Philly welcomes NCAA Championship

PWB exceeds goals, readies for Final Four PWB exceeds goals, readies for Final FourThe organizing group overcame a fundraising shortage and plans to put on activities without a hitch. Women's Final Four Championship Week kicked off yesterday with an announcement that Philadelphia Women's Basketball 2000, the event's organizing committee, has exceeded its fundraising goal of $1.4 million and will be able to pay for all of the planned activities. Over the past weeks and months, there had been much talk that there would be a fundraising shortfall, but the host city and state governments came through with grants to cover the shortage. PWB officials would not release exact fundraising totals or how much money the state and local governments had provided. Philadelphia Sports Congress Executive Director Larry Needles, however, estimated that Philadelphia and Pennsylvania together donated about $150,000. The rest of the funds came from local corporate sponsors such as First Union Bank, American Water Works and Independence Blue Cross. Much of yesterday's press conference was spent publicly thanking the corporate sponsors, host schools and labor organizations for their donations. "We are so very proud of what our corporations have done, to join forces to make [the Final Four] possible," PWB co-chair Fred DiBona said. "I think the Final Four is one of the most important events to come to the city of Philadelphia in years." Speaking on why her company became a charter sponsor of the 2000 Final Four, American Water Works CEO Marilyn Weir contended that her company got involved for more than the customary tax write-off and image-enhancing publicity. "This all happened because I'm a frustrated 56-year-old basketball player," Weir said. "This has nothing to do with corporate citizenship. It's that [I] wish I could do that baseline shot from the corner the way I used to." On a more serious note, Weir said she noticed the growing fan base of women's basketball in the 23 states in which her company operates. While Penn and St. Joseph's are the official host universities for the Final Four, they handed the organizing and fundraising responsibilities off to PWB two years ago with the idea of creating a larger event than in past years. The creation of the PWB was a departure for the Women's Final Four, which in the past was organized out of the offices of the host university. Last year, for example, host-university Stanford had just a fundraising director, one staff member and three interns working full-time on Final Four activities, all of whom were Stanford employees. In contrast, this year's committee had two fundraising chairs, an organizing director, media directors, interns and help from the city visitors office. The shift in organizing strategies has caused an explosion in the size and scope of Final Four activities. To keep pace with the increase in programming, PWB announced it has recruited over 700 people to volunteer at least 12 hours of time. Last year's volunteer corp numbered just 600 according to Beth Goode, who was director of media relations for last year's event. Even with the increased staff, those associated with PWB gave much of the credit for the growth of the event to PWB Executive Director Cathy Andruzzi, who has headed PWB since its inception. "She's the one that has provided the energy; she's the one that has provided the insight; she's the one that had to deal with the problems every single day," DiBona said. Andruzzi's future with PWB, and PWB's future itself, will be one of the most pressing issues to consider following the Final Four. Andruzzi said there hasn't been time to think that far ahead this week, but she hopes to leave PWB as an organization that can grow the sport of women's basketball and continue to stage major basketball events. To help her assess PWB's potential future, Andruzzi will meet with a group of first-year Wharton MBAs who have spent the past 10 weeks studying PWB and assessing its viability as a permanent city organization. "Part of the creation of PWB was to create a long-term legacy financially and otherwise," said Mary DiStanislao, Penn's senior associate athletic director. "Our whole idea is to continue this and build playgrounds, to possibly fund scholarships, to get involved in youth programs."

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