"Specialness" of Final 4 now gone...

Heelinohio

Heelinohio

Active member
First of all congrats to all the teams who have advanced to the semi-finals of your respective divisions. You worked hard and achieved a measure of success that all aspire to. It is a shame that you won't get to experience the special feeling of making it to THE Final Four. That Final Four 'energy' and big-time venue...gone. I have had the good fortune of being a long-time Pickerington girls basketball fan (and long-ago player parent). The excitement of going to St. John, the Schott, and (even) UD was always something to behold! The gathering of all the best teams in the state at one location. That has all gone away... This year's watered-down semifinals will be played all over the state. Our Pick Central girls and Rocky River Magnificat get to play at Mansfield high... on early Sunday afternoon... I feel sad for the players...
 
 
I think the correct decision wouldve made sense to have a site in columbus to host all of the Semi games if they were going to go away from UD hosting. Having it all at one site that is central for everyone makes more sense than splitting it up all over the state. Taft Colisuem or ODU would've been a great choice to host all of the semi's in my opinion and would've kept some of that excitement you were talking about in playing in a nice arena and in front of big crowds. Some of these games will have very small crowds.
 
Heelinohio said:
First of all congrats to all the teams who have advanced to the semi-finals of your respective divisions. You worked hard and achieved a measure of success that all aspire to. It is a shame that you won't get to experience the special feeling of making it to THE Final Four. That Final Four 'energy' and big-time venue...gone. I have had the good fortune of being a long-time Pickerington girls basketball fan (and long-ago player parent). The excitement of going to St. John, the Schott, and (even) UD was always something to behold! The gathering of all the best teams in the state at one location. That has all gone away... This year's watered-down semifinals will be played all over the state. Our Pick Central girls and Rocky River Magnificat get to play at Mansfield high... on early Sunday afternoon... I feel sad for the players...
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I agree.. one example, .Princeton girls go to Fairfield High School. An arena they have now played at 4x this season including this game....(as a member of the G.M.C conference, and for the 3rd time in a row during the post-season).
 
LHS WRESTLING said:
I agree.. one example, .Princeton girls go to Fairfield High School. An arena they have now played at 4x this season including this game....(as a member of the G.M.C conference, and for the 3rd time in a row during the post-season).
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Yeah, I wondered about that as well once I saw they were playing at Fairfield against Springboro. The games should be played at a truly neutral court, meaning not a GMC or GWOC facility.

Heelinohio said:
First of all congrats to all the teams who have advanced to the semi-finals of your respective divisions. You worked hard and achieved a measure of success that all aspire to. It is a shame that you won't get to experience the special feeling of making it to THE Final Four. That Final Four 'energy' and big-time venue...gone. I have had the good fortune of being a long-time Pickerington girls basketball fan (and long-ago player parent). The excitement of going to St. John, the Schott, and (even) UD was always something to behold! The gathering of all the best teams in the state at one location. That has all gone away... This year's watered-down semifinals will be played all over the state. Our Pick Central girls and Rocky River Magnificat get to play at Mansfield high... on early Sunday afternoon... I feel sad for the players...
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Agreed. Dayton playing host was awesome! I do wish it was in Columbus to be more central.
 
What about this solution....

Use Covelli Center for ALL final four games. 3700 capacity. Centrally located. I imagine cheaper than the Schott.

D1/D2 - Thursday, Friday
D3/D4/D5 - Friday, Saturday
D6/D7 - Saturday, Sunday

Thursday
1pm
4pm
7pm

Friday
10am
1pm
4pm
7pm

Saturday
10am
1pm
4pm
7pm

Sunday
1pm
4pm
7pm
 
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Not a bad idea but I'm sure one of the reasons the OHSAA has made this decision to not have it at UD was $$$$. Using HS sites has to be much cheaper and simpler to schedule.
Hback said:
What about this solution....

Use Covelli Center for ALL final four games. 3700 capacity. Centrally located. I imagine cheaper than the Schott.

