I love it when a plan comes together…

For the past few weeks, I have been slowly getting opinions on the toughest place to play in the conference. The plan was not to check with fans–we all have our favorite places. No, I surveyed coaches–head honchos and assistants–on the condition that there would be no names. We’d do it Sports Illustrated style.

Last night, I decided to sit down and re-review my work on the CAA preview for Blue Ribbon. (Side note: C+ work, at best. Egad, some of that writing is miserable.) I also used that re-review to check schedules against one another in hopes of combining games to plot road trips. And this morning, I got an email from EP himself, in part containing a query: are you geeked for the season?

Uh, yes. Very much so.

Anyway, that combination led me to choose to release what I have on the whole “toughest venues” subject. Seems like it is the day for this.

Of course, I got more than one version of: ”all of them. There isn’t an easy place to play in the entire league.” You know how coaches are.

I also got the expected responses, so we’ll skip the coachspeak and give you the three items that stood out:

1. Drexel’s DAC was mentioned most, for reasons running the gamut from sharing a staircase to how close everything is in relation to the floor.

2. UNCWs Trask was not mentioned; Mason’s Pat Dome only once.

3. The surprise answer: “James Madison was surprisingly tough.  Not crowded but tough. That little student section behind the basket was clever and they seemed to do their research.”

~ by mglitos on October 23, 2007.