OT: NCAA lacrosse finals
NCAA semi-finals are tomorrow on ESPN2 at 4:00 and 6:30 and final is Monday on ESPN at 3:30.
Notre Dame vs. Cornell and Virginia vs. Duke.
All games at M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore. Should be great crowds. At least 50,000 per game. With all the talk on mgoblog this year about hopefully making lacrosse D1 at Michigan, this is a good chance to tune in to see what the top of the sport looks like and to get a taste of a pretty incredible event that any school should want to be a part of.
Incredible actually that they have presold over 40,000 tickets with no Maryland team playing and no Syracuse (they always bring thousands of fans). Can't wait.
...the crowds could really get big for the 2014 Final Four:
The Greater Washington Sports Alliance is hoping to bring the 2013 and 2014 NCAA men's lacrosse Final Fours to 91,000- seat FedEx Field, with the U.S. Naval Academy as the host. The NCAA will announce the winning bid in late June, after the completion of the 2010 championship. Washington is among five cities vying for the bid; the NCAA would not release the other cities. The event is held on Memorial Day weekend each year.
"I think we've got a very, very good chance. I don't think we're a dark horse at all," said Robert Sweeney, president of the Greater Washington Sports Alliance. "It's never been here before, but because we have the Naval Academy as our host institution and FedEx Field as one of the best facilities to host this event because of how many people we can put in there. It's probably not going to be sold out. They've never had more than 60,000 fans in a game. But we think with the Redskins database and our own marketplace knowledge and the fact that we're in the center of the hotbed of lacrosse, we can be the best place to host this event."
The event has been held at the University of Maryland's Byrd Stadium 10 times, but since 2003 it has rotated among three NFL stadiums: Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia, Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Mass., and M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore, site of this year's Final Four. Sweeney said the growth of lacrosse in Northern Virginia and proximity to the Baltimore region, a lacrosse hotbed, would give Washington's bid an edge. He also said the bid will help in efforts to promote lacrosse in Washington's inner city.
Well, I don't really have any lacrosse loyalties, but Go Cornell for sure.
Incredible actually that they have presold over 40,000 tickets with no Maryland team playing and no Syracuse (they always bring thousands of fans).
It's not that incredible. Baltimore is lacrosse ground zero and a huge, huge chunk of UVA's fanbase is only 60-90 minutes away.
Glad to see DC is going with the Redskins' stadium for their bid. Looks like Byrd's days of hosting the NCAA finals are at an end. Anyone who saw the ACC tournament (admittedly not many since the damn thing was only streamed, not on TV) would have seen why that's a good thing.
I hope they play it at new Giants stadium in the future. Hot bed of Long Island, with New Jersey and Maryland just south. Ship it.
I caught the Syracuse-Princeton game this year at the Big City Classic that was held at the new Giants Stadium. It would be a great facility to host more lacrosse games. I hate that area but it nevertheless would be a great spot for the Final 4.
I'm still not completely sold on having the Super Bowl there, but Final 4 yes.
If i didnt go to Michigan I would have gone to Cornell, so go Cornell, I guess.
Part of the final four experience is being able to hang around the city and enjoy yourself. Fedex isn't near anything whereas M&T Bank is walkable to the inner harbor in Baltimore, hotels, and tons of bars that have been built up around Camdem Yards and M&T Bank. Maybe they could draw more to Fedex, but it would not be as good of an experience for fans. Plus, I loathe giving Dan Snyder anymore money.