2024 Secondary Tournament options?

[kiyoat]

I'm sure many of you are thinking this 2024 Yotes WBB team is done playing, ... but based on their record and ranking, they will likely have an opportunity to play in some form of secondary post-season tournament.

Lots of unknowns this year:
- Should they accept an invitation, if one is offered? 
- How many Power-conference teams will get behind the new NCAA WBI tournament and participate in it's inaugural year?
- What will the WNIT look like this season as a 3rd option?  Will any P-5 schools even participate in that?
- Will the WBI even exist this year? Do we Care?

Last year we were not offered to participate AFAIK, but our NET ranking was much lower than right now.

Personally, I say we should take any opportunity that exists.  These players deserve to keep playing if they can, especially the seniors.  We have always done that in the past.  The fan enthusiasm for attending might be lower this year, but who knows.

[fightsd]

Mar 12, 2024 9:13:55 GMT -6 kiyoat said:

I'm sure many of you are thinking this 2024 Yotes WBB team is done playing, ... but based on their record and ranking, they will likely have an opportunity to play in some form of secondary post-season tournament.

Lots of unknowns this year:
- Should they accept an invitation, if one is offered? 
- How many Power-conference teams will get behind the new NCAA WBI tournament and participate in it's inaugural year?
- What will the WNIT look like this season as a 3rd option?  Will any P-5 schools even participate in that?
- Will the WBI even exist this year? Do we Care?

Last year we were not offered to participate AFAIK, but our NET ranking was much lower than right now.

Personally, I say we should take any opportunity that exists.  These players deserve to keep playing if they can, especially the seniors.  We have always done that in the past.  The fan enthusiasm for attending might be lower this year, but who knows.

We're not in a position to turn down any post season invitations. As a fan, I'm not really interested but the players deserve to keep competing if they're invited.

[kiyoat]

Just a refresher on the acronyms:

WBIT = Women's Basketball Invitation Tournament
- new in 2024, funded by the NCAA, just like the NIT on the men's side.
- auto-bids (regular season champs) and at-large teams.  Selection committee.
- all 32 teams seeded, placed in 4 regions based on geography
- early rounds hosted by higher seed (as long as they are willing/able to host)
- final 4 and championship at neutral site (Indianapolis this year)

WNIT = Women's National Invitational Tournament
- since 1998, not affiliated with NCAA
- auto-bids (highest reg season finisher not in other tournaments) and at-large.
-1998 (16 team)
-1999 (32 team)
-2006 (40 team)
-2007 (48 team)
-2021 (64 team)
-2024 (48 team)
selection process is often negotiated well in advance based on willingness to participate/ host/ bid.
- generalized seeding based on a "3-tier" model (T1 vs T3 and T2 vs T2 in first round)
- hosting based on bids
- all games hosted by participants

WBI = Women's Basketball Invitational
- since 2010, not affiliated with NCAA
- 2010-2020 was 16 teams, 8 seeds, single elimination
- 2020-present is 8 teams guaranteed 3 games, all at a single neutral site (Lexinigton, KY)

[kiyoat]

The WBIT selection show will be Sunday at 8PM.

If I had to guess, I'd say that the P5 will get behind it in this inaugural year, so the caliber of teams should be good.  Honestly, I hope that that is the case, and that quality teams continue to play in it moving forward.  I doubt we are selected this year, but I could see USD in it frequently in the future.

WNIT selections will also be made sometime Sunday evening.  I'm guessing both tournaments are making a lot of calls right now to have contingency plans on a bunch of teams if they have to decide only a few hours after the NCAA.  My guess is that we end up in a watered-down WNIT.

[kiyoat]

So I took the current NET list (USD is 18-12 and #140 NET) and removed all the projected NCAA teams (Charlie Creme's bracket).

If you make a few assumptions:

1. The NET is a major factor in selecting teams (not always true)
2. All teams slated to win Auto-bids to the NCAA get them (not always the case)
3. All teams will accept bids to the WBIT (maybe not the case)
4. All teams will accept WNIT bids (not usually the case)
5. teams with losing records will not be invited to the WBIT or WNIT (probably true)

Then... USD would be the 36th team of  48 invited to the WNIT.  Not great, but I think an WNIT bid is almost a certainty.

