The fall sports season is in full swing, with NESCAC teams in most sports having completed their second weekend of full conference play. But despite all the action on the field, the most significant developments came from administrative offices.
At a meeting last Thursday, Sept. 20, the 11 NESCAC presidents voted to continue to allow at-large bids to the NCAA Tournament and to alter the structure of the conference tournament.
On Thursday, the presidents met to discuss the format of the end-of-season tournaments. Faculties of many of the schools were upset that players had to miss classes on short notice for mid-week tournament games, necessitating a change in scheduling.
"Tuesday games were a problem," said Bill Gehling, Tufts' athletic director. "You would find out Monday that you had a game the next day three hours away," he said.
Seeking a solution that would eliminate mid-week games, the presidents asked the athletic directors to come up with a new format for the tournament. The system they created complies with the presidents' needs, but will force teams to play back-to-back games two weekends in a row. The number-one seed will receive a bye in the first round, while the two through seven seeds will play at a pre-determined site on the Sunday following the final game of the season.
For soccer, the sites will be announced about two weeks beforehand, providing teams adequate time to make travel plans. The field hockey games will be played at Bates. Because games for winter sports are generally held at night, they will not be affected by the new structure. In the spring, the lacrosse teams will switch to the new setup. Baseball and softball already play under a different system.
The athletic directors, in return, asked the presidents to reconsider their decision to reinstate the ban on at-large bids to NCAA Tournaments. The policy would have prevented all but the conference champion from advancing to NCAAs, and was scheduled to go back into effect this year. But changes to the NCAA's tournament bid selection procedure had eliminated many of the reasons behind the ban, Gehling said.
Prior to 1993, NESCAC teams were not allowed to accept bids to the NCAA Tournament, and could only compete in the ECACs. From 1993-1998, NESCAC teams had unlimited access to both tournaments on a trial basis. In 1998, the presidents voted not to continue to allow at-large bids to the NCAA Tournament, or any bids to the ECAC Tournament, and instead to permit only the conference champion, determined by the end-of-season conference tournament, to advance to the NCAAs. Both 1999 and 2000 were used as "phasing-in" years.
Before the 1999 season, however, the NCAA introduced an automatic qualifier system for giving out bids for the championship tournament. The system specifies that each conference winner receives an automatic bid, a certain number of bids are given to independent teams, and the remainder are given out as nation-wide at-large bids.
Previously, groups of bids had been given to regional committees, which would distribute them to teams within the region. Because of the strength of the NESCAC, a large number of teams, sometimes as many as four or five, would receive NCAA bids. But under the new system, it is unlikely that more than two, or possibly three, NESCAC teams, including the conference champion, will advance to the tournament.
"I'm excited about the at-large decision," Gehling said. "As far as the tournament structure, I would have preferred to have kept the same structure for another year, but I understand the concerns that they have.
"The other choice was to cut the tournament to four teams, and it's much better to allow tournament access to seven teams, especially in such a strong conference."
While the presidents decided Thursday to allow at-large bids to the NCAAs this year, they did not make a definite decision for future years. NESCAC teams will still be barred from participating in ECAC tournaments.
"It's a disappointment to me," Gehling said. "In the last few years, some of the most exciting events have involved the ECACs."
With the return of at-large bids, non-conference games re-assume an important role on Jumbo schedules. Had the previous system remained in place, non-conference games would have had virtually no bearing on postseason play. But although the NESCAC Tournament seeding will still be determined by conference record, and the winner will receiver an automatic qualifier bid, overall record will play an important role in determining which teams receive at-large bids.
"Now all those mid-week, non-conference games mean a lot more," said Martha Whiting, the women's soccer coach.
