: they'd reached and agreement with UHart... But what do I know I'm never right about these things.

UVM Hoop Cat

Now I want to know the (hypothetical) "plan" and details for allotment.

Wow. Apparently Fiore has no qualms with shutting out a couple thousand SBU fans. No shame. Total self-serving move.

Seriously hope this doesn't come to fruition. If everyone wasn't already rooting against SBU to lose, they should be now

__________________
"Let's win this game for all the small schools that never had a chance to get here"
- Hoosiers,
& UVM mens basketball NCAA's 2005

NotDeadYet

SBU also will not allow any TV or radio broadcasting of the games or any video to be taken. All the officials must also be SBU grads whose children all go to or have gone to SBU. The opposing team is not allowed any chairs to sit on during the game and they have to play barefoot.

uvm4life20

Come on FFTS don't get down on yourself. You are right occasionally.