If P-5 teams are not interested in the WNIT (likely), then we would be the 32nd team selected, or higher if some other teams opt out of either the WBIT or WNIT.

Also: if SDSU loses today, they are guaranteed into the WBIT.  NDSU is not guaranteed a spot there, and might fall to the WNIT with ORU and USD (unless I am mistaken).

[90yote]

Karius was quoted yesterday that they were hoping to play in a tournament.

[kiyoat]

Stupidly, I did not save the spreadsheet I was using to calculate if USD would qualify for the WNIT.... I'll have to make one again. It will be interesting this year to see what teams turn down the opportunity for either the WBIT or WNIT tournaments.

I'll guess that this is the last year for the WBI tournament as a 4rth-tier option.  There just won't be enough quality teams left after the 68-team NCAA, 32-team WBIT, and the 48-team WNIT make picks.

[yote18]

This program needs some post season play. I don’t think we should lower ourselves the WBI necessarily though especially now with the WBIT. No offense to the schools in it but we usually played some decent mid majors and experienced some power 5’s in the WNIT in the past and I think that’s much more valuable then just playing some extra games. If we can make a small run in one of them that should help create some momentum for next season and also could open up some potentially better scheduling arrangements for the non-con. I personally would rather see us get valuable experience against some “better” teams to grow then play some cupcakes and not.

[marco]

It would be good to get in on some more games to get ready for next year. If we do I hope we can play Mason and Broughton to see what they can bring next year

[GoYotes]

With 5 conference championship games left to play, there are only 6 regular season conference champions that won't advance to the NCAA tournament and will therefore receive an auto-bid to the WBIT. My best guess is that there will be at most 3 add'l auto-bids to the WBIT. That leaves at least 23 at-large bids to the WBIT.

The WNIT gives an auto-bid to the team finishing the highest in the regular season standings of each conference. There are 32 conferences and I am guessing that after the NCAA & WBIT selections, there will be at least 6 conferences and likely more that will not accept an auto-bid to the WNIT. That should leave at least 22 at-large spots for the WNIT.

[GoYotes]

I am using strictly NET for my analysis just to keep things simple. The NET for the top 4 Summit League teams are: SDSU - 55, NDSU - 110, ORU - 135 & USD - 139.

With all the conference championship games completed, there will be 6 teams advancing to the NCAA tournament with a NET higher than USD's NET of 139 and 2 auto-bids to the WBIT with a NET higher than 139.

The NCAA will take 62 teams with a better NET than USD & the WBIT will take 30 teams with a NET better than USD. That should leave 46 teams with a NET better than USD available for the WNIT field. 8 teams with a NET worse than USD have already accepted WNIT bids, leaving 40 available slots.

NDSU might sneak into the WBIT, but likely ends up in the WNIT. USD & ORU are both on the WNIT bubble. If it were just USD, they might sneak in based on past reputation, but the WNIT committee likely won't take USD without also taking ORU, since ORU beat USD comfortably twice during the regular season.

[jackjd]

Which post-season tourney will bring in the most money for USD? Is there a risk that some of the tourneys could cost money or be no better than a break even?

[GoYotes]

WNIT it is. NDSU & ORU also in WNIT. Bracket will be released on Monday.

WNIT announcement

[yote18]

Who wants to take bets that we draw Minnesota in the opening round?

[kiyoat]

Mar 17, 2024 18:54:39 GMT -6 jackjd said:

Which post-season tourney will bring in the most money for USD? Is there a risk that some of the tourneys could cost money or be no better than a break even?

Not even the big dance offers a payout on the women’s side.

I think they cover most if not all of the travel expenses, though.

The WNIT has always cost teams money to participate.

I’m not sure if the WBIT is more like one or the other.

Regardless, we weren’t going to get to choose between them anyway.

If you mean bids vs attendance, I think the first couple of rounds are typically poorly attended, so you would have to make a run to get attendance numbers that would even come close to eclipsing costs. This is all just my opinion, no idea what the actual numbers look like.