Cornell lacrosse 2014

[Jeff Hopkins '82]

Looks like NCAA tournament will have 18 teams next year, apparently with four lowest-ranked automatic qualifiers playing mid-week to determine which two will advance to round of 16 on the weekend:

http://www.insidelacrosse.com/news/2013/09/25/updated-ncaa-di-bracket-expands-18-teams

Hmm.  Why the four lowest ranked AQ's and not just the four lowest ranked teams?  Strikes me as big conference bias.

Not to mention just another way to get Hopkins into the tournament.

Because of this:

NCAA bylaws mandate that at least 50% of a tournament field be at-large qualifiers; with the number of AQ conferences rising to 10 next season, that means that the bracket must expand to either include 10 at-large berths or "eliminate" two AQs prior to the bracket officially beginning.


...teams will be considered tournament participants and the games will be held after tournament selection; the distinction now is that play-in games are not officially considered part of the bracket.

So they had to eliminate 2 AQ teams.  It would make sense to eliminate the lowest ranked ones.

OK.  Missed that.

But it still seems a jury-rigged solution to me.  If you have 10 conferences, and you have enough teams to justify the 50% rule, go up to 20 teams and be done with it.  And if the original rationale was that conferences were expected to be larger than 6 or 7 teams, then the rule itself needs modification.  Don't eliminate the AQ's and say they didn't make the tournament.

[Jim Hyla]

Looks like NCAA tournament will have 18 teams next year, apparently with four lowest-ranked automatic qualifiers playing mid-week to determine which two will advance to round of 16 on the weekend:

http://www.insidelacrosse.com/news/2013/09/25/updated-ncaa-di-bracket-expands-18-teams

Hmm.  Why the four lowest ranked AQ's and not just the four lowest ranked teams?  Strikes me as big conference bias.

Not to mention just another way to get Hopkins into the tournament.

Because of this:

NCAA bylaws mandate that at least 50% of a tournament field be at-large qualifiers; with the number of AQ conferences rising to 10 next season, that means that the bracket must expand to either include 10 at-large berths or "eliminate" two AQs prior to the bracket officially beginning.


...teams will be considered tournament participants and the games will be held after tournament selection; the distinction now is that play-in games are not officially considered part of the bracket.

So they had to eliminate 2 AQ teams.  It would make sense to eliminate the lowest ranked ones.

OK.  Missed that.

But it still seems a jury-rigged solution to me.  If you have 10 conferences, and you have enough teams to justify the 50% rule, go up to 20 teams and be done with it.  And if the original rationale was that conferences were expected to be larger than 6 or 7 teams, then the rule itself needs modification.  Don't eliminate the AQ's and say they didn't make the tournament.

But they do make the tournament.

And it was because of money.

"[Bracket expansion] is out of sync with the NCAA budget cycle to begin in the 2013-14 academic year. There isn't the money to expand the bracket right now,"

[jtn27]

I just got this email forwarded to me:

Battle at Bethpage IV- SAVE THE DATE
The Bethpage Educational Foundation is pleased to announce the the Battle at Bethpage IV will feature
NCAA Mens' Lacrosse Cornell v. Princeton
April 26, 2014
at the Bethpage Athletic Complex
This is a major game with national playoff implications and we expect a HUGE crowd. More details will follow.

"Bethpage Athletic Complex" is code for Bethpage High School football field. I'm not sure how they expect to have a "HUGE" crowd; these are the home bleachers. The away side is even smaller.

[phillysportsfan]

I just got this email forwarded to me:

Battle at Bethpage IV- SAVE THE DATE
The Bethpage Educational Foundation is pleased to announce the the Battle at Bethpage IV will feature
NCAA Mens' Lacrosse Cornell v. Princeton
April 26, 2014
at the Bethpage Athletic Complex
This is a major game with national playoff implications and we expect a HUGE crowd. More details will follow.

"Bethpage Athletic Complex" is code for Bethpage High School football field. I'm not sure how they expect to have a "HUGE" crowd; these are the home bleachers. The away side is even smaller.

Why is the game there?

[jtn27]

I just got this email forwarded to me:

Battle at Bethpage IV- SAVE THE DATE
The Bethpage Educational Foundation is pleased to announce the the Battle at Bethpage IV will feature
NCAA Mens' Lacrosse Cornell v. Princeton
April 26, 2014
at the Bethpage Athletic Complex
This is a major game with national playoff implications and we expect a HUGE crowd. More details will follow.

"Bethpage Athletic Complex" is code for Bethpage High School football field. I'm not sure how they expect to have a "HUGE" crowd; these are the home bleachers. The away side is even smaller.

Why is the game there?

I don't know. The only thing I could think of is that part of the deal with Princeton for the Giants Stadium game last year was that there would be a second neutral site game this year in place of the Princeton home game, and this was the best annual game available that wasn't already booked by other teams. I doubt it has to do with money because Bethpage is a fairly small school district and probably can't afford to pay much (if anything) to Princeton and Cornell, and as you can see from the picture, they won't be making much money at the gate.

