Postseason schedule limits media coverage

Arizona's Tarquin MacManus at the 2009 NCAA Southeast Regional.

This year’s postseason schedule has left the Golfweek college gang scrambling for a plan. You see, the NCAA Women’s Championship and the NCAA Men’s regionals fall on the same date.

Postseason dates

May 6-8: NCAA women's regionals

May 18-21: NCAA Women's Championship

May 20-22: NCAA men's regionals

June 1-6: NCAA Championship

What I don’t get about this is that the coaches on both sides are begging for more attention for their sport. And since the people wearing Golfweek shirts always outnumber any other media outlet in attendance come postseason time – we can’t be in two places at once. This obviously will limit what we can do.

I sought the reason for the pile-up on the same date.

It turns out that the date formula for the men’s finals revolves around Memorial Day, with the finals always falling on the Tuesday through Sunday following Memorial Day. Men’s regionals start the Thursday the second week prior to the championship week.

As for the women, the date formula for their championship is the third full week in May.

In most years the timing is perfect: women’s regionals one week, men’s regionals the next, followed by the women’s championship and then the men’s championship.

It still leaves me scratching my head, though. The men changed the entire way they decide their champion in order to possibly attract more attention, and in what is often considered the most exciting three days of the year – NCAA regional competition – they now have to share the stage with the women’s championship.