D1/D2/D3 - Thursday, Friday
D4/D5 - Friday, Saturday
D6/D7 - Saturday, Sunday

Thursday
1pm
4pm
7pm

Friday
10am
1pm
4pm
7pm

Saturday
10am
1pm
4pm
7pm

Sunday
1pm
4pm
7pm
Click to expand...
 
fbfan17 said:
I think the correct decision wouldve made sense to have a site in columbus to host all of the Semi games if they were going to go away from UD hosting. Having it all at one site that is central for everyone makes more sense than splitting it up all over the state. Taft Colisuem or ODU would've been a great choice to host all of the semi's in my opinion and would've kept some of that excitement you were talking about in playing in a nice arena and in front of big crowds. Some of these games will have very small crowds.
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If you are going to play multiple games and expect bigger crowds to come because of it I'm not sure you can play at ODU.....their website says it has a capacity of 2000
 
tcgobucks said:
If you are going to play multiple games and expect bigger crowds to come because of it I'm not sure you can play at ODU.....their website says it has a capacity of 2000
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Some of these games will be lucky to have 500 people at them because of the travel times. If you did it at a central area like columbus, the "average" basketball fan might be more likely to attend if there are multiple games. A lot of these sites will struggle to bring in the "average" fan from the bigger cities for just one game. I would venture to say that people would be more likely to come to sites where they get to watch multiple games in a day. Whenever I go to the state championships, I go for the day. It's about an hour drive for me so I wouldnt go if it was just for one game.

ODU might not be the best example, but 2000 people in a gym and being sold out is a better problem to have than only a couple hundred fans showing up for a state semi. Which is going to happen.
 
OHSAA should NOT have made changes to # of Basketball Divisions so fast
Should have waited until UD contract with Final 4 was up
With increase to 7 Divisions the Final 4s could then be in 2 locations
(1 thru 3 or 4) and (3 or 4 thru 7)

The removal of an ACTUAL Final 4 by immediately switching to 7 Divisions may be the most short sighted knee jerk reaction the OHSAA has ever done and they’ve made a few. Even in VB they made some teams play SF games away from Nutter Center. STUPID!

First thing in this case would be realizing Basketball and Football seasons/playoffs/scheduling are intrinsically and historically very very different.
OHSAA, teams at EVERY level play more than 1 basketball game a week!!!!!!!! It’s not football.

Semi Final Day in NCAA Basketball is one of the most vibrant, exciting, exhilarating, special and memorable days in kids lives and an important day on the annual Sports Calendar. The same can be said about Basketball State Semi Finals in every state.

If location is so important, and logistics are hard have the games in 2 locations in the same cities on the same weekend or use 2 different cities
Cleveland, Toledo, Columbus, Dayton/Fairborn, Cincinnati all have 2 capable arenas

EMBARASSING for OSHAA to take the opportunity for a FINAL 4 game in a big time college arena from the kids.

SO SO DUMB!!
 
SWOHHSfan said:
OHSAA should NOT have made changes to # of Basketball Divisions so fast
Should have waited until UD contract with Final 4 was up
With increase to 7 Divisions the Final 4s could then be in 2 locations
(1 thru 3 or 4) and (3 or 4 thru 7)

The removal of an ACTUAL Final 4 by immediately switching to 7 Divisions may be the most short sighted knee jerk reaction the OHSAA has ever done and they’ve made a few. Even in VB they made some teams play SF games away from Nutter Center. STUPID!

First thing in this case would be realizing Basketball and Football seasons/playoffs/scheduling are intrinsically and historically very very different.
OHSAA, teams at EVERY level play more than 1 basketball game a week!!!!!!!! It’s not football.

Semi Final Day in NCAA Basketball is one of the most vibrant, exciting, exhilarating, special and memorable days in kids lives and an important day on the annual Sports Calendar. The same can be said about Basketball State Semi Finals in every state.

If location is so important, and logistics are hard have the games in 2 locations in the same cities on the same weekend or use 2 different cities
Cleveland, Toledo, Columbus, Dayton/Fairborn, Cincinnati all have 2 capable arenas

EMBARASSING for OSHAA to take the opportunity for a FINAL 4 game in a big time college arena from the kids.

SO SO DUMB!!
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I'm not disagreeing with you, but I would note that at least 2 neighboring states, Pennsylvania and Indiana, play state semifinals at sites around the state with only their finals in Hershey and Indianapolis, respectively.
FWIW, I have been anti-expansion since it was first announced.
 
goshengophers said:
I'm not disagreeing with you, but I would note that at least 2 neighboring states, Pennsylvania and Indiana, play state semifinals at sites around the state with only their finals in Hershey and Indianapolis, respectively.
FWIW, I have been anti-expansion since it was first announced.
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And just because somebody else does it doesn't mean it is correct. The whole post season with 7 divisions is completely waterdown. Districts are meaningless now.
 
goshengophers said:
I'm not disagreeing with you, but I would note that at least 2 neighboring states, Pennsylvania and Indiana, play state semifinals at sites around the state with only their finals in Hershey and Indianapolis, respectively.
FWIW, I have been anti-expansion since it was first announced.
Click to expand...
MAC and Shelby county schools love the expansion.
 