[billhoward]

Looks as if Cornell and Princeton, at least not as a duo, were not invited back to the Konica Minolta Big City Classic in 2014. If there is a 2014. The website http://www.bigcityclassic.com/ has no info about a 2014 tournament at all, still references 2013. Cornell and Princeton probably agreed that if Cornell gave up its 2013 home game, Princeton would do it in 2014.

[TimV]

Wow. From Giants Metlife Stadium to the Bethpage Athletic Complex.  Can't believe they couldn't use or double up with a Hofstra or Stony Brook Stadium game. Part of the punishment for hazing?::whistle::

[TimV]

Hmm... just another way to get Hopkins into the tournament.

Jeez Jeff.  You watch games when you're in freakin' Korea.  Just buy a ticket and GO.**]

[Jeff Hopkins '82]

Hmm... just another way to get Hopkins into the tournament.

Jeez Jeff.  You watch games when you're in freakin' Korea.  Just buy a ticket and GO.**]

+1

[Jim Hyla]

Men's Lacrosse Trio Named To Team Canada Selection Camp Roster

"Sophomore Brennan Donville, as well as alumni Jesse Gamble '11 and Jason Noble '13 "

If anyone's interested, here's the whole roster.

[Weder]

2014 schedule is out.

Virginia and Syracuse are the big names of the nonconference opponents, but CU will play at Michigan as well. Scrimmages are against D-III schools (RIT and Cortland State) and the Iroquois Nationals.

[billhoward]

Good that softies Canisius and Siena are gone. Bucknell would have been a good short-bus-ride opponent to retain. Too bad there's not room for Army, a better nearby opponent than most other non-league competitors. Hofstra is good if you want to wave the Cornell recruiting flag on Long Island, giving us two LI games including the Princeton game in Bethpage (Princeton hosts this year) complementing the Cornell-hosts Princeton game last year at the Big City Classic at Giants-Jets stadium. BCC will not be played this year.

Code Select Expand

[b]2014 non-Ivy[/b]
Hobart @ TBD site <-- Cornell's year to host (Feb 22)
@ Binghamton
@ Michigan        <-- Cornell [i]at[/i] Michigan? Maybe the Big Ten paid Cornell a nice travel stipend?
Canisus           <-- [edit add] Nice if this was Army; more likely to be a ranked opponent
Virginia          <-- [edit] 2 of the 3 toughest non-league games at Schoellkopf
@ Colgate
Syracuse
@ Hofstra

[b]Gone from 2013[/b]
[s]Canisius[/s]
Bucknell          <-- lost 9-8 last year
Siena

[billhoward]

BCC is no more, according to the site, Big City Classic. I thought attendance was decent last year, announced 19,875. It drew 22,000-26,000 in its first four years, 2009-2012.

Thanks for your past support of the Big City Classic and Inside Lacrosse.

We hope to bring the Big City Classic back to MetLife Stadium in future seasons.

According to http://www.collegecrosse.com/2013/11/20/5125748/inside-lacrosse-big-city-classic-independence-classic-event-face-off-classic:

The magazine and lacrosse event coordinator [Inside Lacrosse] is only hosting one event this season: The Face Off Classic. ... This is a somewhat surprising development for the 2014 season. The 2013 Independence Classic [Chester, PA] was the first iteration of the event and failed to attract much of a gate at PPL Park (around 5,200 fans passed through the gates according to this box score). The loss of the event from the schedule this year is only interesting in the fact that the concept of "Classic" now requires only that a thing happened at least once. The Big City Classic, though, was quickly becoming the marquee event of the regular season, regularly drawing decent crowds (around 20,000 fans passed through the gates last year according to this box score) and featuring landscaping-defining games. The non-existence of the event this coming spring is going to leave a void on the national agenda, creating an open date on the late-spring calendars of Northeast fans .

The story also talks about declining attendance at NCAA tourney games. It didn't help last year that Maryland hosted Cornell in the first round, got blown out, and then Maryland was host site for the quarterfinals, along with Indianapolis.

[jeff '84]

Good that softies Canisius and Siena are gone. Bucknell would have been a good short-bus-ride opponent to retain. Too bad there's not room for Army, a better nearby opponent than most other non-league competitors. Hofstra is good if you want to wave the Cornell recruiting flag on Long Island, giving us two LI games including the Princeton game in Bethpage (Princeton hosts this year) complementing the Cornell-hosts Princeton game last year at the Big City Classic at Giants-Jets stadium. BCC will not be played this year.

Code Select Expand

[b]2014 non-Ivy[/b]
Hobart @ TBD site <-- Cornell's year to host (Feb 22)
@ Binghamton
@ Michigan        <-- Cornell [i]at[/i] Michigan? Maybe the Big Ten paid Cornell a nice travel stipend?
Virginia          <-- The only 2 non-league games clearly at Schoellkopf are the toughest
@ Colgate
Syracuse
@ Hofstra


[b]Gone from 2013[/b]
Canisius
Bucknell          <-- lost 9-8 last year
Siena

Mar. 4, 2014 4:00 p.m. vs Canisius College

[Jim Hyla]

So Inside Lacrosse picks us 17.

Here's their poll and their All-American list.