Ivy League Tournaments have finally arrived.
After 55 years of determining championships through regular season round robins, tiebreakers and one-game playoffs, the Ivy League announced that men's and women's lacrosse will be the first sport to hold a conference tournament to determine its automatic NCAA qualifier.
"There's nothing that I can see negative," men's lacrosse coach Brian Voelker said. "Just a great experience for the kids and a great thing for the Ivy League to showcase our talent and try and get more teams in the playoffs."
The top four teams in the regular season will advance to the conference tournament, which is played over the course of one weekend and hosted by the team with the best conference record, which will still be crowned Ivy League Champion.
The tournament will begin in 2010, with the men's tournament on the final weekend of the season (May 7-9) and the women's tournament the weekend before that (April 30-May 2).
Ivy League Executive Director Jeff Orleans issued the press release and cited the Ivy League's national success in men's and women's lacrosse as primary reasons for the tournament. Princeton and Cornell have won six and three men's NCAA Tournaments, respectively, while Princeton holds three women's NCAA Tournament championships and Harvard holds one. The Penn women's team came second in the nation last year.
"Our sport is a little bit unique [for the Ivy League] because there's teams competing for the national championship," Voelker said. "There's been multiple teams getting into the tournament in years past and we want to do whatever we can to make sure we continue to do that."
The weekend will provide an opportunity for the NCAA Selection Committee to get a closer look at the Ivy League's best. It should also bolster the strength of schedule for mid-tier Ivy lacrosse schools - like Penn - and allow them to catch fire and garner an automatic bid, potentially knocking off a bubble team from a rival conference.
And at the very least, Voelker notes, the players are sure to have a memorable experience competing in such an environment.
"When you bang heads with these guys year in and year out once a year, getting the four teams together at the end of the season with a playoff berth on the line is going to be a great weekend and something the kids never forget."