Hback said:
What about this solution....

Use Covelli Center for ALL final four games. 3700 capacity. Centrally located. I imagine cheaper than the Schott.

D1/D2 - Thursday, Friday
D3/D4/D5 - Friday, Saturday
D6/D7 - Saturday, Sunday

Thursday
1pm
4pm
7pm

Friday
10am
1pm
4pm
7pm

Saturday
10am
1pm
4pm
7pm

Sunday
1pm
4pm
7pm
Click to expand...
I'm not the most mathematically inclined person, but my eyes tell me you are missing 7 games in the semi finals. There are a total of 28 schools remaining so there are 21 games required to leave 7 champions left standing.
 
If the OHSAA would have expanded to 6 divisions instead of 7 they could have played the semifinals and finals at one site, Wednesday through Sunday.
4 games Wednesday through Friday, then 3 championship games Saturday and Sunday
 
D4fan said:
I'm not the most mathematically inclined person, but my eyes tell me you are missing 7 games in the semi finals. There are a total of 28 schools remaining so there are 21 games required to leave 7 champions left standing.
Click to expand...

That is just final four games. State championship games played at another date/location/time, etc. Think football.
 
I believe there are several options like this that can be utilized.

[SIZE=4]SWOHHSfan[/SIZE] is probably right that the UD contract and UD availability is limiting viable solutions for this year.​


Wednesday
6pm D7 Semi Games 2 games

Thursday
10am D6 Semi Games 2 games
2:30pm D5 Semi Games 2 games
7pm D4 Semi Games 2 games

Friday
10am D3 Semi Games 2 games
2:30pm D2 Semi Games 2 games
7pm D1 Semi Games 2 games

Saturday
9am D7 Championship
12:30pm D6 Championship
4pm D5 Championship
7:30m D4 Championship

Sunday
12:30pm D3 Championship
4pm D2 Championship
7:30m D1 Championship
 
Madame Secretary said:
I believe there are several options like this that can be utilized.

[SIZE=4]SWOHHSfan[/SIZE] is probably right that the UD contract and UD availability is limiting viable solutions for this year.​


Wednesday
6pm D7 Semi Games 2 games

Thursday
10am D6 Semi Games 2 games
2:30pm D5 Semi Games 2 games
7pm D4 Semi Games 2 games

Friday
10am D3 Semi Games 2 games
2:30pm D2 Semi Games 2 games
7pm D1 Semi Games 2 games

Saturday
9am D7 Championship
12:30pm D6 Championship
4pm D5 Championship
7:30m D4 Championship

Sunday
12:30pm D3 Championship
4pm D2 Championship
7:30m D1 Championship
Click to expand...

Thursday/Friday you got games tipping off after 9pm in that scenario. I am just not sure 28 games in a 5 day window is doable. I guess you could try it - but that is a lot and I am sure won't be cheap.
 
Madame Secretary said:
So 21 games is able to be done in 5 days.
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In no way am I advocating for this but the thought exercise is fun.
Should the Browns get their domed stadium, set it up like Lucas Oil did for the 2021 B1G Tourney and first couple rounds of same year's NCAA tourney.

2 courts setup running between the sidelines with stands in between (maybe even drop a curtain between) run each divisions semi finals concurrently. Something like:

Wednesday:
2pm
4pm
6pm

Thursday:
12pm
2pm
4pm
6pm

Friday and Saturday would follow the same schedule but alternate courts so only 1 is in use at a time for the championship games.

No this is not realistic and would only happen if the Haslams decide to waive all rent and pay for the courts and all labor.
 
Winnie Pooh said:
If the OHSAA would have expanded to 6 divisions instead of 7 they could have played the semifinals and finals at one site, Wednesday through Sunday.
4 games Wednesday through Friday, then 3 championship games Saturday and Sunday
Click to expand...
I was literally just talking about this idea today. It seems like such common sense.

I feel bad for the kids who are getting cheated out of what should be an incredible experience
 
BelowTheLine said:
I was literally just talking about this idea today. It seems like such common sense.

I feel bad for the kids who are getting cheated out of what should be an incredible experience
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I think it will still be an incredible experience. I just think it could have been a lot better than what it will be. Not being argumentative.
 
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