Home Cooking

Let me start by saying that I am not a fan of Duke. Not in any sport (although sometimes you can't help but root for the little engine that could which is the Duke football program). So you should not infer by anything that I am about to write that I feel sorry for Duke.

Last night Michigan State beat Duke in the women's basketball tournament. Duke was the number one seed in the region and Michigan State was the number nine. This is not uncommon (not as common as in the men's tourney but it happens). What makes this victory noteworthy was that Michigan State won this game on their home floor. Not at some neutral site that happened to be close to their school (like Villanova playing in Philadelphia in the men's tourney or UNH playing in Manchester for the hockey tourney). It was their actual home floor on their actual campus. Something is very wrong here.

A few years ago, the women's tournament switched from having the top four seeds in each region getting home court and hosting the games at their school to locations being picked out before the tournament started and the teams getting to play in those locations. I have no problem with the rationale here. You just can't then allow the team who's court you are using to be placed in that region. I know that the women's game needs a little help in the attendance department and certainly attendance was high at the MSU/Duke game last night as men's coach Tom Izzo and members of his team were even at the game but there needs to be a balance here. There have been times when a seed as low as 12 is getting home court advantage in the national tournament.

Granted, in a lot of cases, the home court makes no difference. Anyone playing UConn women are probably doomed for failure this year now matter where they play - Storrs, Hartford, Seattle, an outdoor court in Boise - it won't make a difference. But in a game like last night, there was a definite difference. If the home team can keep it close the crowd can play a factor in the second half. That East Lansing crowd was loud and involved in that game. You can't say that it didn't give the Michigan State players a little boost and didn't rattle the Duke players down the stretch. Duke was clearly rattled. They played hard all year in a tough league and earned a number one seed and its just too bad to have to play a "true" road game in the national tournament. I don't have the answer on how to make the change but clearly one needs to be made here.