THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
SPORTS
FRIDAY, MARCH 10, 2006
WWW.KANSAN.COM
DOWN THE HALL Auto-bid tourneys hurt some schools
BY TIM HALL thall@kansan.com
It's a topic that comes up a lot in today's sports world and it will probably continue. But that doesn't mean I can't stress my hatred for it. The automatic-bid tournaments placed at the end of regular season completely negate the entire season's play for some schools in the country.
Look at the poor mid-major schools for example. The future second-round-and-out Gonzaga Bulldogs just managed to beat a 12-17 Loyola Marymount team in the finals of the West Coast Conference tournament. Gonzaga was playing at home, but only managed a one-point victory after a Loyola forward missed a lay-up as time expired. My point is this: it's not fair to allow that Loyola Marymount team (if it had won) an automatic bid into the NCAA tournament with a 13-17 record when there are other schools that are legitimately better than them sitting at home or playing in the NIT.
Gonzaga is the only team that deserves to go dancing from the WCC and the selection committee knows it. The conference tournaments allow a team that didn't play well the entire season to charge up for one three-game winning streak to earn a trip to the NCAA tournament.
All fans has their favorite day in sports. Some choose the Super Bowl, others go with the college football National Championship, and even some crazies circle Daytona on their calendars.
It's not fair to the teams that play better basketball for an entire season. If LMU were to get in, teams like Maryland, Florida State, Colorado, and South Carolina should definitely get in. They play tougher schedules and have winning records.
As you read this I am in Dallas at the Big 12 tournament preparing to broadcast the KU game for KUJH. I'm loving every minute of it, but I hate the principal cf it. God forbid a team like Missouri goes on a run and wins this thing. They would just lose in the first round anyway.
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Hall is a Woodsbride, Va., senior in journalism.
For me, it's Selection Sunday. It's a day that tells us where everything is going to take place for the next fev weeks, often forcing us to book last-minute spring break plans. But I'll tell you what event in the sports year I do not circle, and never will — conference tournaments.
In 2001, the Iowa Hawkeyes rolled through the Big Ten tournament after a porous regular season. They got blasted in the second round of the NCAA tournament by Kentucky. In 2002, Ohio State won the Big Ten tournament as a No. 8 seed. They also lost in the second round of the NCAA tournament to Missouri. The conferences that are at least doing something right with this are the Big Sky and West Coast Conferences, who award schools for playing well in the regular season. Those conferences let the regular season winner play host to the conference tournament. The winner of the conference tourney still gets an auto-bid to the big dance, but at least the regular season champ has the advantage it deserves. In the WCC's case, they can go ahead and book the "Kennel" in Spokane, Wash., where Gonzaga plays, for the next 10 years.
▼ BIG 12 MEN'S BASKETBALL
Tony Gutierrez/THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
iowa State's Rahshon Clark, center, wrestles with Oklahoma State's Byron Eaton and JamesOn Curry, right, as he drives to the basket in the first half of the Big 12 Men's Basketball Championship first-round game in Dallas Thursday.
It's rematch time OSU beats ISU, earns right to play Kansas
BY RYAN COLAIANINI
rcolaiani@kansan.com
KANSAN SENIOR SPORTSWRIVER
DALLAS — Bill Self was ready to sit down with his team for dinner and watch the Oklahoma State-Iowa State game at the team hotel on Thursday.
There was only one problem — the game was blacked out on his hotel television.
Self quickly came over to the American Airlines Center to get a glimpse of the team his Jayhawks will face today.
What Self saw was an Oklahoma State team that played
the best it has offensively this season during the game's first 25 minutes. Oklahoma State built an 18-point lead just 5 minutes into the second half.
"We did the things we needed to do to win this game," Oklahoma State coach Sean Sutton said. "We wanted to establish an
inside game."
The lead dwindled, though, with Iowa State cutting the lead to two points with less than 2 minutes to play. The Cowboys have lost many close games this season — but not last night.
