Here’s the latest on the UMass-Dartmouth saga.
Interesting comments from Louise Goodrum, Athletic Director at UMD:
“It’s an oversight on my part,” Goodrum said, “We went through the bid process and it covered the first round. I didn’t put down for the quarterfinals, because I didn’t suspect we’d be in position to host at the quarterfinals level.”
“It would be nice to host,” Goodrum said. “I know the NCAA has policy and procedure they need to follow. They do a lot of championship games, If they give us a little break that opens the door in the future to other schools. I’ve learned that in the future I’ll bid for everything and see how things happen.”
I talked with an official at another school, who agreed with me that the bid process needs to be revised. The notion of submitting essentially the same bid for different rounds is counterproductive. This official told me that for basketball, his school submitted four bids, two each for men (first and second rounds) and women (first and second rounds). All four bids are identical. “It’s the same gym,” he said. “And we don’t even think we’ll make the NCAAs.”
Imagine the paperwork generated by all these schools submitting “just in case” bids. But, based on the hard lesson UMD learned this week, its looks like there’s no alternative.