SEE REMATCH ON PAGE 8B
▼ CHEERLEADING SQUAD
Injury causes rule review Cheerleaders told to stop performing riskier stunts
BY ERIC JORGENSEN
ejorgensen@kansan.com
KANSAN STAFF WRITER
Southern Illinois cheerleader Kristi Yamaoka was the first domino to fall. The 18-year-old
Yamaoka triggered the rest of the pyramid to collapse. The American Association of Cheerleading Coaches and Advisors advised all conference commissioners and tournament directors to prohibit all basket tosses and two-and-a-half-high pyramids for the remainder of the season Jim Marchiony, Kansas associate athletics director, said the University understood the reasoning for the AACCA's recommendation. "There aren't a lot of serious injuries," Marchiony said. "But one is too many."
fell head-first after a high toss during a Saluki basketball game last weekend. She suffered a broken vertebrae and a concussion.
including tournament play
Basket toss stunts are when two or more squad members toss another member roughly 15 feet in the air. Two-and-a-
half-high pyramids are when two rows of people are formed on top of one another, with a third person at the top squatting.
The AACCA told coaches and advisers via e-mail that it was considering a permanent rule change regarding tosses and pyramids, but the nationally televised incident led them to take immediate action. The association will re-evaluate the rule prior to the 2006-07 season.
"Our goal is to manage the risk associated with cheerleading and minimize the risk to participants while allowing for reasonably safe skills," the AACCA said in the e-mail. "We hope and expect that this action will help us all to reach those goals."
Kansan file photo
The association said another accident, even a minor one, could bring more negative attention.
Thus, it decided to advise the conferences and tournaments to prohibit these dangerous stunts until further review.
Jim Marchiony, Kansas associate athletics director, said the University understood the reasoning for the AACCAs recommendation.
SEE CHEER ON PAGE 4B
Kansas cheerleader Lyndsay Bettchall pumps up the crowd during the game against Kansas State on Jan. 14 in Allen Fieldhouse. The American Association of Cheerleading Coaches and Advisors have prohibited all basket tosses and two-and-a-half-high pyramids for the remainder of the season, including tournament play.
DANCING NACHOS
Big 12 should set new standard
BY MICHAEL
PHILLIPS
mphillips@kansan.com
DALLAS - I've got a crazy idea.
I don't know what triggered it. Maybe it was too much time in the Texas sun. Or maybe it was seeing Barry Bonds dressed as Paula Abdul. There's just no way to know.
Today in Dallas, four teams that are in the NCAA tournament will beat up four teams not likely to make the NCAA tournament. I'd like to change that.
I'm well aware that this is never going to happen. Television stations aren't exactly chomping at the bit to cover Baylor vs. Nebraska, and fans of the winning teams often enjoy making the trip to Dallas or Kansas City to follow their team.
Under my proposal, the Big 12 would allow only eight teams to participate in the season-ending tournament; the worst eight.
By doing this, the top four teams in the league would be rewarded for a terrific regular season and allowed a weekend of rest before beginning the NCAA tournament.
The lower eight would be given a second opportunity to make the tournament, which they don't really have under the current system. Let's not kid ourselves, Kansas State's odds of winning the tournament this season are about the same as Jim Wooldridge's odds of getting the Duke job. It's not gonna happen.
Television viewers would be treated to games that were better, not worse. People watch the championship games of conferences they've never heard of because they mean something. When Fairleigh-Dickinson plays Monmouth, it turns into a real game, and often a close one, when a trip to the NCAA tournament is on the line.
If the Big East and ACC saw that the Big 12 teams got an extra week, they'd be crying foul within seconds. I.J. Redick would probably write a poem about the injustice of it all.
Still, if even just one conference did this, I have to think the others would quickly follow suit. Nobody wants to be at a competitive disadvantage, in the same way that NFL teams go all-out to try to earn an off-week before the plavoffs.
The same formula would work in bigger conferences like the Big East. Currently the top 12 of the conference's 16 teams are invited. Instead, the bottom 12 would be invited, allowing a whole new group of teams to experience how futile it is to try to win four in a row.
Like I said, it's a crazy idea. However, giving the best teams in the conference a chance to rest before the real tournament has a huge upside. In addition to the extra money from putting another team in the NCAA, teams like Kansas and Texas would enter the tournament well-rested, instead of having to beat up on each other in the days before the dance.
Don't write me off so quickly. Remember, in a conference in which Bobby Knight's son can become a head coach, anything can happen.
Phillips is a Wichita junior in journalism
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